Using AI to tackle Type 2 diabetes in Taiwan
Diabetes is an international healthcare crisis impacting hundreds of millions of people, causing one death every nine seconds. In 2024 alone, diabetes care was estimated to have cost global healthcare systems more than USD$1 trillion. And with rates on the rise, the Taiwanese government is collaborating with Google for Health and Google Cloud to use AI to transform the way healthcare for people with type 2 diabetes is delivered.
Taiwan's National Health Insurance Administration (NHIA)’s initiative uses Gemini and Google Cloud tools to personalize care for 1.3 million Taiwanese living with type 2 diabetes — with an ambitious goal to reach over two million individuals by 2026.
Type 2 diabetes impacts approximately one in ten Taiwanese people, though it is preventable or reversible with the right lifestyle changes. Diabetes rates have continued to climb over the years, and now represents one of the largest cost burdens on the nation's healthcare budget.
The Google partnership enables NHIA to use AI to analyze two decades of NHIA tests, health claims and insurance data to provide personalized treatment plans. Its first initiative, AI-on-DM (Artificial Intelligence for Diabetes Mellitus), is built out on Google Cloud and categorizes individuals based on the severity of their condition. That categorization is integrated into the government's Universal Family Physician Program 2.0, which will help provide customized planning and care based on the individual’s risk assessment.
The second initiative, a Gemini-based AI agent integrated into the Taiwan My Health Bank app, will use that same information and authoritative, trusted diabetes content to give personalized guidance through their health journey.
"AI has the power to transform healthcare in Taiwan by making it more personalised to individual needs," says NHIA Director General Dr. Shih Chung-liang. "We believe we are the first country to integrate AI into government-supported preventative healthcare initiatives at a national scale."
This integration of Google AI in the national healthcare system moves Taiwan towards a globally accepted and transformative healthcare funding model called value-based care, that better distributes healthcare funding to individual needs with a greater focus on improved health outcomes, moving away from the more traditional funding approach. Using AI at national scale is accelerating Taiwan's transition to a preventive healthcare model that aims to enhance the efficiency and quality of healthcare delivery, viewed as the future of healthcare.