China, and not the US, just built the world's first Artificial Intelligence hospital. Why, and why?

Medical researchers at Tsinghua University in Beijing have created an AI (Artificial Intelligence) hospital town. It can theoretically serve 3,000 patients per day with a small handful of doctors and staff.

In one example of their optimism in AI, doctors for the project claim that their accuracy in respiratory illness is over 93% on MedQA datasets. Respiratory diseases such as COPD and asthma have notoriously low accuracy in diagnosis and treatment, with high degrees of false positive and false negative diagnoses.

By employing Large Language Models across large virtual populations, and soon in real-world patient populations, China can transform medicine across the whole world. China is already the world's dominant manufacturer of most generic drugs, and is the key maker of Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients for the most expensive specialty drugs. Chinese companies are also primary makers of diagnostic equipment and medical devices. With advances in AI, tested across large human populations, personalized medicine may be a reality across most of the world. The US, however, will most certainly employ regulatory and licensing pressure to ensure high prices throughout our healthcare delivery systems.

Resources and links:

Interesting Engineering, China: Robot doctors at world’s 1st AI hospital can treat 3,000 a day
https://interestingengineering.com/health/china-worlds-1st-ai-hospital

China's first AI hospital town debuts: Revolutionizing healthcare with Artificial Intelligence
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202405/1313235.shtml

China Focus: China's medical equipment market reaches 1.27 trillion yuan
https://english.news.cn/20240329/46cd1e0a62184d719dfe15c28aa30352/c.html

Politico, U.S. policymakers worry about China ‘weaponizing’ drug exports
https://www.politico.com/news/2019/12/20/policymakers-worry-china-drug-exports-088126

Diagnostic accuracy of respiratory diseases in primary health units
https://www.scielo.br/j/ramb/a/CBLNqDNygL85rnyXnWntC4t/

Travel Industry News, Hainan debuts as hub for medical tourism
https://news.itb.com/regional-spotlight/asia/hainan-medical-tourism/

Accuracy of diagnosis of COPD and factors associated with misdiagnosis in primary care setting. E-DIAL (Early Diagnosis of obstructive lung disease) study group
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0954611118302634

Comparable US salaries by field:
https://weatherbyhealthcare.com/blog/medical-oncologist-salary
https://www.auntminnie.com/practice-management/article/15631065/radiology-salaries-edge-higher-in-latest-salaryscan-numbers