Exploring the benefits and challenges of public-private digital partnerships in public health and beyond
Governments around the world are focusing on how to use technology to deliver better public services, and this episode of Global Government Forum’s Government Transformed 2.0 podcast series explores the progress and challenges of government transformation through digital technologies, particularly in public health.
In the conversation, GGF’s executive editor Richard Johnstone, Australian economist Nicholas Gruen, and Sherry Glied, professor of public service at New York University, discuss the potential of public-private digital partnerships and how to make better use of data, including genetic information, to deliver better services.
Also discussed is the importance of public trust in government to share data and build partnerships and better services – and the lessons from the COVID-19 pandemic in how to do things differently.
Gruen describes going to San Francisco in 2012 to see 23andMe’s co-founder Anne Wojcicki give a presentation, and his thought that the company’s genetic testing could be used by government for preventative and personalised public health care.
“There was this perfect opportunity. What should happen with 23andMe is that the government should pay for the genomic analysis, it should get a copy of the genome, which, of course, it should keep private,” he said.
Glied dives deeper into privacy concerns. In the US, for example, the idea of the government owning information on individuals is problematic, plus, as she highlights in the podcast, genome analysis “hasn’t actually generated as much medical advance as people had thought”.
Estonia an exemplar of ‘personal government’
The conversation also touches on the countries that are leading in the practice of digital government, and how pioneering governments are not just enabling citizens to access digital public services more easily, but proactively making them aware of relevant services when they reach life milestones.
However, as Glied noted, for this approach to work, citizens must have confidence in their government’s use of personal data.
“There’s lots of good work on trying to make government services much easier to access, but there is something about the compulsory aspect of government… that can’t be completely denied. Facebook is not going to throw you in jail, or deport you, and the government can do that,” she said.
Listen to this episode to find out more about:
- The potential for public-private digital partnerships
- The challenges in leveraging digital technology in healthcare
- The lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic
The series is published on GGF’s Government Transformed podcast feed. Subscribe to Government Transformed on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or Acast, or wherever you get your podcasts.
About Jack Aldane
Jack is a British journalist, cartoonist and podcaster. He graduated from Heythrop College London in 2009 with a BA in philosophy, before living and working in China for three years as a freelance reporter. After training in financial journalism at City University from 2013 to 2014, Jack worked at Bloomberg and Thomson Reuters before moving into editing magazines on global trade and development finance. Shortly after editing opinion writing for UnHerd, he joined the independent think tank ResPublica, where he led a media campaign to change the health and safety requirements around asbestos in UK public buildings. As host and producer of The Booking Club podcast – a conversation series featuring prominent authors and commentators at their favourite restaurants – Jack continues to engage today’s most distinguished thinkers on the biggest problems pertaining to ideology and power in the 21st century. He joined Global Government Forum as its Senior Staff Writer and Community Co-ordinator in 2021.
