21/05/2026
🌍 What does resilience look like in a world shaped by overlapping crises, strained health systems, and rapid technological change?
At the World Health Summit side event “From Crisis to Resilience: Innovating for Health” during the 79th World Health Assembly, leaders from government, academia, multilateral institutions, civil society, and the private sector explored how innovation can support more equitable, adaptive, and future-ready health systems.
💡 Key discussions focused on:
• Strengthening primary health care and community-based systems
• Building trust before crises emerge
• Expanding sustainable and locally driven financing models
• Supporting regional and local leadership in global health innovation
• Ensuring artificial intelligence and digital health reduce, rather than deepen, inequities
• Advancing cross-sector collaboration for preparedness and resilience
Together, the speakers underscored that resilience is not built through technology or financing alone, but through trust, equity, and sustained investment. Their reflections captured the central message: innovation must serve people, strengthen systems, and support countries and communities in preparing for future shocks.
💬 “We often talk about resilience as something built before disaster strikes. But when you have not seen a dry day in years, you build the ship while navigating the flood.“ — Hanan Balkhy, WHO Regional Director for the Eastern Mediterranean Region
“We believe innovation should not remain confined to pilot projects but needs to be scaled.” — Hon. Aden Duale, Cabinet Secretary, Ministry of Health, Kenya
“We are in a transition period and at a crossroads in our international system.” — Axel R. Pries, President, World Health Summit
“We are seeing a divergent pattern in the use of artificial intelligence for health across low- and middle-income countries, compared to high-income countries.” — Jay Rajda, Physician Executive for Global Healthcare, Amazon Web Services (AWS)
“We are in a period of rupture and rupture can bring crisis. It means to clearly rethink what you are doing.” — Ilona Kickbusch, Co-Chair, WHS Council
Thank you to our media partner Foreign Policy for supporting this discussion.
