TY - JOUR T1 - Challenges and opportunities for future health policy JF - Future Healthcare Journal JO - Future Healthc J SP - 88 LP - 89 DO - 10.7861/futurehosp.6-2-88 VL - 6 IS - 2 AU - Tony Blair AU - Chris Yiu Y1 - 2019/06/01 UR - http://www.rcpjournals.org/content/6/2/88.abstract N2 - As this special edition of the Future Healthcare Journal illustrates, the outlook for technology and health policy is one of tremendous possibility. The fourth industrial revolution is sometimes described as the era of cyber-physical systems (following on from the eras of the microprocessor, mass production and ­mechanisation). For ­clinicians, advances in technologies like sensors, artificial ­intelligence, drug discovery and regenerative medicine have the potential to deliver a step-change in the efficacy and ­affordability of health interventions. More broadly, by harnessing large, ­real-time data sets, connected devices and personalised ­programmes, we can reframe the debate around a long-term ambition to keep people well.The urgency of this agenda cannot be underestimated. Around the world, healthcare systems face severe pressures relating to long-term funding, demographic and lifestyle changes, sluggish productivity growth and outdated infrastructure. And yet most countries are a long way from seeking to revolutionise their approach to healthcare to meet the scale of the challenge ahead.Here in the United Kingdom, the secretary of state's observation that he owns the world's largest collection of fax machines (and is also, thanks to Brexit, the world's largest buyer of fridges) shows in some respects how far we have to go. The gulf between the paper-based bureaucracy and the digital lives of most citizens is now decades wide, and the frustration … ER -