US-China Track II Dialogue Successfully Held in Tianjin
Jun 26-2024
The 9th US-China Track II Dialogue on Healthcare was held with flying colors in Tianjin, China, from June 16-17. The Dialogue is a long-running initiative of the National School of Development (NSD) and the National Committee on United States-China Relations (NCUSCR). In this year’s event, 21 leading experts from the two countries had in-depth exchange on four major topics and actively sought solutions therein. They called on the two countries and the rest of the world to join hands to address global healthcare challenges.
The event opened with speeches by Mr. Stephen Orlins, US side convener and President of NCUSCR, and Mr. Liu Guoen, China convener, PKU NSD Changjiang Scholar Distinguished Professor, and Dean of PKU Institute for Global Health and Development.
The first part of the dialogue focused on the applications of AI and digital technology in healthcare and was hosted by Prof. Xiao Ruiping, Dean of PKU College of Future Technology and Associate Editor-in-Chief of The New England Journal of Medicine. Prof. Harlan Krumholz of the Cardiovascular Department of Yale School of Medicine and Mr. Zhang Ligang, Chairman of iKang Group, respectively presented their lead-in opinions. In the ensuing discussions, the experts from the two countries agreed on the importance of data sharing, which would lay a better digital and informational groundwork to facilitate the applications of AI and digital technology in healthcare. They highlighted the major significance of adopting Ai and advanced digital technology in medicine development, trial design, and healthcare management.
Prof. Mark McClellan, Margolis Professor of Healthcare Policy at Duke University, presided over the second section of dialogue, which centered on regulatory coordination and bilateral cooperation on biomedicine and healthcare innovation. The lead-in opinions were given by Mr. Yu Xuefeng, Co-founder, Chairman and CEO of CanSinoBIO, and Mr. Olivier Brandicourt, Life Science Senior Consultant of the Blackstone Group’s Consultancy and Governance Department. Fully acknowledging the contributions of China and the US to global healthcare, the experts explored the feasibility and directions for strengthening regulatory coordination on the basis of recognizing discrepancies between the two countries. They pointed out that despite certain challenges, the potential for collaboration is presenting itself in some specific areas.
The third section zoomed in on China-US cooperation in global healthcare development and was hosted by Mr. Stephen Orlins, with lead-in opinions from Mr. Steve Davis, Executive Director of Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and Prof. Liu Guoen. Then the experts discussed the crises and challenges of healthcare development on the global scale and clarified the extensive scope of global healthcare problems and the comparability of global cooperation. A consensus was reached on the necessity of quantifying the positioning of global healthcare development and the pressure it faces. Building partnerships in specific areas, they said, will help build momentum in overall cooperation.
The fourth part of the dialogue looked into cancer prevention and was hosted by Prof. Chen Xi, Professor of Global Health Policy and Economics at Yale University. Mr. Cheng Tao and Mr. Clifford Hudis each presented their lead-in opinions. The former is member of Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Tenured Professor at Peking Union Medical College, and Director of the Institute of Hematology of Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, and the latter is CEO of American Society of Clinical Ontology. The experts from the two side shared views on the losses and risks posed by cancer and identified its complex causes. They agreed that effective cooperation can be achieved by taking advantage of new tools such as AI and digitalization.