Supercomputing for personalized medicine

Yes, say the experts on the DMEA panel “Vision 2035” - with the right strategy, clever collaborations, a pragmatic approach to data and consistent education. The recently launched European Health Data Space (EDHS) is an important first step.

In January, US President Donald Trump announced the “Stargate” project - “the largest AI infrastructure project in history”, as he called it: private deep tech companies want to invest half a billion dollars to evaluate patient data, among other things.

Prof. Dr. Christopher Baum, CEO of the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH), who moderated the DMEA panel, asked the question right at the beginning: Will Europe succeed in going its own way, where health data does not belong to corporations, but to society, which uses it optimally and responsibly for the benefit of citizens? “How can we achieve this vision?” Baum asked.

In Europe, there are many regulations for making health data available, said Prof. Dr. Petra Ritter, head of the Brain Simulation Section at the Charité Berlin Institute of Health. What is missing is the infrastructure – “the pipelines where the data can be processed and stored securely and in compliance with data protection regulations”. This must be initiated not only in Germany, but also in the EU, with the clear prospect that sensitive data can be exchanged throughout Europe.

Consolidation of high-performance computing centers

In Germany, it was “a real boost” that the university computing centers have now been bundled into nine high-performance computing centers, explained Prof. Dr. Sarah M. Neuwirth, holder of the Chair of National High-Performance Computing and its Applications at the Johannes Gutenberg University in Mainz. Previously, there was a high level of fragmentation: “Each university had several small server cabinets standing around.” Now, a common strategy is needed to use the resources efficiently. If high-performance computing centers at six to ten locations could collect data and make it available in bundled form, smaller institutions would also benefit, and costs could be saved – for example, in terms of electricity consumption.

Data silos are no longer up to date

Dr. Dominik Roters would also like to see more uniformity in the way health data is handled in Germany. “What we can no longer afford is a federalist data protection regime,” said the partner at the law firm Dierks + Company. The federal states should have the opportunity to contribute their perspective on data protection, “but we can no longer afford data silos.” That is no longer appropriate.

Petra Ritter emphasized that interdisciplinary cooperation between lawyers, IT experts and doctors will be even more important in the future for a proper assessment of data. Only by working together can it be determined whether data is still personal and identifiable or not. It is also clear that the population will have to adapt to an ever-increasing complexity – and be trained accordingly.