Commissioner echoed the need to build up resilience. He highlighted that this is the
first global pandemic after 100 years, and that the world was not prepared for such
magnitude. He presented ongoing and upcoming actions in his portfolio in response
to the COVID-19 emergency, such as Emergency Medical Teams mobilisation,
repatriation of EU citizens, and increase of the availability of medical equipment for
Member States under rescEU.
Commissioner explained that Commission President is putting a great effort in
coordinating the Commission Services, which are all very active in the crisis
response. He also referred to the need to coordinate with Member States, as the
Commission only has a supporting competence in the domain of health and civil
protection.
Asked to explore the potential of applying cutting-edge Microsoft technologies to
improve the effectiveness of ECHO Situation Awareness team, Mr
indicated
the company
as possible candidate for the purpose. He flagged data-maps
overlapping and the use of geospatial data to monitor and track epidemic spreads
(hotspots). He also referred to the successful collaboration with WHO, for which a
global data platform was developed.
The discussion focussed on the three followed areas proposed by Microsoft.
4.1.
Protect public health: Using technology tools and data to protect public
health
4.1.1. Contact Tracing Apps
To de-escalate COVID-19 crisis, it is critical to interrupt cross-border infection
chains. Member States, supported by the Commission, adopted an EU toolbox on
contact tracing applications to ensure interoperable contact-tracing applications.
expressed himself in favour of a decentralised approach, that is, data kept
at device level instead of being centralised on the cloud. A decentralised solution
would guarantee higher user privacy, and higher security if a malicious attempt had
to be addressed to one single centralised data storage. He opined that there is no real
need of a centralised data set because, for contact tracing, authorities would access
data only if users are tested positive. He added that it is crucial to define common
privacy principles and data fields that specify which data are to be collected and
how. In his view, for the success of contact tracing at European level it is essential
that the Commission leads the process of definition of the interoperability criteria.
He indicated that many competent companies exist to develop such apps, and that
Microsoft would step in if specific technical design should be required.
4.1.2. Clinical Management Support System (CMSS)
The Commission is working to facilitate knowledge sharing between clinicians
dealing with COVID-19 across the EU through the COVID-19 CMSS. This includes
establishing EU-wide registries to facilitate research.
reported that in the US, Microsoft has helped to make accessible the great
amount of research material generated on clinical results through a common dataset
that anyone can query. In support of CNSS, he mentioned that Microsoft has created
chat bots to identify good candidates to participate in clinical trials to support WHO
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efforts. He advocated a more global approach to collect data based on a European
approach as building block.
4.1.3. Data collection on epidemiology
The Commission’s Joint Research Centre’s (JRC) epidemiological model and data
collection delivers daily trends on the virus’ spread in Member States. The model
includes mobility data from Google and Apple for each Member State.
Asked whether it would be possible from Microsoft to contribute to data collection,
said that Microsoft contribution would be less relevant than Google’s and
Apple’s, which possess the best data on mobility. However, in analogy with what
has been done with geospatial analytics, Microsoft tools can use data sourced by
Google and Apple for data analysis and visualisation to help public to understand
trends.
4.1.4. Artificial Intelligence (AI)
In Spain, Microsoft has worked with healthcare providers to apply machine learning
to predict which patients are most likely to develop more severe symptoms, using
AI algorithms’ output to define healthcare strategies on a case-by-case basis.
Machine learning will also be impactful on research to develop treatments of
vaccines.
AI can be used to relieve the work of human being. In this crisis, the general
concern about “AI eliminating people’s jobs” is reverted because there is no
sufficient work force available to execute the required amount of tasks.
mentioned a couple of examples of AI-based chat bots that are substituting human
interviewers to identify whether somebody should be tested for COVID-19, or to
identify whom should participate in clinical trials for the development of vaccines or
therapeutics. The number of scenarios for similar applications is and will be
growing. Together with technological challenges, an increased use of AI during
COVID-19 crisis carries privacy, data protection and ethical AI concerns. The
Commission is well placed to develop the framework to defend those principles.
4.2.
Promote an inclusive economic recovery: sustaining economic and
societal activity in the short-term and promoting an inclusive recovery
for the long term
Commission support to hard-hit SMEs consists of EUR 1 billion from the EU
budget to incentivise banks to provide working capital loans to companies, and in
the mid/long-term InvestEU programme will play a central role in ensuring
economic recovery.
acknowledged that SMEs are the backbone of the economy and it is
important to find the right solutions to protect them. Microsoft has granted an initial
six months of free access to its offer of productivity solutions to support them.
Today, online collaboration has become central to productivity. While in the first
weeks of the crisis it has been necessary to expand capacity for online work, at
present products’ features are being innovated on a weekly basis to take into
account the evolved needs of companies’ mutated way of working.
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x Other follow-up by Commission services as appropriate.
Signed
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