Health and Mass Media Minister Nalinda Jayatissa told a 79th World Health Assembly side session in Geneva on Friday that the safe use of artificial intelligence in healthcare depends on strong governance, ethical oversight, public trust and clear legal frameworks.
Addressing the session on “Artificial Intelligence in Health: Laws, Ethical Oversight, Research and Equity,” the Minister said Sri Lanka had identified the need for a dedicated regulatory architecture for AI in the health sector and was moving to establish a regulator under the Personal Data Protection Act (PDPA).
The Minister called for mechanisms covering the registration, evaluation and post-market monitoring of AI tools used for disease diagnosis, clinical decision-making and patient monitoring, and said data-governance frameworks protecting privacy, cybersecurity and accountability must underpin digital health systems. Ethical safeguards should be embedded “from the earliest stages of technological design,” he said.
Jayatissa warned that globally developed AI products could widen healthcare inequalities if adopted without proper localisation, and said such tools must be adapted to Sri Lanka’s disease patterns, healthcare workflows, language requirements and social realities. He also flagged the need for new intellectual property frameworks to govern large-scale data systems used in medical research and pharmaceutical development.
Representatives and health ministers from India, Nepal and Thailand also attended the session, the Ministry said.
WHA79 runs from May 16 to May 23 and has gathered representatives from 194 countries, including health ministers, diplomats and international observers. Friday’s intervention follows the Minister’s opening engagement at WHA79 on May 18, positioning Sri Lanka as a regulatory-standards advocate rather than a passive adopter in the global AI-in-health debate. It is the country’s first ministerial statement on AI healthcare governance at WHO level this cycle and complements domestic moves on AI governance frameworks under ISO 42001 and the National AI Policy Framework for higher education.
Source: Newswire — Minister Nalinda says strong regulation vital for AI use in healthcare at WHA79.
