President Donald Trump signed an executive order Tuesday meant to bring AI tools to bear on the challenge of pediatric cancer treatment.
The order, titled "Unlocking Cures for Pediatric Cancer with Artificial Intelligence," doubles the budget of the Childhood Cancer Data Initiative to $100 million and sets up new partnerships with private AI companies to improve prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cancer in children.
"We're going to defeat childhood cancer once and for all," President Trump said as he signed the order.
It was not immediately clear what private companies or specific technologies may be involved in the effort.
As part of the initiative, the Department of Health and Human Services will use AI to analyze medical records and claims to design clinical trials. The agency says "Parents will remain in control of their child’s health information as the data is used to benefit patients and researchers."
In an interview following the signing, NIH director Jay Bhattacharya told Scripps News more about the program and how it will balance cutting edge tech with patient privacy.
"Protection of patient privacy is central to what we do. Patients trust us because they know that the data they share with researchers will not be violated. We're going to continue to do that and we'll build on that," Bhattacharya said.
"This isn't just ChatGPT," Bhattacharya said. "This is scientific work to see how we can use the best technology to analyze the data in a way that improves health outcomes for people."
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The order comes as the Trump administration has curtailed funding and resources for cancer research.
The administration announced in August it would end federal funding for research involving brain cancers, which are the leading cause of cancer deaths in pediatric patients.
And more broadly this year the administration has canceled or delayed hundreds of millions of dollars in cancer research funds, cut government jobs in cancer research fields and proposed budget reductions of billions of dollars for the NIH's National Cancer Institute.
