Human rights in the age of

HELPFUL AI
Improving access to healthcare and predicting disease outbreaks: 
Already there have been significant 
advancements through the use of AI in disease diagnosis and prevention. AI is also being used to improve 
access to healthcare in regions where there is a lack of access.
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Victims of disease outbreaks also benefit 
from the use of AI to enable health officials to intervene early to contain an outbreak before it starts.
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Making life easier for the visually impaired: 
Tools for image recognition are helping people who are 
visually impaired better navigate both the internet and the real world.
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Optimizing agriculture and helping farmers adapt to change: 
AI is combining information from global 
32 IBM’s Watson is being used in hospitals around the world to help doctors diagnose and treat disease. See https://www.ibm.com/watson/health/ for 
more information. Another example is Aajoh, a Nigerian start-up developing an AI system for remote medical diagnosis. Users share their symptoms via 
text, audio, and photographs, and Aajoh uses AI to provide possible diagnoses. See Stephen Timm, “6 Artificial Intelligence Startups in Africa to Look out 
For,” Venture Burn, April 24, 2017, http://ventureburn.com/2017/04/five-artificial-intelligence-startups-africa-look-2017/?platform=hootsuite.
33 https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/06/health/rainier-mallol-tomorrows-hero/index.html
34 For some examples see Facebook’s efforst to help the blind “see” Facebook: “Using Artificial Intelligence to Help Blind People ‘See’ Facebook,” 
Facebook Newsroom, April 4, 2016, https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2016/04/using-artificial-intelligence-to-help-blind-people-see-facebook/. See also 
Microsoft’s work: “Seeing AI: An app for visually impaired people that narrates the world around you,” Microsoft, https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/
garage/wall-of-fame/seeing-ai/.

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