Ministry of Health (MOH) and EVYD Technology recently unveiled the MOH Intelligence Hub at EVYD Campus located in Jerudong as part of the ministry’s efforts to strengthen the resilience of Brunei’s healthcare ecosystem.
The co-located Hub will house the nation’s Epidemic Intelligence and Response Unit (Disease Control Division), functioning as a surveillance centre to monitor the nationwide spread of diseases; the Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience Unit; and the Digital Health Unit.
In the future, more government health units could be housed in the Hub, including the Behavioural Insights Programme, the National Clinical Research Unit and the Non-Communicable Disease Unit.
The centre is a physical symbol of the ministry’s strategic vision and forward planning.
It evinces MOH’s courage to embrace and adopt new technologies, as part of its commitment to demonstrating Brunei’s leadership in digital health transformation, said the ministry in a statement.
“This is but the latest initiative to improve Bruneians’ health with the ministry continuously being proactive in leveraging technology to further propel the world-leading digital optimisation of Brunei’s healthcare ecosystem”, it added.
The Epidemic Intelligence and Response Unit Surveillance Centre leverage a recently developed automated communicable disease surveillance system linked with clinical and laboratory data from Bru-HIMS to track and monitor the emergence and spread of over 50 infectious diseases in real-time.
Minister of Health Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Dr Haji Mohammad Isham bin Haji Jaafar said that the decision to co-locate the MOH Intelligence Hub in EVYD Campus demonstrates the strategic relationship among healthcare technology, data analytics, research and policy planning.
It will function as a sandbox for collaboration, knowledge generation and practice transformation.
“The Hub will provide a co-working space for different teams dealing with data and intelligence. Facilitating these enhanced interactions all in one location will provide Brunei with more value-added insights to craft data-driven decisions around population health with greater confidence,” he said.
On his part, Chief Executive Officer of EVYD Technology Chua Ming Jie said that they are proud to have partnered with MOH from the start of the pandemic in 2020 – beginning with co-developing BruHealth as a pandemic management tool, and now evolving it to become a national health app.
“Brunei also leverages our EVYDENCE data operating platform to integrate information from various data sources and process it into a common data model, enabling better health outcomes. The data from EVYDENCE is also used to power a whole range of digital health solutions for Bruneians,” he added.
The co-location of the hub in the EYVD Campus symbolises the symbiotic
relationship between MoH and EVYD Technology, providing actionable data for meaningful impact in terms of policy-making and clinical outcomes.
The centre also allows MoH to leverage the data to empower the digital transformation of Brunei’s healthcare system.
“The opening of this Hub is the latest milestone in our relationship, and we look forward to growing our partnership with the ministry further in our shared mission to improve Bruneians’ health,” said the ceo.
Cross-border collaboration to strengthen health systems
At the opening, the ministry and EVYD Technology also signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the National University of Singapore Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health as a crossborder collaboration to strengthen health systems.
This will include:
▪ Building the research ecosystem and infrastructure to conduct research relevant to policymaking;
▪ Organising and participating in joint academic and scientific activities; and
▪ Identifying opportunities for knowledge transfer, capability building and joint research and development (R&D) in areas of mutual interest.
In a statement, Minister at the Prime Minister’s Office and Second Minister of Finance and Economy, who is also the Chairman of the Board of Directors of EVYD Technology Yang Berhormat Dato Seri Setia Dr Haji Mohd Amin Liew Abdullahsaid: “Given the increasingly complex health challenges in a borderless world today, there is much value that we can realise by fostering greater cross-border collaborations to collectively improve our public health responses.
“Through this regional collaboration, we aim to strengthen the healthcare systems in Brunei and Singapore, and will be happy to share our key initiatives and learnings with the rest of our ASEAN member countries to improve public health across the region,” said the minister.
The MoU will be effective for two years initially and will renew automatically for successive periods of two years after each contract period unless terminated by any of the three organisations.
Signing the MoU was Acting Deputy Permanent Secretary
(Policy) at MoH Dr Anie Haryani Abdul Rahman; Chua Ming Jie; and Dean of Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, National University of Singapore Professor Teo Yik Ying.
Present to witness the ceremony were Permanent Secretary of MoH Haji Maswadi Haji Mohsin; Assistant Managing Director of Brunei Investment Agency Ahmad Jefri Abdul Rahman; and Singapore High Commissioner to Brunei Darussalam Heng Aik Yeow,.
Conference to promote cross-border public health collaboration
As part of the three organisations’ commitment to improving cross-border public health collaboration, they are also part of the organising committee behind the 2nd ASEAN Digital Public Health Conference, which will take place in Brunei and online on 22 – 23 November 2022.
The conference will bring together ASEAN Ministers of Health and Finance, policymakers, health authorities, multi-disciplinary experts, and leaders from industry participants and nongovernmental organizations to share experiences and engage in holistic discussions on the benefits, risks and challenges associated with the adoption of artificial intelligence and digital
technologies in healthcare.
The conference is hosted by the Ministry of Finance and Economy and the Ministry of Health and organized by EVYD Technology, the Brunei Investment Agency and the National University of Singapore Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, and supported by Temasek Foundation.
More information is available at www.dphasean.org.
THE BRUNEIAN | BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN
