Dear Readers,

In December 2024, California Senator Josh Becker, author of the Physicians Make Decisions Act (SB 1120), stated, “Artificial intelligence has immense potential to enhance healthcare delivery, but it should never replace the expertise and judgment of physicians.” He added, “An algorithm cannot fully understand a patient’s unique medical history or needs, and its misuse can lead to devastating consequences. SB 1120 ensures that human oversight remains at the heart of healthcare decisions.”

The rapid advancements in cutting-edge technologies—from CRISPR gene editing to artificial intelligence—promise nothing short of a revolution in healthcare and public health. These tools hold the potential to eliminate diseases, enhance personalized medicine, and improve health service delivery on a global scale. Yet, as history reminds us, progress without purpose can lead to catastrophic consequences. Hope and planning must go hand in hand.

In this issue of NPQ, we tackle a fundamental question: How do we harness the transformative potential of health innovations while ensuring they advance health equity rather than exacerbate existing disparities?

This is not a technical or theoretical debate. It is a matter of life and death. As these technologies take hold, spread, and grow, it also lies at the heart of what it means to design a more equitable future.

It is tempting to see emerging technologies through a binary lens. On one side, a utopian vision: AI systems breaking down barriers to care, CRISPR eliminating hereditary diseases, and tech-driven solutions making healthcare universally accessible. On the other, a dystopian nightmare: algorithms entrenching systemic biases, genomic data exploited for profit, and entire populations excluded from the benefits of innovation.

But such polarized thinking obscures the most urgent reality: These technologies will not inherently lead us to one extreme or the other. Their outcomes will depend on the intentionality with which they are designed, implemented, and governed.

As Yewande O. Addie eloquently writes within, “AI is a powerful tool for advancing human potential—but only if it is designed with intentional boundaries that protect and uplift the most vulnerable among us…. In this sense, establishing policies and ethical frameworks acts as a boundary of love, not only safeguarding society at large but also protecting creators from the unintended consequences of their own innovations.”

As you turn these pages, we invite you to sit with this tension. To ask difficult questions. To challenge assumptions. And most of all, to imagine what a future rooted in health equity and justice could look like. The stakes could not be higher.

In solidarity and curiosity,
Sara Hudson
Interim CEO & Editor in Chief, Nonprofit Quarterly

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