Professor John Robertson OBA

Thanks to Dorothy for this.

From the FT yesterday:

The UK should “leverage” its new health data storage service for the “benefit of the Treasury coffers”, a health minister has said, as well as accelerating the discovery of new treatments for NHS patients.  Zubir Ahmed said in an interview that the government’s new Health Data Research Service (HDRS) will give researchers a single access point to national datasets for the first time and unlock “the power” of NHS data. “There is no shame in saying, we have world leading examples of high quality care and high quality research, and we should be leveraging that for the benefit of the Treasury coffers, and patients and citizens in this country,” the health innovation minister told the Financial Times. 

https://www.ft.com/content/0531e76b-a800-450f-8a10-ac5ada1b2695

The minister is surprisingly ill-informed.

In the Guardian, 30 August 2025:

Public sector workers have voiced “deep concern” after Coventry city council signed a £500,000-a-year artificial intelligence contract with the US data technology company Palantir.

The deal is the first of its kind between a UK local authority and the Denver-based company, which supplies technology to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and to help Donald Trump’s mass deportation efforts.

Palantir already has a number of public sector contracts in the UK, including providing AI to help tackle organised crime in Leicestershire and building the new NHS federated data platform. Keir Starmer toured the company’s Washington office in February with its chief executive and co-founder, Alex Karp. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2025/aug/30/coventry-city-council-signs-ai-deal-contract-palantir-technologies

It was the deal to handle NHS England patient data which prompted Ian Murray, Governor General for Scotland, to accuse FM John Swinney of somehow being old-fashioned, ‘analogue‘, and letting patients in Scotland down.

The truth is, you will not be surprised, somewhat different.

There are no suggestions that Palantir is being considered for any role in NHS Scotland.

There’s some detail about Scotland’s National Digital Platform

at: https://www.digitalhealth.net/2022/12/scotland-gets-national-digital-platform-to-improve-data-access/

While NHS Scotland does have plans to work with industry partners, only Astra Zeneca UK and Lenus Health have signed a memorandum of understanding. You can read more on this at: https://www.digitalhealth.net/2022/09/nhs-scotland-set-for-transformation-with-new-collaboration/

While Lenus Health is a digital consultancy managing patient data, they are compliant with User-Managed Protocols enabling patients to control what data they share and who can access it. You can read more on them at: 

https://lenushealth.com/platform/August 30, 2025johnrobertson834ai, health, news, politics, technologyEdit