AI4HealthyCities
Active Since: 2017
Contributing to SDGs…




Apply advanced analytics to deliver new insights that can help city authorities make more informed decisions toward interventions that improve cardiovascular population health and narrow health inequities.
MEMBER COMPANIES
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Novartis
Company Profile
PARTNER ORGANISATIONS
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Academia or research institute
Centre universitaire de médecine générale et santé publique (UniSanté), Switzerland
École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL)
Institute of Geography – University of Lisbon, Portugal
New York University
School of Public Health – NOVA University, Lisbon, Portugal
Escola Superior de Tecnologia da Saúde de Lisboa Portugal
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Government
Direction générale de la santé (DGS), État de Vaud, Switzerland
Health Commissioner, New York, US
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Pharma company foundation
Novartis Foundation
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Technology
Microsoft AI for Health
Objectives
- Apply advanced analytics to data from health and health-influencing sectors to deliver new insights that can progress the understanding of the underlying social, economic, or environmental determinants that truly drive health.
- Help city authorities make more informed decisions with support tools that enable to translate data insights into action and target resources toward interventions that improve cardiovascular population health and narrow health inequities.
What are the health needs and challenges?
Cities are facing unprecedented health challenges, from the growing burden of cardiovascular disease, to increased demands on health systems due to rapid urbanization, the constant threat of emerging diseases often hitting urban populations hardest as seen during the COVID-19 pandemic, the impact of climate change, and the global shortage of skilled health workers.
Only 10-20% of our health is determined by the healthcare we access. 80-90% is determined by the conditions in which we are born, grow, live, work and age – factors known as social, environmental, and economic determinants of health. At the same time, data and AI are transforming the urban health landscape and providing new opportunities for driving population health and transforming health systems from reactive care systems, to proactive, predictive and even preventive health systems.
How partnership activities address these needs and challenges
Under the umbrella of AI4HealthyCities, a network of cities was created by the Novartis Foundation and developed in collaboration with Microsoft AI for Health. AI4HealthyCities aims to challenge the current reality where people living in neighboring zip codes experience drastic differences in heart health and life expectancy.
Partner organizations work in cities to bring together data from health and health-influencing sectors and apply advanced analytics and AI to provide decision makers with insights about the true drivers of cardiovascular health and equity. Data from health-influencing sectors is included because health is influenced more by the conditions in which people are born, grow, work, and age, than by the quality of healthcare they access. This includes factors as diverse as housing, access to healthy food, income, physical exercise or green space, education, professional occupation, pollution, migration, and the influence of structural racism and agism.
These insights will ultimately help city authorities make more informed decisions about how to target health resources toward the interventions that positively impact the health of the greatest number of people. Only by understanding what truly drives health outcomes in different populations can health inequities be narrowed.
SDGs THE PARTNERSHIP CONTRIBUTES TO

SDG 3: Good Health and Wellbeing
- 3.4: NCDs (including mental health)
- 3.8: Achieve universal health coverage
SDG 9: Industry Innovation and Infrastructure

SDG 17: Partnerships for the Goals
RESULTS & MILESTONES
In 2022, New York in the US became the first city to be announced in AI4HealthyCities. Here, the initiative is run in partnership with the New York University School of Global Public Health; the public hospital system NYC Health + Hospitals. Lisbon in Portugal was the second city to launch activities with a partnership between the School of Public Health – NOVA University and the Institute of Geography – University of Lisbon. Lausanne in Switzerland was the third city to join with a collaboration between the École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) and the Centre universitaire de médecine générale et santé publique (UniSanté).
Additional cities will be announced, with each city initiative examining the influence of different factors impacting heart health, such as structural racism, housing, extreme weather, mobility, or education.
Further, in 2022, the Novartis Foundation and Microsoft AI for Health hosted their first AI4HealthyCities Summit in Basel, Switzerland. Topics covered narrowing health inequities in cities; improving urban cardiovascular population health with data and digital; using data to improve decision making in population health; and virtual health and care. In January 2023, the Novartis Foundation moderated a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum 2023 in Davos on “The future of health: Unlocking the power of data to improve urban population health.” The live panel discussion gathered global leaders from government, academia, healthcare and tech.
Geographic Reach
Africa
- Senegal
Americas
- Brazil
Western Pacific
- Mongolia
Disease Area
Non-communicable Diseases
- Cardiovascular Diseases
- Hypertension