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By Pete Harris, Executive Director, Austin Blockchain Collective  As I write this blog, deaths globally due to COVID-19 are estimated at nearly one million. Health experts here in the US are suggesting that a vaccine should be available to everyone by the third quarter of next year. Meanwhile, some pharmaceutical company executives reckon that vaccines might take another 3 years to be distributed globally. How many deaths will this pandemic account for before it is snuffed out? It’s a big, terrifying number.
That’s the direct human life cost. The global business collapse caused by the pandemic will impact many — probably most of us— over the next few years. A surge in unemployment, poverty, hunger, mental and physical illness are very likely. Civil unrest, regime change and even geopolitical land grabs are possible. The recovery is not going to be a V curve — methinks the affects of COVID-19 will be felt across the globe for a decade or longer. For sure there will be gloom and doom to contend with. But there is also the promise of overcoming the pandemic and its massive fallout. Innovation in bioscience, healthcare, supply chains and technology is already playing a critical role in the comeback — and at a bold and rapid pace not witnessed since the Apollo space program.
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By Pete Harris, Executive Director, Austin Blockchain Collective I’ve known for a long time that healthcare relies on data in order to operate (no pun intended) effectively, safely and efficiently. It’s also been apparent that current processes to capture and share data are pretty much broken — one example that most patients can relate to are badly designed paper forms, usually partially completed with bad handwriting, and then faxed between providers. Some of it might end up being manually entered into an EHR system, mistakes and all, which of course can’t communicate digitally with similar systems at other providers.
All that paper, manual processing and silo-ed databases will need to change, and not just to make healthcare delivery more efficient and less costly for payers and providers, and to offer better outcomes for patients. Here’s why … By Pete Harris, Executive Director, Austin Blockchain Collective
It’s too late for 2020 predictions so here is one for the decade ahead … read this blog to the very end … Web 3.0 describes the next phase of the internet where control and privacy, and hence power, will be restored back to individuals and away from big tech companies that millions of people and businesses have come to rely on (to their benefit for sure, but at potentially great cost). Blockchain technology — specifically public blockchain — is a key enabler of Web 3.0. So too is decentralized storage and query mechanisms, decentralized telecommunications, tools to build decentralized applications. And integration gateways with other public blockchains, private blockchains and non-blockchain applications and databases. The Web 3.0 term was coined in 2014 by Gavin Wood, a Brit computer scientist who was the first CTO of Ethereum. He went on to found Parity Technologies and the Web3 Foundation, which is now rolling out its first public blockchain projects, known as Substrate and Polkadot. |
About the Author
Pete Harris is Principal of Lighthouse Partners. He has 40+ years of business and technology experience, focusing in recent years on business applications of blockchain and distributed ledger technologies. Curated By
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The Austin Blockchain Collective is an open community with a common focus on accelerating the understanding, development and adoption of blockchain and Web 3.0 approaches to address fundamental business challenges and opportunities.
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