Interview with Mr. Peter Wu. CEO. ASUS Cloud Corporation
Which are the main motivations to become involve in PULSE?
Taiwan has a very high population density. Environmental pollution at a single location is likely to affect the health of most people. Through the public health monitoring station, data such as environmental sensors, community health, and transportation are integrated in an open format and visualized. Information display, analysis tools, and reports enable Big Data and Data Science to rebuild the foundations of traditional public health models, create new prevention methods and approaches to prevent and manage health issues, in order to monitor and support sustainable health cities.
Which are the key framework elements needed to successfully deliver digital interventions in the context of urban public health?
The main purpose of public health is to prevent disease, promote health, and prolong life among the population as a whole. The implementation of digital intervention in cities mainly requires a supportive environment. It encompasses where people live, work and play, including people’s access to resources for health, and opportunities for empowerment. We believe that if we can get more data from the supportive environment, we will have the higher chance of success in digital interventions. In order to more accurately collect urban public health data, this project will design two types of wireless sensing network systems to collect data at regular intervals. The first is an outdoor air environment quality sensing system, mainly for the detection of changes in the surrounding environment, and the second is physiological monitoring. The system senses changes in physiological values.
From the establishment of software and hardware in cities, formulate prevention and control approaches, then jointly promote with the government agencies, which will effectively improve people’s overall health awareness and health Level.
Which are the main challenges you face to develop a policy-making across the domains of health, environment and transport?
The density of population in Keelung is the fourth highest in Taiwan. Due to the narrow mountainous zone, the roads in the urban areas are relatively narrow. Besides, the daily ratio of commuters across the city is relatively high. There are fewer choices for transportation vehicles in Keelung, so most commuters choose to drive their own cars to work. Traffic congestion during periods of time creates a lot of air pollutant emissions in rush hour during on-duty and off-duty . Therefore, air pollution control and reduce traffic congestion will be the main challenge when develop a policy-making.
Which is the added value of solutions like PULSE for your municipality?
The environmental damage to health is more complex than other health damages, and it is trace, chronic, long-term and irreversible. Air pollution, for example, significantly increases the incidence of respiratory and allergic diseases in urban populations. From the perspective of environmental research, we will pay attention to the health effects of society and economic activities on human physiology and psychology, and explore measures for prevention and control of environmental hazards that are harmful to people’s health. The health effects of the environment are closely related to the public interest. If environmental problems are to be improved, they will be prevented from being transformed into social and economic problems in the future.
Taiwan has the following advantages:
- A variety of medical materials for medical sandboxes
- Globally ranked first open data
- Forward-looking technology – Ai Health Bot.
The use of these advantages in combination with the PULSE project will enable Taiwan’s large amount of data and R&D energy to be effectively integrated and reused. Learning from the experience of the PULSE project planning and management will enable Taiwan to be in line with international standards, increase international visibility and enhance Taiwan’s innovative R&D capabilities.
QUOTES:
“PULSE project, together with, a wide variety of medical sandboxes, a globally ranked open data and a forward looking technology, will enable Taiwan’s large amount of data and R&D energy to be effectively integrated and reused”
“Through the public health monitoring station, data is integrated in an open format and visualized and will enable Big Data and Data Science to rebuild the foundations of traditional public health models, create new prevention methods and approaches to prevent and manage health issues, in order to monitor and support sustainable health cities”
About ASUS Cloud
ASUS Cloud set up data centers in Taiwan, the United States, and Luxembourg to serve ASUS global users. ASUS Cloud provides the high security private cloud solution to government, enterprises, education, hospitals, and financial industry. ASUS Cloud is the only one which can provide server plus cloud system service in Taiwan, and have the pubic cloud, private cloud, or hybrid cloud service model. At the same time, ASUS Cloud actively cooperates with partners in various fields and smart cities through open platform to accelerate industrial integration and innovation and build the ASUS cloud ecosystem
Images about Keelung ； Photographer： L.W Lai
