Govt taps private sector, academia to build India’s AI pandemic warning system

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. New Delhi: Facing a surge in zoonotic threats, India is set to use artificial intelligence (AI) to detect emerging pathogens that jump from animals to humans, according to officials and documents reviewed by Mint. The initiative, led by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) under the National One Health Mission (NOHM), marks a shift from reactive reporting to predictive surveillance.

The project will target a broad spectrum of threats, including Nipah virus, Zika, Avian Influenza (H5N1), and Kyasanur Forest Disease (monkey fever), among others. In 2025, India reported 41 bird flu outbreaks across 10 states, including Maharashtra and Odisha, primarily affecting poultry, wild birds, and mammals like tigers. Crucially, the virus caused two human fatalities.

These rising novel pathogen threats drive the ICMR's new AI mission to enhance integrated surveillance and prevent local outbreaks from becoming global pandemics. The system will provide early signal detection and real-time decision support to prevent local outbreaks from escalating into pandemics. The framework will utilize sophisticated data analytics, including predictive modelling, automated disease surveillance, and rapid response coordination.

Towards this end, the government is expanding its digital and physical infrastructure to manage high-resolution health data. The Integrated Health Information Platform (IHIP) already provides a unified, near-real-time reporting system across all 36 states and Union territories. Furthermore, the Ayushman Bharat Digital Mission (ABDM) has created a national digital health ecosystem that integrates various health programmes, enabling the creation of digitized records usable for