Should artificial intelligence and nuclear conflict be treated as public health threats? Discuss the merits of a foresight-based approach to health security.

A new Lancet Commission, launched at the World Health Summit in Berlin, has identified 17 interlinked catastrophic threats to health through 2100. These include pandemics, AMR, air pollution, AI and nuclear conflict [1]. Calling AI and nuclear war health threats is justified, as long as the label leads to action and does not blur responsibility.

Why AI and nuclear conflict are health threats

• Health outcomes: nuclear conflict means mass casualties, radiation injury and the collapse of hospitals and food supply. It would be the ultimate health emergency.
• AI risks: health misinformation, biased diagnostic tools and possible misuse to design harmful agents all raise accountability and regulation questions [1].
• Security convergence: the Commission treats health threats as economic, environmental and national-security challenges [1]. This brings defence and foreign-policy actors into health planning.
• Caveat: health ministries cannot control these risks themselves. The health framing should add to arms control and AI governance, not replace them.

Merits of a foresight-based approach

• Anticipatory, not reactive: horizon-scanning to 2100 [1] moves preparedness ahead of the crisis. COVID-19 showed how costly reacting late can be.
• Captures interactions: the World Bank describes a polycrisis as many crises at once, where their interactions make the total damage worse [2]. AMR, which spreads through human, animal and environmental pathways, shows that siloed responses fall short.
• Builds capacity early: India's National One Health Mission includes the Nagpur institute, a network of high-containment (BSL-3/4) labs and wastewater surveillance [3]. This turns foresight into infrastructure.
• Enables hard targets: the 2024 UNGA declaration on AMR commits to cutting bacterial AMR deaths by 10% by 2030 from a baseline of 4.95 million. It also aims for at least 60% of countries to have funded national plans [4].

Limitations

• Diffused accountability: if many ministries share 17 threats, no one may be clearly in charge. The Commission itself accepts that single-issue focus "produced many benefits" [1].
• Mismatched timelines: budgets run year to year, but the horizon is 2100. Neglected diseases risk being sidelined.

In sum, AI and nuclear conflict are legitimate health threats, and foresight is how to prepare for them. The way forward is to assess threats together but give each a named owner, target and budget. For India, this means building foresight into NAP-AMR 2.0 and NOHM, setting up an inter-ministerial health-security cell, and pushing for global risk-pooling. That approach advances the right to health under Article 21 and SDG 3.