The app that promised an NHS ‘revolution’ then went down in flames

Babylon Healthcare won NHS contracts after being championed by Matt Hancock but the company’s AI tech was oversold and it has now collapsed.
The NHS spent millions of pounds on a flawed AI chatbot whose creator used aggressive sales techniques and overpromised what it could do, former staff have claimed.

Babylon Health, a tech start-up championed by Matt Hancock and advised by Dominic Cummings, promised that its AI chatbot could keep patients who didn’t need to be seen by a health professional out of the overstretched NHS.

But the technology was not as sophisticated as the company claimed, with former staff now claiming that what began as a crude tool based on “decision trees written by doctors, put into an Excel spreadsheet” never realised its promised potential. Concerns — including the fact the app missed clear signs of a heart attack or dangerous blood clots — were raised.

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Source: The Times, 28 October 2023