Temasek-Backed Disease Outbreak Intelligence AI to Begin Pilots in 2026

Hosted on AWS, it aims to deliver early warning insights by analysing diverse datasets, including pathogen genomics, clinical information, population trends, climate patterns, and mosquito habitat data.

The Asia Pathogen Genomics Initiative (Asia PGI), led by the Duke-NUS Medical School Centre for Outbreak Preparedness, is preparing to pilot PathGen, a new AI-based disease outbreak intelligence platform designed to detect emerging disease threats earlier and accelerate risk assessments across Asia.

Backed by the Temasek Foundation, the Gates Foundation, and the Philanthropy Asia Alliance, the system is scheduled for pilot deployment in early 2026.

PathGen is described as an AI-powered decision-support platform for public health agencies, clinicians, and policymakers.

Hosted on AWS, it aims to deliver early warning insights by analysing diverse datasets, including pathogen genomics, clinical information, population trends, climate patterns, and mosquito habitat data.

Duke-NUS says the platform is built on a federated, sovereign-by-design architecture, ensuring that only analytics—not underlying raw data—are shared across borders. The data remains under the control of each participating country. This model is intended to enable actionable cross-border intelligence without compromising data sovereignty, one of the key barriers limiting the region’s current surveillance systems.

According to Duke-NUS, PathGen’s insights can help determine when to adjust treatment protocols, where to deploy vaccines, and how to allocate resources before outbreaks escalate. The proof-of-concept was recently previewed with Singapore’s Health Minister Ong Ye Kung.

PathGen is being developed in collaboration with Amazon Web Services, IXO, Sequentia Biotech in Spain, and the Sydney Infectious Diseases Institute. Asia PGI, based in Singapore, brings together over 50 government and academic partners across 15 countries working to advance pathogen genomics sequencing and regional intelligence sharing.

The initiative comes amid rising concerns about more frequent and complex outbreaks driven by rapid population growth, mobility, climate-related disruptions, and antimicrobial resistance. Duke-NUS highlighted that current surveillance systems face challenges around interoperability, contextual data availability, and policy-related restrictions on data movement.

“By sharing only essential insights, countries can respond faster to outbreaks while strengthening trust and sovereignty,” said Paul Pronyk, director of the Duke-NUS Centre for Outbreak Preparedness.

Asia PGI plans a staged rollout through 2027 following the 2026 pilots.

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