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Introducing GeoAI4EI: an open, trustworthy & ethical AI toolbox for epidemic intelligence

· 3 min read
GeoAI4EI Project Team
GeoAI4EI Project Team
European research & public health consortium
GeoAI4EI logo

We are excited to introduce GeoAI4EI: an EU project that develops an open-source, trustworthy, and ethical Artificial Intelligence (AI) toolbox to strengthen European and global epidemic intelligence (EI) for pandemic preparedness and response.

Why GeoAI4EI?​

The world is facing a growing risk of new and re-emerging infectious disease threats. Zoonotic spillovers and climate-driven disease dynamics make it clear that pandemic preparedness needs better tools:

  • Faster — detecting signals earlier, when they are still actionable
  • Richer — combining epidemiological, mobility, environmental, ecological, Earth Observation, and socio-economic data into one geospatial picture
  • Trustworthy — AI that public health agencies, policymakers, and citizens can rely on

And it needs to be built the right way: ethics and inclusiveness are not features added at the end — they shape the methodology from day one.

What GeoAI4EI builds​

GeoAI4EI builds on the Horizon 2020 MOOD platform and state-of-the-art geospatial and epidemiological modelling. On that solid foundation, the project adds:

  • Multi-source data integration — six complementary data domains fused into a coherent spatio-temporal picture of disease risk
  • Advanced AI — including Large Language Models (LLMs) and retrieval-augmented conversational assistants that ground answers in the governed data corpus
  • Scenario-based management — tools to explore "what-if" situations and support preparedness planning
  • Open, lightweight platforms — open-source and designed to run in resource-limited contexts

The toolbox is co-produced with researchers, public health agencies, policymakers, and supranational bodies — including the ECDC, HERA, and WHO — so that it solves real operational problems in epidemic intelligence.

Ethics by design​

Trust in AI-driven public health tools cannot be assumed; it must be engineered. GeoAI4EI therefore commits to:

  • GDPR compliance, Data Sharing Agreements, and strict anonymisation standards for all data
  • Conformance with the EU AI Act, FAIR and CARE principles, and independent ethical audits
  • Fairness-by-design pipelines: bias audits and sex/gender covariate analyses
  • Transparency: model cards, uncertainty visualisation, and traceable sources for every answer
  • Safeguards against over-reliance and misuse — all tools are decision support, never decision replacement

Inclusion & security​

GeoAI4EI aims to reduce inequalities in pandemic preparedness:

  • Open-source tools that any health system can adopt
  • Lightweight platforms for resource-limited contexts
  • Training programmes that transfer skills to practitioners everywhere
  • Cybersecurity through EU-based secure hosting, encryption, and role-based access control
  • Interoperability with EU infrastructures such as the EHDS and ATHINA

What's next​

The GeoAI4EI website, documentation, and this blog are now online. In the coming months we will publish updates on the platform's development, our data and AI components, and the ethical safeguards being built into every tool.

If you are a researcher, public health professional, developer, or simply interested in trustworthy AI for health, we would love your help — explore the documentation, join the conversation, or contribute to the open-source project on Codeberg.

Together, we can build epidemic intelligence that is effective, equitable, and worth trusting.