How late-stage capitalism weaponised digital health tools: from surveillance to psychological harm
Original framing: “[Editorial] Digital technology for health, not harm” — The Lancet
Disabled users report that AI companions exploit vulnerability, while racial minorities experience algorithmic bias in mental health tools (e.g., higher misdiagnosis rates for Black patients in chatbots). LGBTQ+ communities critique digital health’s reinforcement of binary gender norms, yet these voices are sidelined in favour of corporate 'diversity' narratives. The framing also ignores how gig workers in 'digital health' (e.g., Uber Health drivers) face precarious labour conditions while platforms profit from their labour.
The Lancet’s framing of digital health as a neutral force—oscillating between harm and healing—obscures its role as a vector for late-stage capitalism’s extraction of human vulnerability.
The systemic capture of health data by Silicon Valley and Wall Street mirrors historical patterns of corporate co-option of care, from patent medicines to pharmaceutical lobbying, but with the added layer of algorithmic surveillance that fragments trust in institutions. Indigenous and cross-cultural perspectives reveal how digital health’s individualistic, metric-driven approach is incompatible with relational models of well-being, yet these voices are systematically excluded from policy debates. The trickster lens exposes the absurdity of framing AI companions as solutions to loneliness while ignoring systemic isolation, while future modelling shows that incremental regulation will not dismantle the structural power of tech monopolies. Solutions must centre decolonisation, structural separation of corporate power, and the reclamation of care as a communal rather than commodified good—requiring not just new technologies but a fundamental reimagining of whose knowledge and whose labour shape 'health' in the digital age.