The Artificial Intelligence Basic Law, recently passed in its third reading by the Legislative Yuan, is often portrayed in public discourse as a purely declaratory law, distant from real industrial practice. However, a closer look at its overall design reveals that the law is not primarily concerned with how fast AI technology advances, but rather with whether society is willing—and able—to deploy AI when it enters high-risk fields such as healthcare, finance, and government.
Over the past few years, smart healthcare in Taiwan has made measurable progress, yet most initiatives have remained at the pilot or single-project level. The bottleneck has rarely been technical accuracy, but trust. Who is accountable when failures occur? Is data being used appropriately and lawfully? Are AI systems controllable and traceable? The AI Basic Law seeks to address these long-standing unresolved issues through a systemic governance framework. Rather than focusing on “how powerful AI should be,” it emphasizes “how AI can be trusted,” signaling a shift in smart healthcare development from technological breakthroughs to institutional maturity.
Under the governance logic of the AI Fundamentals Law, medical AI—given its direct impact on life and health—is almost inevitably classified as a high-risk application. It must therefore meet requirements such as validation, transparency, human oversight, and clear attribution of responsibility. While this may initially appear to raise barriers and slow innovation, it is in fact a prerequisite for the large-scale adoption of smart healthcare. Healthcare systems are conservative not because they resist technology, but because they cannot absorb uncertain risks. Only when responsibility and risk are clearly designed into the system will hospitals integrate AI into routine workflows, insurers align reimbursement mechanisms, and society grant AI its legitimacy.
For the industry, this signifies a new watershed moment: single-function solutions will find it increasingly difficult to gain the full trust of the healthcare system; while platform-based roles with capabilities in data governance, privacy design, traceability, and accountability will gradually accumulate an irreplaceable position. From this perspective, the AI Basic Law is a clear signal—in the next stage of smart healthcare, whoever can first establish trust as an infrastructure will be the most secure in the next 10 years.
Source: Financial News Issue 754