I have long been an admirer of Amy Webb - a quantitative futurist – founder and CEO of the Future Today Strategy Group – you can find out what that means here https://ftsg.com/member/amy-webb/
I have had the privilege of hearing her present a few times, at an annual conference in Austin Texas, where she launches the annual Tech Trends report – a freely available resource that analyses trends across different sectors, including health care.
At the end of 2025, I read many end of year summaries on various platforms but her end of year letter was different.
The letter is long but fascinating and it presents ten themes that she believes will shape 2026.
I found number 8 of the 10 themes particularly interesting to me as a HIFA advocate: The weaponization of trust. Given that artificial intelligence is making it easy to create highly convincing fake voices, videos, and messages people will increasingly be put at risk of being misled about health information they rely on. For global health, this means trust becomes as important as access. Without strong ways to verify sources and authenticity, misinformation has the potential to spread rapidly, undermining public health decisions and the safety and quality of healthcare worldwide.
She prefaced the 10 themes by suggesting that a leader's job in 2026 will be to ensure that organisations can adapt when the code of business, nature, and truth itself starts to change. Sober reflections for us all.
https://mailchi.mp/ftsg.com/2025-annual-letter
HIFA profile: Jules Storr is CEO and co-founder of S3 Global Healthcare and past president of the Infection Prevention Society of the UK and Ireland. Her core subject matter expertise lies in infection prevention and control (IPC) which has been used as the foundation for developing strengths in strategy, leadership, behaviour change and implementation across diverse national and global programmes, including IPC, patient safety, quality health care, partnership working, water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) and antimicrobial resistance. As a respected global healthcare leader and influencer Jules has a record of achievement in the development, implementation and evaluation of initiatives, guidelines and improvement resources in both high and low income countries. During the West Africa Ebola outbreak of 2014-15 Julie worked with colleagues in Sierra Leone to develop their national IPC programme. Previously, she led the award winning national cleanyourhands campaign, as assistant director of IPC at the English National Patient Safety Agency. She currently serves as an honorary advisor to Global Health Partnerships (formerly THET) and is on the steering group of HIFA and a member of HIFA Partnerships and Projects Working Group and Social Media Group. Jules is a champion of person-centred, compassionate care. Her recent work explores the social and behavioural dimensions of IPC, blending clinical expertise with human-centred care. Through her boutique consultancy she works as a consultant and adviser to a number of organisations including WHO, WaterAid and other development partners and charitable organisations. https://www.hifa.org/support/members/julie-0 email: julesstorr AT me.com