Build With, Not For: Making Public Health Tech That Actually Works

Author: Khahlil A, Louisy

Published: Data-Smart City Solutions, Bloomberg Center for Cities, Harvard University

Successful public health technology depends on co-designing solutions with agencies and residents, while prioritizing trust, compliance, and real-world needs.

The Opportunity Hidden in Plain Sight

American public health infrastructure stands at a crossroads. The recent pandemic demonstrated what's possible when resources and attention converge on public health innovation, yet as current emergency funding recedes and federal support shifts, we're witnessing a concerning trend: the momentum that could modernize our public health systems is rapidly disappearing.

This creates a unique window of opportunity for public-private partnerships (P3s). Local and state health departments, many still operating on decade-old technology and shrinking budgets, need sustainable solutions that don't require massive upfront investments. Meanwhile, the private sector, from established health tech companies to venture-backed startups, is looking for stable, scalable markets beyond the increasingly saturated consumer health space.

The challenge isn't a lack of innovation or need; it's a fundamental mismatch between how private companies typically build technology and how public health systems actually function. Too many well-funded health tech startups end up in a graveyard of beautiful dashboards, clever AI, and zero adoption. Why? Because they built for public health rather than with it. Public health isn't just another vertical, it's its own terrain of bureaucracy that is high-stakes, trust-bound, and excruciatingly slow by design. No one really gets to disrupt it; you only get to work inside it, or not at all. To build something that sticks in public health, private sector partners must unlearn the habits of Business-to-Business (B2B) hustle and Direct-to-Consumer (DTC) polish and instead, they must start with both the human and technical systems and ask: who holds the data, who feels the friction, and who pays the procurement officer?

This process means learning to speak the language of regulatory compliance, legacy system integration, community trust, and slow coalition-building. When done right, which means taking the long and unglamorous route of "building with" rather than "building for," public-private partnerships can create technology that isn't just usable, but indispensable. Here's how to do it:

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