King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) took part in the Global Health Exhibition, held from October 21 to 23 at the Riyadh International Convention and Exhibition Center under the slogan "Invest in Health". In a roundtable meeting to discuss enhancing local content in the health sector, KACST Vice President of the Health Sector Dr. Batoul bint Mohammed Yousef Baz spoke about the role of the KACST as a national laboratory and an innovation hub in supporting national strategies, building competencies, enabling innovation by supporting startups and launching accelerators and incubators in partnership with relevant entities with the aim of enriching local content and achieving the goals of the health sector transformation program. She stressed the importance of partnerships between the health sector, research centers, the private sector, non-profit organizations, and innovation incubators to find innovative solutions that contribute to advancing healthcare services, enhancing public health and quality of life, and achieving national aspirations for R and D and innovation in health and wellness. She also praised the strategic partnership with the Seha Virtual Hospital and the health sectors for establishing a clinical trials center for digital health solutions, which will contribute to enhancing the Kingdom's global position in the field of clinical research, enabling innovation, evaluating startup companies within the sandbox of the health innovation incubator environment, and enabling data sharing. She pointed out the importance of researchers and innovators' commitment to research ethics frameworks and regulations and the role of legislative and regulatory authorities and business governance, which contributed to the Saudi Food and Drug Authority reaching maturity level 4 (ML4) in regulating medicines and vaccines. In a dialogue session entitled "Utilization of Bio-engineering in infection control - Biocontrol of Dengue Fever Project", KACST General Manager of the Advanced Diagnostics and Ther apeutics Institute Dr. Essam Tawfik highlighted Saudi Arabia's experience in transferring and localizing Wolbachia replacement technology in dengue fever control in Jeddah, in cooperation with the Public Health Authority (Weqaya) and the Jeddah Municipality. In its pavilion during the exhibition, KACST highlighted the efforts of the National Laboratory in localizing health technologies to control vector-borne diseases through the Biocontrol of Dengue Fever Project using the Wolbachia replacement technology in Jeddah, which employs green technologies that are eco-friendly and do not cause harm to humans and the surrounding environment. The KACST pavilion also showcased the experience of the Garage incubated company "NanoPalm", which provides low-cost biorobots to treat sickle cell disease, increasing the success rate of clinical trials and significantly reducing development costs. KACST also introduced the exhibition's visitors to the GDDPS-Genomic-Driven Rx, which it developed in collaboration with the Sau di Food and Drug Authority. This Rx relies on drug notification data in the pharmacovigilance platform and preliminary results collected by the team from global genetic databases, the Saudi Genome Database, and global legislation such as the Clinical Pharmacogenetics Implementation Consortium (CPIC). Furthermore, In the field of epidemic prediction, KACST presented its epidemic prediction platform to confront pandemics such as Covid-19, which supports decisions based on data and information to implement public health measures using AI technologies, analyzing demographic, geographical, environmental and medical data, developing predictive models, and identifying factors that spread epidemics in population centers. KACST also showcased the "Alamy" platform, which is designed to help patients precisely track their symptoms and manage their pain. It uses advanced applications and wearable devices to enable individuals to manage and relieve chronic and acute pain. This platform is characterized by the ease of re cording pain, activating effective communication mechanisms with doctors, helping doctors manage pain, and providing profiles for data analysis and personalized treatment planning Source: Saudi Press Agency