Singapore: Ministry of Health (MOH) announces enhancements to legislative protections on the use of genetic test information

30 Jul 2025    2 minute read
Sectors Healthcare & Life Sciences
Artificial Intelligence AI

In brief

On 10 July 2025, the Ministry of Health (MOH) announced that it is working on enhancing legislative protections on the use of genetic test information. With the new legislation, MOH intends to provide greater clarity on acceptable uses for genetic information (e.g., medical treatment) and those that are prohibited (e.g., employment and insurance underwriting).

MOH will be conducting broad public consultations on this topic.

This development is in line with MOH’s previous statements, where it highlighted ethical issues involving the use and disclosure of genetic and genomic test data, and MOH’s previous efforts in this regard. Further information on MOH’s previous statements may be found in our client alert here.  

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In more detail

On 10 July 2025, MOH reemphasized its position that the way the healthcare industry uses AI is different from many other industries. This meant that a total revamp of the healthcare sector due to AI disruption did not happen, unlike in many other sectors. MOH highlighted that this is because healthcare is an essential public service that cannot be substituted by technology alone and is highly regulated. This means that clinical governance could potentially keep out disruptive technology changes. These comments are similar to those made by MOH in 2023, as detailed in our client alert here.

That said, MOH underlined that its strategy is to deliver as much care as possible, especially preventive and continual care, by leveraging technology and transforming its workforce. This would therefore invariably include harnessing AI.

Potentially significant issues with the increasing use of technology include cybersecurity and data privacy concerns:

  • MOH is addressing cybersecurity concerns by strengthening its IT infrastructure.
  • Patients are naturally worried about data privacy as their patient data could potentially be shared among healthcare providers. MOH will address such concerns through the proposed Health Information Act, which would include various data protection measures and ways patients can choose to restrict the sharing of their medical data among healthcare providers (see more information on the proposed Health Information Act in our client alerts of March 2023 and December 2023).

Data privacy issues are compounded with the greater availability of genetic data, especially due to societal and ethical concerns with how that genetic data would be used. MOH has therefore announced that it is working on enhancing legislative protections on the use of genetic test information. With the new legislation, MOH intends to provide greater clarity on acceptable uses of genetic information (e.g., medical treatment) and those that are prohibited (e.g., employment and insurance underwriting).

Key takeaways

MOH continues to look closely into AI developments and harnessing AI systems and use cases in the healthcare industry. It has maintained its position that healthcare should be AI-enhanced and AI-enabled, but not AI-decided. The implementation of the proposed new legislation should provide further guidance to ensure the ethical and secure implementation of AI in Singapore’s healthcare sector.

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Contact Information
Andy Leck
Principal
Singaproe
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andy.leck@bakermckenzie.com
Ren Jun Lim
Principal
Singapore
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ren.jun.lim@bakermckenzie.com

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