The healthcare industry is in dire need of change. With costs going up and reimbursements and margins going down even before Covid-19, transformation is afoot. A major area of transformation and one that this crisis has highlighted is the supply chain. The healthcare supply chain is unique in its own right but in many ways, it lags behind other industries in terms of best practices and digitization.

Our society functions on the foundation of numerous social contracts: public education, civil liberties, fair taxes, criminal justice. The crises of this year have tested America’s social contracts in unprecedented ways and brought our nation to a time that will someday be reflected upon as a turning point. Yet our healthcare system, the importance of which we are now starkly reminded daily, persists outside the bounds of our social contracts—not fully embraced as a collective pursuit. Healthcare in America continues to be largely viewed as an institution citizens engage with on a very individualized level. We now face an opportunity to embrace a new take and work as a team to save lives.

The COVID-19 pandemic has driven a massive realignment to virtualized work and interactions, giving hackers a larger attack surface. Even more worrisome are potential security challenges around the therapeutics and vaccines developed to fight the virus. The intellectual property involved is of enormous interest to both state actors and the black and gray markets for vaccine development and distribution. Essential information from government health authorities is also under threat from hackers stoking rumors and purposeful disinformation, along with a wide array of scams and fear-based attacks.