ZUO Meiyun: Breaking down Data Barriers to Advance Technology-Enabled Elderly Care from Availability to Excellence

As intelligence meets population aging, how can technology-enabled elderly care evolve from availability to excellence? How can we resolve the three major challenges in integrated medical and elderly care? At the recently held 2026 China (Dalian) Conference on High-Quality Development of the Silver Economy, professor ZUO Meiyun discussed the transformation logic and future trajectory of China’s health and elderly care industry from the perspective of technological empowerment.

“Intelligentization and population aging are two definitive trends, and urban smart health and elderly care sits right at their intersection,” stated ZUO Meiyun, Research Fellow at the National Academy of Development and Strategy at Renmin University of China, opening his remarks. In his view, a common misconception plagues the current smart elderly care sector: prioritizing hardware over connectivity, and platforms over data. Many local governments have invested heavily in purchasing smart devices and building information systems. Yet unresolved data barriers between governments, institutions, service providers and families leave these assets as mere ornaments stranded on isolated information silos.

“The key to smart health and elderly care lies not in the isolated stacking of hardware and software, but in breaking down data barriers to build an integrated health and elderly care service network,” said ZUO Meiyun. This observation cuts straight to the industry’s key pain point: only when data can flow freely can services be precisely matched, supervision be evidence-based, and decision-making be well-supported.

AI technology will serve as the most transformative variable. Professor ZUO Meiyun agrees that in the next phase of technology-enabled elderly care, competition will no longer hinge on the quantity of devices or the scale of platforms. Instead, it will depend on who can effectively leverage data, deliver services to the grassroots, and put the elderly at the center of everything. Building an integrated health and elderly care service network is the inevitable path toward this goal.

Original Link：http://finance.people.com.cn/n1/2026/0909/c1004-40795083.html