The Wei Zexi incident and the vaccine incident from the perspective of blockchain

May 1, the second day of the May Day holiday, should have been a relaxing and happy day, but the article titled "A young man died at the hands of Baidu and a military hospital" was all over the WeChat Moments, which hurt our hearts. Wei Zexi, a 21-year-old college student in the prime of his life, suffered from synovial sarcoma and was eager to seek medical treatment. He went to the hospital for treatment out of trust in Baidu's promotional information and the military's top three hospitals, but he died due to "fraudulent medical treatment".

Coincidentally, in March of this year, the illegal vaccine incident in Shandong also went viral on WeChat Moments. The reason why this news caused a great panic is that although these vaccines and biological products are produced by regular manufacturers, they are not transported and stored in accordance with relevant national laws and regulations. They are out of the constant temperature cold chain of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius, and it is difficult to guarantee the quality and effectiveness of use. They may even cause side effects after injection. Moreover, some of them are near-expiry vaccines, and there is a risk of expiration and deterioration during circulation.

Today, the Internet has entered an era of information explosion, but it is also trapped in an "era of information scarcity". Because of the information explosion, the sources and quantity of information are increasing day by day, which makes it impossible for Wei Zexi to obtain accurate and effective information for seeking medical treatment and medicine. In addition, due to the lack of effective supervision, the drive of commercial interests, and the incompleteness of the moral and legal systems, a flood of false information appeared in Wei Zexi's vision, which cost him his life.

The "vaccine incident" involves 24 provinces, cities and regions. The case has lasted for a long time, involves a large number of drugs, and involves many people who are complicated and intertwined. The impact is huge and far-reaching. In addition, every family with children may be involved. It takes a huge amount of manpower, material resources and time to find out the flow of all vaccines.

Therefore, although the Wei Zexi incident and the Shandong illegal vaccine incident seem to have nothing to do with each other, at their core, they both have the same problem – the problem of information supervision.

Medical care is a major livelihood issue and is closely related to the vital interests of the people. However, problems occur frequently and are repeatedly banned. Therefore, strict information supervision must be carried out in the medical field, and the use of blockchain can effectively solve this problem. Through blockchain, the security and reliability of network information can be guaranteed, so that "Wei Zexi" can successfully seek medical treatment and recover soon; and the entire process of vaccine production, circulation, and use can be easily traced. So, how should blockchain be defined?

Blockchain is a data structure that combines blocks in a chain. It is suitable for storing simple, sequential, self-verifiable data, and uses cryptography to ensure that the data cannot be tampered with or forged. Combined with the above definition, blockchain has four main characteristics: decentralization, trustlessness, collective maintenance, and reliable database.

1. Decentralized

The biggest feature of blockchain is decentralization. The entire network has no centralized hardware or management organization. The blockchain database is distributedly recorded, stored, and transmitted. Each piece of information is transmitted from a single node to all other nodes in the entire network. Each node is responsible for recording and storing all data on the blockchain. Therefore, the rights and obligations between any nodes are equal, and if any node is damaged or lost, other nodes will continue to update and store data. Through decentralization, the system can be kept stable and the information is complete and reliable. Therefore, the blockchain system has excellent robustness.

2. Trustless

In the traditional Internet model, information matching verification and trust accumulation are carried out through trusted central nodes or third-party channels. Whether these central nodes or channels are trustworthy has a great impact on the credit of the entire system. Blockchain solves the trust problem through mathematical methods, and completes credit endorsement through asymmetric encryption and reliable databases. All rules are expressed in advance in the form of algorithmic programs. Participants do not need to know the credit of their counterparties, nor do they need to rely on third-party institutions to endorse or verify transactions. Instead, they only need to trust the common algorithm to establish mutual trust, create credit, generate trust and reach consensus for participants through the algorithm.

3. Collectively maintain

The data blocks in the system are jointly maintained by all nodes with maintenance functions in the entire system, and anyone can participate in these nodes with maintenance functions.

4. Reliable Database

The entire system will be in the form of a sub-database, so that each participating node can obtain a copy of the complete database. Unless more than 51% of the nodes in the entire system can be controlled at the same time, the modification of the database on a single node is invalid and cannot affect the data content on other nodes. In practice, launching a 51% attack is meaningless. The cost required to control 51% of the computing power of the entire network is far greater than the benefits obtained after a successful attack. Therefore, in theory, blockchain technology can ensure the security and reliability of the database, and the more nodes involved in the system and the stronger the computing power, the higher the data security in the system.

In short, blockchain refers to a technical solution that uses decentralization and trustlessness to collectively maintain a reliable database. Through collective maintenance, the characteristics of distributed records and storage are decentralized, while asymmetric encryption mathematics and reliable database technology complete the trust endorsement to ensure that the blockchain system is open source, transparent, and secure. Therefore, blockchain has significant advantages in the Internet era of centralization and lack of trust.

Blockchain technology has been applied in the fields of law, retail, Internet of Things, and medical care, making it no longer dependent on third parties to establish credit and information sharing, and improving the operating efficiency and overall level of the entire industry. Currently, the medical field is the second largest application field of blockchain after the financial field. For example, Philips cooperates with Tierion to provide patients with blockchain solutions for privacy and sensitive data.

The rapid development of blockchain depicts a unified vision of the world based on technology. The whole society is expected to enter the era of intelligent Internet and form a programmable society. In this era when credit has become a scarce resource, the technological innovation of blockchain, as a distributed credit model, will make medical information tamper-proof, more open and transparent, traceable, and ensure the authenticity and reliability of information, thereby providing an effective solution to the information supervision of medical problems and a broad development prospect for the medical field, so that medical care will no longer be a heavy topic.