With the healthcare industry mostly relying on the traditional approach, and being slow to adapt to rapidly evolving digital technologies, the Covid-19 pandemic has revealed the low quality of cyber security infrastructure in US hospitals, due to persistent under funding and slow pace of upgrades. Healthcare facilities have always been conservative towards integrating and keeping up with new technologies, and with the cyber threats coming from the recent unprovoked Russian invasion of Ukraine, healthcare facilities across the US might be soon facing a wave of cyber attacks.

Due to Covid-19, healthcare facilities have undergone a rapid integration of new technologies, such as telemedicine and remote monitoring technologies, and heavily rely on them now. However, due to poor cyber security infrastructure, healthcare facilities became susceptible to cyber attacks, due to the nature of the sensitive information hospital databases contain. Cyber attacks are incredibly harmful for healthcare as they contribute to high financial losses and endanger patients’ health and lives.

The Covid-19 pandemic has revealed the flaws of the current cyber security infrastructure in hospitals and prompted healthcare providers to shift prioritising data protection and cyber security. However, the pandemic has also aggravated the problem, as healthcare facilities were overwhelmed by various waves of Covid-19 and were not able to invest as much into IT infrastructure.