Journal of African Development

The western countries have standard governance in the Healthcare industry and are also very agile and versatile in building digital infrastructure for the welfare of the economy. The European countries and Asian nations have to scale up their operations by being more agile to implement AI in the healthcare sector. This study has examined the AI readiness and innovation diffusion in the healthcare industry in the European region. In addition for the analysis purpose this study has made use of the data published by the World Health Organization (WHO). The AIRA data is the measure code in WHO database and it is based on the 2024 - 2025 survey on AI in healthcare in European regions. A mixed research approach has been incorporated to initially examine industry 6.o to know the latest contributions and growth trends. Based on the AIRA dataset a descriptive analysis, Random forest machine learning has been used to determine level of maturity in implementing AI in healthcare. In addition, an AI readiness assessment has been done using few important parameters such as Governance, Infrastructure, Resource availability and regulatory indicators. The findings from the machine learning model reveals a high predictive accuracy, indicating that governance and institutional variables strongly influence healthcare AI maturity. The study proposes the Integrated AI Healthcare Ecosystem Readiness and Diffusion (IAHERD) Model for sustainable and governance-driven healthcare AI transformation. The future holds multiple opportunities to outshine innovative and actionable policies for AI implementation in European nations with uniformity to achieve SDG goals