Preventative health is hard.
It’s hard for medical students because their education has a strong focus on reactive care (e.g. pharmacology, surgery) vs. proactive care (e.g. nutrition, mindfulness, fitness). It’s hard for practicing physicians because they’re incentivized by pharmaceutical companies to promote reactive medicine and treatments. It’s hard for pharma companies because they make money from developing and selling drugs that fix problems vs. prevent problems. It’s hard for private health companies because consumers don’t prioritize health spending until they’re sick.
So here we stand today, with this hard problem that’s pervaded us since the dawn of medicine and with its progress moving forward at a pace decades behind the speed at which technology has managed to positively disrupt other industries. Over 70% of the US is overweight or obese and 45% suffer from at least one chronic illness, yet the top 3 causes are preventable (poor nutrition, inactivity, and tobacco use). Tech is improving nearly every aspect of our lives, while America's obesity count has been increasing every year since 1995. I'd say this should be a priority over flying cars and food delivery apps.
So, what's the solution?
It begins with rallying consumer interest. With consumer demand comes money, with money comes research, with research comes useful products and progress. Consumers will be the ones to change the future of health. It won’t be the sluggish government, not the regulated insurance companies, not the archaic medical school programs, and not the backward pharmaceutical industry. Consumers have the autonomy and power to quickly drive change, and rallying consumer interest is done by appealing to innate desires in an immediate way.
Investors sense the opportunity
According to Rock Health’s 2017 Funding Report, companies delivering consumer health information as a primary value proposition dominated 2017 funding, reaching $1.6 billion with 41 deals. This means that technology dedicated to empowering users to better understand and improve their own health surpassed technologies for clinical decision support, disease monitoring, disease diagnosing, and EMR. Consumers are the gas (or charge) for the vehicles that the big players drive in the health space. Health companies and investors accelerate towards what consumers care about. And, thankfully, this is shifting.
Consumers are catching on
Consumers are starting to take health into their own hands. We're seeking out more transparency and control. We're ordering 23andMe and EverlyWell testing kits to learn about our genetic health risks and traits. We're subscribing to Care/Of to receive personalized supplement packs. We're using ShareCare and Apple HealthKit to manage all of our health information in one place (and Apple's working on taking that even further). We're visiting Forward to receive technology-driven concierge healthcare. We're using MyFitnessPal to track caloric intake and nutrient deficiencies. Consumers are taking initiative. Perhaps this is due to the increasing costs of healthcare. Or maybe it’s the growing trends of lifestyle brands and health influencers spanning the media (think SoulCycle, Urban Remedy juice cleanses, and Bulletproof coffee). It could also be a result of this increased funding going into consumer health companies causing improved options–a chicken or the egg question. Or maybe, and this is my favorite guess, consumers are recognizing the importance of preventative health and are seeking their own methods of addressing it. Regardless of the triggers, this is a good thing.
What's next?
Consumer interest and investment funding are both important catalysts in the adoption and growth of preventative health. 2017 was a big year for both. I strongly believe that this will further increase in 2018–consumers will embrace their newfound control over their health, and investors will help fuel their options.