Healthy choices and their connection to long‑term health outcomes are featured within the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2026’s exploration of investment in people and well‑being
In a World Economic Forum session on “Making Healthy Choices, Better,” leaders from research, consumer advocacy, nutrition science and insurance argued that health is increasingly shaped outside clinics, yet prevention remains chronically underfunded and unevenly accessible. Novo Nordisk Foundation CEO Mads Krogsgaard Thomsen stressed that wellness tools and personalized strategies largely benefit the advantaged, while vulnerable groups need “stratified” approaches focused on early risk detection and scalable prevention. He also noted regulators have been slow to approve medicines explicitly for prevention, despite rising evidence of their preventive impact.
Consumers International’s Helena Leurent grounded the debate in affordability and trust: “1.3 billion people have gone into poverty because of out-of-pocket medical expenses,” while AI-driven advice can be inconsistent, biased and opaque in data use. She warned personalization can backfire via “personalized pricing” and a creeping shift of responsibility onto individuals.
DSM-firmenich CEO Dimitri de Vreeze framed prevention as a system imperative amid unsustainable cost trajectories, citing Singapore-style incentives and calling out unproven health claims that fuel “fake news.” Discovery CEO Adrian Gore emphasized behavior change as the bottleneck: despite compelling data, adherence is hard. Tools that exploit behavioral economics—status, rewards, and “loss aversion” financing—can create “a virtuous cycle” where healthier customers make insurers more profitable and society healthier.
Welcome everyone. So lovely to have a packed room for a livestream session on health and wellness. This is obviously a topic that's germane to all of us. The industry of health and wellness is growing at an accelerating rate. It's currently a $6.8 trillion industry. And today we're joined by esteemed experts from a variety of different perspectives that I'm very excited to lead this discussion with. So let me introduce our panelists and we'll start with Adrian Gore, who leads vitality, is the group chief executive officer at Discovery Vitality. They're doing some amazing work in AI to lead behaviors and health. We're really excited to hear from Adrian today. And Dimitri DeVries, who joins us from DSM fermented and from Switzerland, who has a perspective on the science behind health. We're really looking forward to his perspective. Helena Laurent, who will join us today as director general from Consumer International Switzerland. Looking forward to hearing Helena's perspectives on health and wellness. And Mads Mads Krogsgaard Thompson, CEO of the Novo Nordisk Foundation, one of the leading companies when we think about global impact to health and wellness. My name is Michelle Longmire. I'm a physician and the CEO of metabolic, and my company is based in Palo Alto. And we provide technology to accelerate drug development, working with companies like Novo Nordisk. And really, we connect with people all over the world who participate in clinical trials. I'm also a dermatologist, so I'm at this intersection of things people love to come into clinic for and then things people spend a lot of money online for or on in stores. And I think, you know, really is a dermatologist. You see the intersection of health and wellness and really how high the consumer interest is in this domain. So to kind of shape the discussion today, we want to start with this idea that healthcare starts outside of the clinic. And all of us in this room engage with our healthcare in ways that are becoming increasingly consumerized. This isn't just about going to the doctor. It's about wearing our, you know, Garmin watches. Many people doing whole genome sequencing online and gaining insights from that using Llms ChatGPT Gemini to ask health questions. And I think increasingly we're democratizing healthcare to the individual. But it raises a lot of questions around the ethics, the actual validity of these suggestions, and how do we do this to scale access to healthcare and improve human health, while also taking into account the risks and safeguarding everyone worldwide against what is potentially a double edged sword? When we think about really putting it into our own hands, how do we really do that well? So let's open it up to our incredible panelists, and I'll start with, let me quickly get to my questions here. Okay, great. I'm going to start with, Mads. And we're going to go with, you know, you guys really lead the industry in the pace of research, all different angles of research, obviously really well known for the metabolic and obesity impact. But when you think about consumer wellness, you know what is top of mind for you. If you could share a little bit more about your background and where are the opportunities to actually accelerate the impact and improve the safety of the impact?
Yeah. Well, thanks for that question. Well, my background is actually, for more than two decades as head of research and development in the company. So, of course, you know, the advent of GLP one medicines, all these has, has been important in that regard. I'll get back to that in a minute, but I think we have to divide it into two, because if you're on Palo Alto or from Denmark, you will have access to all the wearables, all the eyes, all the whatnots that actually can really help you maintain health. And there are people who can speak more to that here. Likewise, nutrition. We just got the Dietary Guidelines for Americans DGA a week ago that seemed reasonable, by the way. So nutrition that drives cardiometabolic diseases creates obesity that drives diabetes, cardiovascular, etc. is a very important element. So it's like you're on a journey from health. And then if you are socioeconomically, disfavored, i.e. you don't have right education, right access to funds, etc., it will be very difficult to take part in this whole wellness game that I think we all should. I'm just saying there are a big part even of the Danish community where that will not be the case. So I think what we need to do is not only think personalized, but also think stratified. Look at those who can and will and have the mental capacity and financial capacity to do all the beautiful things. Eat healthy plant based food, fermentation based food, whatever. Use all the health apps and the wellness things. That's one population. And there we can more and more personalize how each individual can see her or his health develop and avoid illness, such as cardiometabolic disease. But we also, as a foundation, have to cater for the vulnerable populations, the least privileged, whether it be in Africa, India or for that matter, Denmark, because they're also there and there. It's a different approach where you don't use as many smart tools and gadgets and so on, but where it's about detecting early on, are these at high risk? And then you can actually use AI. By the way, are these at high risk of developing, for instance, chronic disease. And then it's about preventing that from getting worse early on. So I see differently depending on who and where.
It's a fantastic point bringing it back to this idea of prevention. You know, whether you're in the group who's using all the wellness trackers or we're really looking at how do we identify disease more effectively earlier, you know, in people or populations that may not be interested or have access? This is the opportunity absolutely around.
If I can just one final thing, please.
It is amazing that regulators such as Food and Drug Administration, European Medicines Agency generally have not been in the mode of approving medicines as prevention measures. We can discuss the regulatory framework at some point, but it is important because there are preventive medicines. They're not labeled as such today.
It's a great point. And when we look at health budgets worldwide, only about 3% are going to prevention. And I think there's a number of variables and factors. So Helena, you know, you are representing the consumer. You're very connected to how consumers are using these tools worldwide. I'd love to hear, you know, what are you hearing from consumers? Where's the opportunity? What keeps you up at night? What have we learned? And please describe a little bit more about what drives your perspective.
Absolutely. So I sit here with some levels of trepidation, I have to say, because we're not a patient advocacy group. And I think those things, the fact that we're consumer does bring with it pros and cons, right? My dad's also was also a surgeon. So, you know, I'm very conscious of of the environment we're in. But within that context, I represent our organization as an umbrella organization for 200 consumer advocacy groups in 115 countries. They work closely with patient groups in those settings. So let me give you some of what we're seeing. The first is of course the cost. As already mentioned, you know, if you look at the financial worries that people have, the biggest financial worries are monthly and medical expenses. And I think it's 1.3 billion people have gone into poverty because of out-of-pocket medical expenses. And then, you know, you look at the number of people who can't access emergency funds to help. For example, if their kid had an accident, 54%, only 54% of people in the world can access access emergency funds, which aren't that much in some places within a month. So that's the sort of environment we're in there. And then let's talk about food and nutrition, the amount of people who are able to access a healthy diet. You know, in low income countries, 72% of people can't access a healthy diet. And we're not even talking about a healthy diet within planetary boundaries. So you have to start with that sort of context and then link it to people who are therefore turning off energy to save on bills. Right. So how do we help there? That's one part. And you've got to think about the things that will support more vulnerable communities and also drive the growth and innovation that we want. So let's fix that. The second part is of course data concerns. So if you have got access here what how what what does it give us. And how is my data used. We did an experiment two years ago with generative AI. Just sort of learning, learning about generative AI. Putting a question. My two year old has a fever. What do I do? And we gave that question to all of our consumer advocates in Australia. They were told to call a poison control center in the US. In Rwanda and Japan, they were given medication suggestions. I mean, you just sort of okay, we know these things will improve. We know that AI will be an exciting future. Let's look at how Agentic helps us make better choices. Awesome. But we need the hallucination, the bias to be taken out. Likewise, even when you have laws in place, how your data then gets used in this consumer world is very opaque and very worrying and undermining trust. If I put in an answer to a quiz, you know, how long have you had asthma for? We have examples of cases in places where laws should be looking at this, where that does not stop your data being sent out. And how to do it even probably for the company running that service, it's unclear what to do. All right. And then the last bit will be confusion. So I've got cost data concerns and confusion. How do I know what is the best thing to do? The level of information. So let's take an example from New Zealand. Consumers New Zealand looked at the number of health claims that are out there 200 plus 13, even though those are pre-approved. The way in which I should know as a consumer what to pick, what to choose. The validity of those claims is incredibly complex. So let's help the consumer. Those things both keep us up at night and make us excited because solving those, you know, I've just come out of a year of being on crutches. My goodness, it took technology. It took human contact to get me out the other side. We need that to be possible for everyone.
You really raised so many great points. I think one grounding the problem, right. Which is really that worldwide, the majority of people do not have what they need to live the optimal healthy life. And I think, you know, that alone is something we all need to really take in to understand, you know, what are what is the world facing? What is humanity facing? The other point you raise is, you know, clearly the technology we're all so excited about is still in the very early days. You know, we there's a lot of ambiguity that we can that we need to address to then bring this to a world that is in dire need of technological solutions to optimize health. So it's really interesting. You know, I think it's certainly humbling for all of us, like me coming from Silicon Valley, when we think about the realities of really where we are today, we're not quite there. So thank you for those comments, Dimitri. You have such an interesting perspective on healthcare. Would love to hear from you. How do we improve healthcare and preventative health worldwide and how do we really scale this? Like where do you see the opportunity?
Yeah. By the way, I liked what you were saying, that 3% was preventative. Yeah, I was thinking was 10%. But I like your 3% more. To make my.
Point, when we add the United States, it's a negative number. So then.
You know, maybe the US is 3%, then maybe world is ten. Okay. So I think in this world where I think disruption is is about to play. We talk about healthcare. I do think that in the next 5 to 10 years, there will also be disruption in healthcare. And let me let me show you some of the numbers. So first of all, 10% is preventative, 90% is healthcare starts when people get ill. Then we start working on it. That's not long term visible. I mean, we need to change that because the total healthcare cost rising between 5 and 10% aging population, this will crash, right? So we either act now or we wait for the crash to happen. Right now I'm from Europe. I'm clearly said we should not wait for the crash to happen, but to basically start now. Secondly, within Europe, if we don't change this, then from the working population, one out of three people will work in healthcare, one out of three. So one will help, two who basically really earn the money, and that one who works is basically 8,090% curing people, not preventative. So that also has to change. And then last but not least, to your point, yeah, we do age, but the difference between life expectancy and the health expectancy, the last ten years of our life, the quality of life is questionable. So yeah, what are we fighting for? Right. So preventative healthcare is the way to go on several dimensions. And I think here your second question, which is far more difficult, is how do we scale that up. How do we make that change. So first of all, I think financially that's disruption needs to be there. Then governance need to play their role. The industry needs to play their role, but also consumers need to play their role a little bit. To your point, let me start with the government. Government. So we have seen in the world sugar taxes in several countries, and we've seen that has sped up innovation considerably. So we need to take government seriously in that. Secondly, we've seen a lot of, claims on on front of pack, which are not scientifically proven, but we're mentioning it that we need to stop immediately because we lose credibility and we will get fake news. Then the industry needs to play their role. First of all, innovation needs to be there. I think one of the most interesting areas to go together with Novo Nordisk is microbiome. Right? It's one of the most under-researched areas of our body. We understand our heart works. We know how our lungs work. We know how our architecture works. Maybe brain 50, 50, 50%, but microbiome maybe ten. But let's also admit that we don't know yet how it works and not pretend that we know. Right? So the industry needs to play a role there. Then also the health insurance needs to play a role because today we have lots of solutions. We're talking about it, where we can have faster recovery rates from patients after surgery, but there's no health insurer who is willing to to incentivize that. They say, listen, I give the money to the hospital. They take care of it. Right? So the industry also has to play the role. And then last but not least, consumers, they need to obviously monitor. They need to test to make sure that we have the health care costs under control. Nice example here is Singapore. Singapore requires everybody in Singapore to go to the practitioner twice a year. And if they do that so it's not the outcome talking to the practitioner, but going there two times a year, they reduce your health insurance premium with 25%. So it has an incentive to go. So the total healthcare cost in Singapore has been stable, while the life expectancy has grown considerably. So it's an ecosystem approach. And by meaning ecosystem it's always difficult because you need several players play hand in hand.
Those are such fantastic points and I love that, you know, the convergence of government and consumers and the healthcare system with really pertinent examples that when you do it, you can and you do it right, you can actually move the needle because I think some of us feel discouraged when we don't see things really meaningfully change. And I think as a community focused on health outcomes, we need to focus on the wins and how we got those wins. I don't think enough people really know, you know, some of the areas where the real progress has been made. So, Adrian, you're really at the forefront of incentivizing behavior changes, how behavioral changes, how AI can help guide people, make healthier choices. Tell us about First Vitality and what you guys are doing and what you've learned about how we can optimize health through AI and behavior.
So I'm the points made or so pertinent. We're a life and health insurer and we work with partners around the world. It's fascinating. I mean, it's important to say it's quite a unique industry. It's of considerable size. So, you know, 4 billion policies out there, $5 trillion a year spent. So the scale is incredible. But the amazing thing is we're completely aligned to our customers. If they are healthier, we're more profitable. Right. And now in the past, until we understood the behavioral, the causal effect to behavior change, that fact didn't really matter. Now we know if we can influence customers and make them more healthy. The benefit is in the entire ecosystem. And so we can actually share that profit with them in incentivizing them. So we create a kind of a virtuous cycle. And the point made earlier. And I think that's a critical model in terms of actually creating this shared value approach because we're completely aligned to our customers. But the point is, it's kind of paradoxical. If you look at the data, it is so compelling. It's remarkable. We've seen the causal effect of behavior change that people from a sedentary perspective becoming physically active, bring more tality down by like 5,058% people sleeping seven hours a night compared to, you know, interrupted sleep, 24% reduction in death rates and health care costs. It's quite remarkable and hugely elastic. So, you know, you were talking about healthspan and lifespan. I looked at some data earlier, female, aged 70, with a whole range of chronicity with just a few activities could double her healthspan. So when you see this data, you kind of realize the opportunity we're sitting on. But this is the problem. You talk about this academically, but the truth is, to get people to change behavior is a very complicated issue. I always like the story of, I think over 52% of people with multiple Chronicity believe they're in good health. So in actually overly optimistic, I saw some data from, from our data that I think 40% of our covered base that have had heart attacks are not adhering to their medicine. So even if the data is there and it's clear 4040, it's bizarre. So even if the data is there and it's clear, getting people to actually change behavior is a very complicated thing to do. We overly optimistic. We suffer from what's called hyperbolic discounting. We don't care about the future we want. Now. So, you know, going for that run, avoiding that. You know that that chocolate is painful now. But the benefits are in 30 years time. So just don't do it. So how do you how do you kind of bridge that and get behavior change. We found some really powerful ways. I mean some of them are obvious. I think one is just kind of relevance. We talk to our clients in a way that bridges everything from physical activity to sleep to chronic disease. So it talks to them the context of why with AI and how we can tell them why they should do this. Be very specific. But the key issue is, are behavioral triggers of trying to get people to change behavior. So we try and work with all these behavioral biases. We give people points and statuses. So there's a feeling of progress immediately trying to kind of overcome that hyperbolic discounting. We give people massive extrinsic benefits, you know, discounts on unhealthy food travel benefits, very valuable benefits to change behavior. We've done some amazing work with companies like Apple using the Apple Watch and other devices where effectively, and this is a loss aversion issue. We are programmed for loss aversion. As humans, we are somehow more motivated by potential loss than by potential gain. So what we do is you kind of get the watch upfront, you pay nothing for it, you pay for it monthly. But the amount that you pay is a function of how physically active you are. So if you're meeting your goals effectively, you know the monthly payment comes down to zero. So it kind of evokes loss aversion. I've got this device, whatever it may be. Now we're working with aura. I've got this device and I lose it if I'm not physically active. And we see it from the data, the remarkable change in behavior. So, you know, to my mind, the, you know, the data is incredibly compelling. We're in a very exciting time, but don't underrate the complexity of getting people to actually just make those changes. And I think last year we generated we actually ordered a 600 million health activities across a big 10 million client base across many markets. But the effect of this is powerful. So I think we're sitting on a very important time, like more the idea that there's an underspending on prevention and just much too much on curative. And if we can rebalance that, the potential is massive.
Yeah. It's such an interesting point. You know, is it a lack of knowledge or ones we have that knowledge then are we able to make the behavior change. And then to your point, what will actually drive and sustain that behavior change. So you know I think there's a there's a path that we're still sounds like understanding, but gaining some really meaningful insights into such a fascinating perspective you have with such a big population. I'm really excited about where this will lead us in the next couple of years to be able to do this at scale. So, you know, I think when we look at this group and the broader ecosystem, clearly health and wellness is not a single entity, single industry solution or problem. And partnerships are so important is we think about health insurance and medicines and the consumer perspective, you know, how what are the critical partnerships, you know, from your perspective, Mads, and how do partnerships really enable us to accelerate, say, the research or potentially the fundamental impact?
Okay. I'll give you two examples, because one example is about on a global scale, if you really want, let's say people do get ill, they get chronic disease, they get diabetes, whatever. And we haven't succeeded in preventing because we have 800 million living with diabetes today. Then the partnership has to be with global reach. That means W.H.O. Global Fund, world Bank entities that when coming together with the solutions. And that could be an essential medicine like Glp1, for instance. Then you actually have to cater at very low cost with the cold chain and availability and, and the healthcare system that can actually adopt it. That means that you have to have internet access. You have because there are far too few healthcare workers. So there's an element of making sure that you use health, AI and telemedicine to even diagnose these individuals. So that kind of partnership requires a multitude, as we've learned also here, a multitude of different stakeholders and partners to come together. And another one is more technical. One. So when we kicked off two major clinical cohort studies, because what we want is people to prevent atherosclerosis from developing and developing into heart attacks and strokes and death. And and there today we actually have the technology. You can use an AI risk predictor with very simple things like one blood sample, one scanning. Take a person who is 25 years old, and if that person already has developed fatty streaks, which is the early signs of atherosclerosis, plus a couple of other things in the AI risk predictor, we can then actually do a randomized trial. This we're doing now do a randomized trial where half of the population continue until around age 4550, whatever. They start getting heart attacks and strokes because we know that will happen. And then we can randomize the other half if they're willing to, to take, let's say, the things like statins, maybe GLP one to actually see. Can we create a societal story where if we on a population basis are able to ten years from now, early on, see who is at risk and who is not, and then take the ones at risk and give them very cheap preventative solutions. But in order to do such a trial, like we're doing now in Denmark and in Spain and elsewhere, then you need the physicians community, you need the tech providers like the Philips or whatever of this world. You need software algorithm, developers, you need medicines providers. So we basically everything we do and everything we fund is somehow in partnerships. But the partnerships sometimes are global. Sometimes they're about getting a clinical cohort up and running. And in other occasions when it's about behavioral modification, whether it's about, mental distress and so on, then it's totally different, of course. But partnerships, these are complex diseases. And I have to say the word cure. If only when you say cure, you meant cure. Actually, what we're doing is treating symptoms cancer. Sometimes we cure. But these chronic diseases were actually not really curing them. We sometimes get them into remission. When we then stop, they come back. So. So that's why prevention is much better than than symptom treatment.
It's such an amazing point in time we're at where I think we can prevent cardiovascular disease. And this is the number one killer, the biggest killer more than the next six causes combined. And what's fascinating to me. So I have I look very healthy. I'm a big runner but I have high LP little A and most people don't realize this is genetic. Like if I were not a physician, I'd go to the doctor and be like, I'm healthy. But actually I have a very high cardiovascular risk. But to know that is this intersection, I use consumer genomics to determine that, you know, I then take these medicines, but it is this partner ecosystem. I think right now, we need to do a better job of promoting the idea that there are diseases we can fundamentally prevent, but there's no one part of that solution. And I don't think we're also bringing it together in a way that's consumable by the average person yet. But it is exciting and inspiring that we can prevent these diseases.
Can I just add what you.
Just LP little A is for once an example where we may be able to make semi personalized medicine because no drug targets LP little a yet as you know there are two programs in phase three, so it's looking very promising. So that is one of the first examples where we can actually say okay, cardiovascular disease which you don't have I hope. But but to prevent it in your case means targeting LP little A in other cases target LDL cholesterol. So that's actually an example of where we are industry wise moving towards semi personalized medicine.
Yeah it's very exciting. I think again the medicine is advancing. Now the question is how do we scale that impact into a consumer who in some cases doesn't have access to it, in some cases may not even know their own underlying genetics or risk factors? So I think we're at the tip of the iceberg. But the impact we're far from the real distributed impact and positive outcomes that we could generate. So please, let's.
Go for it. Can I build on that personalization because please, that is triggering. Absolutely a key innovation because at the end of the day, human beings are strange creatures, right. And certainly if we talk about behavior, like you said, I'll give you an example on on personalized nutrition. And we've done that with, with top athletes. So we have sponsored a team with cyclists who are doing the tour de France. Wow. Basically three weeks on a bike, 100, 180km on average a day. It's not very healthy. You can only continue that if you have personalized nutrition, personalized experience. We've. So what was the team of 12 riders. And these riders were willing to give their blood every day to put everything they they have on their diet, exercise everything. So you need to have the data. I mean, lots of people are not willing to give all the data in parallel. We did that with the soccer team out of secrecy. I will not say which soccer team. And there were 23 football players, soccer players, and we explained the same and said, listen, it will help your health, it will help your immunity, it will be quicker on your feet. And they said, okay, fine, let's let's try now with the cycling team. We worked years and years very successfully and you could do your heart rate variability, your VO2 max, everything because they were willing to to measure everything and were very precise. But they also saw their direct effect on their capability and therefore they were willing to continue. The soccer players first thought, I'm a soccer player. I'm on the first team because I have talent, right? And this bloody DSM feminist, why? Why would I do nutrition? Right? And they said, how do you have a direct link to be a better soccer player if you take the right nutrition? Now, I think we have the best soccer player in the world with Ronaldo, who shows that you can still play when you're 38 or 39 at the top. But after a year of this 23 soccer player, we had two left.
Wow.
Because they basically said, why would I go to all the turmoil? Because we were there every day. So blood testing, personalized nutrition, and they didn't see the direct benefit of playing better or scoring more goals. Right. It's sort of an enabler bringing into it. So if there's no direct link and a direct benefit for humans changing human behavior, it's bloody difficult. It's bloody difficult. And we need that. We need to take that as our own responsibility to make that preventative health care work.
Yeah.
I'd love to hear from Adrian.
Do you see this in your data like that feedback loop. How important.
Is absolutely critical? You know, you're talking about personalized personal medicine and tailoring it in in prevention in a very simple way. I'll give you a great example. So forget about, you know, high level athletes doing steps per day. We now know how beneficial that is. So the original heuristic 10,000 steps. Turns out you need 7000 or 10,000. But the effects are dramatic. The question is how do you get people to do that? Right. We've learned from some of the data, kind of this theory of habit formation. You've got to kind of ladder them up. You say to someone, they're doing nothing, do 7000 tomorrow, they'll do for a day or two, and then it's just too much. They give it up. So there are algorithms and other AI where you kind of say on the face of the mobile, you know, why don't you do, I don't know, 500 steps today and kind of looking at the data personalize that ladder upwards. So I think the ability to personalize the intervention you know how you do it in our world we actually will change the incentive based on, you know, the value of that action because we carrying that risk, you know, but to this point of actually making how you speak to people, the tonality, saying to people, you should do this because, you know, you're a parent with two children, that's very important for you. Those kind of nudges and tonality make a massive difference. So beside the complexity of kind of personalized medicine in the space of behavior change, the ability of AI with data to actually work out what that next action is, kind of value propensity, what that optimal point is, how you talk to people, what the tone is, what you flag, and then how you maybe ladder and kind of get them in to do that stuff. It's an amazing world of opportunity. So and again, we are we're in a space where we're dealing with not necessarily health seeking people. We're covering a population. Most of them, in fact, have no interest in health beside the intellectual idea of it. So we've got to kind of pull them in. But the world today, I think of kind of using AI and data llms to actually carefully give context is an amazing, exciting world. We're seeing the early the results now, you know, kind of five times the adherence. So I agree with you. I think we're in a very exciting space.
Can I just add one thing. Go for it.
Because this I totally agree. This thing that, you know, apparently you're LP is high because you have that insight. You are probably willing to take a preventative medicine and be compliant with it because you actually know I'm really at risk of cardiovascular disease. However, when my old folks developed Ozempic and Wegovy, we did trials to show 20% in all cause mortality reduction, kidney failure, and dialysis and transplantation 24% all these things. Funny thing is, when you take the average patient who's got like diabetes or is obese without diabetes, they don't have the insight you do that, they are really at risk. So what happens is come on company. You're telling me I'm going to I'm going to have heart disease because I'm not I'm just a little bit overweight. I want your medicine. But so it's this thing when you have data and you know that actually you are at risk, then you're willing to go the extra mile. But when you're an average person who doesn't have that insight, then your behavior is not likely to to mimic yours.
It's such it's such a great.
Point because, you know, inherently we're more interested in ourselves, and the more it can actually be an individualized and personalized insight. I think it does have more power to drive change. So, you know, the question is, how do we how do we get there? How do we enable the average person to have this personalized insight? Sounds like Adrian's company is doing this at scale. You know, Helena, when you look at this from the consumer vantage point, I guess two questions. One, how do we ensure we can get these to consumers? And at this current point in time, is it driving more health disparity? Is there an access challenge?
I'll pick up on the personalization point, because one of the things you can do is not just and and it's linked into this. If you think of the person as a whole, it's not just about the healthcare. You can, for example, offer older consumers energy solutions as well as health solutions at the same time. So I think it's even more sort of come out of health and think across the entire journey and life of a person and genuinely help them and look at those outcomes. That's the really exciting bit. And you have to remember the downsides of personalization, which, you know, there are. One of the key ones we look at is personalized pricing. Because there is so much information about you, there is absolutely the danger and the need to watch out for the fact that I can be charged. And, you know, we have seen examples of exactly the same product should not in the healthcare space, but should have been absolutely available five times more expensive because you're older, because we think you can pay more and that okay, you know, the rules of the game, the rules of economics. But people genuinely think that is fundamentally unfair. And so you're again undermining the trust. So the pros and cons of personalization of both from an individual and a societal perspective, need to be thought through the bits I think we can have as a really interesting conversation are number one responsibility. You know, there is a lot that's happening in the world where responsibility is being pushed onto the individual to know, to act, to change. Good. There are, there are, but there is a balance to be played here, especially with people who are becoming more and more vulnerable. Our evidence shows our analysis shows that up to 75% of people are vulnerable through things like temporal shocks. Right. You get an income shock. There is a different type of vulnerability in the marketplace. So be thoughtful about, you know, responsibility and where it lies. Consumers have rights. Over 40 years, there has been an entire agreement amongst consumer policy makers, you know, what are the rights of consumers in the marketplace? And one of those was that the online marketplace should be as trustworthy as traditional marketplaces where, you know, where are we on that? So I think, you know, as you're starting to say, let's talk about consumers and patients as consumers. Consumers have rights. And let's start with that fundamental, do not assume that innovation needs to not assume resilience. It needs to, you know, we treat consumers as rational human beings. Perhaps I think something like 16 countries have some sort of vulnerability, you know, and protection approach. Right now we are assuming that resilience is in place and we are not taking a more nuanced approach and personalized making personalization work for us. The last part on outcomes, you started out this session by saying this is a segment which is growing in the trillions. Let's look at outcomes so that we start that with the number of people who are benefiting, the number of people who are genuinely seeing an outcome from this. Otherwise, another sector we work in is finance. 80% of people now have a digital bank account. It's awesome. It really is one of the ways in which technology can help. People can have access, can, you know, bring gender empowerment. But back to that stat about who can access emergency funds, make this the space where it's not just about access, it is about inclusion. The outcomes are real for people. That's that's the sort of the principled way in which you could start a really valuable conversation, then get into, as you said, the roles of those different parts of our world and our marketplace and how they fit together.
Yeah, I mean, I think this is such an important point, right? When we're at Wecf in ten years from now, what will be different and how what is the penetration of these technologies for good and for positive impact? We only have a couple of minutes left, roughly. Let's do a speed round, if you don't mind, with kind of two questions in one question would be if we had a magic wand and could enable a person to have one insight about their health, their genome, their essentially understanding of their family history and better depth, which might be tied to the genome if it would be, I guess, ultimately, like what would be the health insight you would want them to have? And if there was a magic wand or even a device ChatGPT that works. A physical tracker. One question what would that device or insight be? And then the second question is if we could change one behavior, whether it's sleep more, walk more, you know, what would the what would your magic wand for behavior change be?
The latter one, I actually think, I would suggest that people simply try to eat healthier, think about what they put in their mouth. But what was mentioned about healthspan and lifespan, lifespan is how long you live. Healthspan is how long you live without any kind of medical condition. I think if we had one way of actually showing people via a measurement, which we don't. But if we did that, if you behave better, your healthspan increases in parallel with your lifespan, and that means you have many years without any disease. The problem today is that we're witnessing, even in my country, Denmark, that the lifespan is increasing. But healthspan is not. So you're living more years with Chronicity. So. So if we could develop that, I think that would start making people think, wow, maybe I should increase my healthspan by doing healthy stuff.
I love that. So your magic wand would be, how would you visualize your healthspan and lifespan and the impact of behaviors on those two measures?
It could be fantastic.
Yeah, that would be amazing.
Helena. I, intrigued. The link between clean air and cognitive decline and dementia. Last year, there were studies that came out showing, levels of pollution. We now all 99% of us breathe unclean air, dirty air. And that is now, you know, that has multiple long term benefits, long term issues. Excuse me. And the links now to some of these mental health problems are I would love everybody to start building that in. It's one of the key things that we can really work on together. The thing I would love to see is digital and human contact together. Those things have to come together to work for doctors, to trust in the technology, for consumers to trust in the technology, that it works together. Because these things, you know, are. I would worry about a world where we have to rely on tapping in something at 2 a.m. about my two year old, you would want that surround sound to work for everybody. And you know that doctors trust this as much. You know, that's one of the key solutions in here as well.
It's such a powerful point.
And I think, you know, I didn't come to mind was clean air like that didn't come to my mind. But of course, we know that, you know, 25% of the world's population will suffer from COPD in 2030. And a huge driver is air pollution. And we know it has cognitive effects, long term lung effects. And it's just it's such a great point. It's something we all probably need to be very aware of and to drive global health. We need to look at this worldwide. All right. On Dimitri with your magic wand. What is the insight and what is the change.
So before one magic wand I want to close the loop on affordability. I think we didn't close the loop, but I'll be quick. So in my thinking is that people who can afford preventative health care are the ones who have middle income or high income. They should spend that money so that total health care costs, there is a base that everybody can take care of. So the differentiation also in pricing is that the basic health care is taken care of for everybody, and that people who have in this privileged position pay also a little bit more to do that. Right. So then to your point, magic wand and I need to think it through, but I threw it on the table anyway. So I've seen a movie two years ago that was about, an environment where people would live a sort of a limited time, and they knew their time. They had a big indicator these are the number of hours left living. And if you behaved well, it went up. If you behaved less, it went down. And every day it went down.
Right now.
I'm not saying we should use that concept for health expectancy, but if we measure.
, yeah.
Every day we do steps or whatever, but you have the number of hours left and I have to think it through because it also has collateral damage knowing it.
Also somnia.
But I think it will help. Yeah. For some.
Well, and the interesting point is it's largely true. Not to say there aren't diseases that, you know, aren't necessarily tied to behavior, but we don't have that clock. But every day we live is driving that ultimate timeline, you know, for the.
We don't have that clock. Right. And to your point, we always think that we are the exception to the rule. Right?
Right.
And that's slightly overweight. But I don't have any cardiovascular issues. Right, right. If that is on your on your watch. Yeah. I think you will change behavior.
Yeah. The reality of the situation.
But but let me think it through first.
I really applaud that you put something out there that was quite interesting. And and the truth is we do live in a way that drives that clock. We just don't see the clock. So in a sense, it's not that controversial, but it's very interesting. Okay, Adrian. And if there's other comments you want to make generally.
Disappoint you, we actually do have that clock. So we.
Oh wow. This is the actuarial clock.
Actuarial clock. That's the problem with it. So you know saying to someone you've got 32.3 healthy years left is quite a complicated message. Yeah. So we've we've kind of dealt with Healthspan. We've dealt with your effective age. There are different ways of showing the clock. But it's not a it's not a silver bullet. It's a powerful it is a powerful motivator. I mean, my, my desire would be if we could transform our industry's life and health into doing this. To your earlier point, the scale of it could transform humanity. It really could. Given how big it is, the golden, the golden age for me, certainly our data is physical activity.
Yeah.
People physically active at all ages. We've done we've published papers on people with cancer, recovering from chemo across the board. Carefully curated physical activity is a an elixir. It's quite remarkable. And I think we've got to get people out of this mindset of this is fluffy, nice to have. It actually affects how your genes express themselves. You know, methylation of genes. You can actually see the change in epigenetics. So the this is not a soft issue. It's a fundamental health issue. So if I had my way, I'd get people walking 7500 steps carefully curated with with some consumer caveats but carefully done. And I think it's a dramatic change in humanity.
There's almost no health measure that isn't impacted by physical activity. And there was really interesting emerging research showing that it even impacts our children. So, you know, the health status of a parent at the time of conception. You can see differences in the epigenome of physically fit, specifically fathers. And so, you know, this isn't just about the current here and now in me. It is really about the future. And obviously those behaviours are also passed down to our families. So, well, we're out of time. Thank you for such a fascinating conversation and I hope everyone enjoys the rest of the World Economic Forum.
Thank you.
Well done.