Biohacking for health optimization is one of those emerging trends that mean different things to different people. It can range from taking charge of one’s health by adopting research-validated lifestyle modifications in diet, exercise, sleep, meditation etc, to the grinder subculture of implanting chips, injecting chemicals, undergoing gene-editing using CRISPR technology and following cyborg-like ambitions.
The adoption of biohacking by the healthcare industry is closely linked with the growing size of the prevention & wellness sub-sector within the overall healthcare sector. This is because all the varied forms of biohacking are about ensuring wellness or the lack of diseases, rather than treating diseases. Biohacking gels perfectly with wellness also because they both concern themselves with not only prevention of diseases, but also bettering the physical and mental performance.
3. Prevention is the Way to Go
Currently, only 10-20% of the global healthcare industry is made up of the prevention & wellness sub-sector which consists of nutritional supplements, specialized diets, fitness programs, biohacking and such lifestyle solutions. But with the healthcare industry recently crossing the 10 trillion-dollar mark, this means the wellness sub-sector is already huge, valued between $1-2 trillion now. But growing forward, prevention & wellness is poised to do much better than the overall healthcare sector.
This is because prevention & wellness is growing at a faster clip of 15% as against healthcare’s overall growth rate of 7%. According to a major study by a global consultancy major, this will result in around 60% of the global healthcare industry consisting of prevention or wellness activities by 2040, overtaking even the classic reactionary model of treating diseases. There are several reasons for this enormous growth awaiting the prevention & wellness sub-sector.
The Kind of Biohacking
That is Going Mainstream
Until recently, around 10% of the GDP of developed nations like in North America & Europe were coming from their health & wellness industries, whereas in developing nations like India it is still close to low single digits. However, in recent years, the USA has clearly diverged from this trend with healthcare & wellness accounting for 18% of its GDP now.
This in turn is driven by several trends in this largest healthcare & wellness market in the world. For one, lifestyle modifications which are the most proven biohacks have gone mainstream in the US after the health insurance industry started covering them much like they provide for treatments like medicines, procedures & surgeries. Sooner or later, this trend is sure to spread to other developed nations and even to relatively faster growing developing economies like India & China.
Another major thrust for the wellness and biohacking industry is coming from the rapid deployment of technology. For example, the wellness genomics market which is the backbone of personalized prevention & wellness, is poised to touch $12.8 billion by the end of this decade, whereas its other enabler, the digital health records market is projected to reach $48.2 billion by 2025 itself.
There are several other drivers too for the fast growth of wellness and biohacking. One of the most prominent among them is the wearables and quantified self tools sector, which is growing at a rapid rate to touch $118 billion by the end of this decade. While the original devices were smartwatches, fitness bands, pedometers & smartphone apps, today this segment has unbelievable innovations like KardiaMobile, which is a pocket EKG that can detect all the common cardiac arrhythmias even while one is at home, office or travelling.
What Kind of Biohacking
Should You Invest In?
This is equally a riddle for individuals desiring to take charge of their health as well as for healthcare companies. For companies, this is not a million dollar or billion dollar question anymore, but a multi-trillion dollar question. Everyone from hospital systems to pharma giants to tech majors to private equity leaders to giant mutual funds to the best stock market analysts are all desperately trying to crack this puzzle – which way will the wellness and biohacking industry swing finally?
Three pointers are enough to answer this invaluable question. And they also reveal which kind of biohacking should you choose as an individual. Firstly, what will win eventually is what will deliver quantifiable good health & wellness. On this parameter, genomics based personalized lifestyle modifications is the clear winner. This is the gold standard in wellness and biohacking today as such modifications are epigenetic which means capable of overriding even genetic risks for diseases.
Secondly, what will win is those biohacking tools that can be mass adopted. On this count, the wearable wellness & biohacking devices is an obvious winner. Health & wellness ecosystems and metaverses that bring in gamification and rewards using such wearables are also expected to boom. One such example is Limoverse HealthFi which is a move-to-earn project that rewards users with crypto tokens whenever they go for a walk, jog or run. On the other hand, grinder technologies like implantables, injectables & gene editors have a clear disadvantage as there is great resistance for their mass adoption.
Thirdly, the safety of the biohacks will be a major concern deciding the eventual winner. On this count, the clear winner is likely to be the time-tested and totally safe biohacks from the ancient wellness systems like Ayurveda & Yoga, as well as the modern research-validated biohacks that are personalized based on each person’s genetic & metabolic traits, for safety, accuracy & efficacy.