Closing the longevity science-translation gap in the United States

The life expectancy for a woman living in Japan is ~88 years, while the average American has life expectancy of ~79 [1]. Further, for a Japanese woman who does the known best practices for longevity and health (exercise, diet, no smoking, etc), life expectancy is likely easily over 90.

Thus, we have a science-translation gap of at least 11 years of lifespan for the average American. Healthier habits typically healthier aging, less disease and later onset of disease. It can also lead to lower rates of depression, greater wellbeing and greater productivity. Across 400 million Americans, that's 4.4 billion years of unnecessarily lost life. To me, this is a travesty and a huge opportunity for change. 

How do we close the gap? There are probably lots of ways to approach it. One idea is through a new company that does what Omada Health does for diabetes and hypertension, or what Octave Biosciences does for multiple sclerosis. As I understand it, these companies provide helpful interventions, often with a coach or advisor, to generate behavior change. For longevity and aging, simply increasing exercise and improving diet for Americans would be enough to close a lot of that gap. Healthcare payers, companies and our federal and state governments would benefit greatly if we did this. Maybe Omada will have more of a longevity focus over time? After all, alleviating diabetes and hypertension are closely related to slowing aging (diet, exercise, etc). Still, we would reach a much larger population if the focus was on extending lifespan vs. treating diabetes, pre-diabetes or hypertension. Both Omada and Octave are VC-backed. Might there be room for a similar new company focused on longevity?


Sources:

[1] Max Roser, Esteban Ortiz-Ospina and Hannah Ritchie (2013) - "Life Expectancy". Published online at OurWorldInData.org. Retrieved from: 'https://ourworldindata.org/life-expectancy' [Online Resource].