The Westin St. Francis San Francisco on Union Square lodge hosted this 12 months’s JPMorgan Healthcare Conference — the primary for the reason that onset of the coronavirus pandemic. (Darius Tahir/KHN)
Darius Tahir/KHN
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Darius Tahir/KHN
The Westin St. Francis San Francisco on Union Square lodge hosted this 12 months’s JPMorgan Healthcare Conference — the primary for the reason that onset of the coronavirus pandemic. (Darius Tahir/KHN)
Darius Tahir/KHN
SAN FRANCISCO — Health care’s enterprise class returned to its San Francisco sanctuary final week for JPMorgan’s annual well being care confab, on the gilded Westin St. Francis lodge on Union Square. After a two-year pandemic pause, the temper among the many executives, bankers and startup founders in attendance had the aura of a reunion — as they gossiped about promotions, work-from-home routines, who’s getting what investments. Dressed of their capitalist greatest — starting from brilliant-blue or pastel-purple blazers to puffy-coat stylish — they thronged to massive events held in artwork galleries and eating places.
But the occasion was tinged with new nervousness: Would the massive cash invested in well being care as a result of COVID-19 proceed to circulation? Would buyers ask to see outcomes — which means income — moderately than simply cool concepts?
The buzzy convention had simply as many phrases about income as about sufferers. The largely maskless crowd spoke English, French, Japanese — and, in fact, cash.
Besides the company and funding sorts, attendees routinely noticed stunning characters — like movie star physician Mehmet Oz, recent off his Senate loss, holding court docket within the foyer on Jan. 10.
If the vibe within the lodge’s congested halls was upbeat — or, no less than, cheery — beneath there was a frisson of hysteria as all had been conscious that the well being care enterprise bonanza seems to be slowing down.
The convention began with a sidewalk protest of pharmaceutical firm Gilead Sciences, whose medicine combating HIV and hepatitis C are fabulously efficient — and fabulously costly. During the pandemic, Congress for the primary time has arrange a plan to permit Medicare to barter U.S. drug costs, that are by far the best on this planet. In an announcement, firm spokesperson Catherine Cantone mentioned Gilead is the biggest non-public funder of HIV applications within the U.S., including, “Gilead’s function in ending the HIV and hepatitis epidemics is to find, develop, and guarantee entry to our life-saving medicines.”
‘A tough 12 months’
Then there’s the financial surroundings, which is popping treacherous. Journalists at monetary publication Bloomberg diagnosed an absence of thrilling offers. Startup executives — who beforehand discovered thousands and thousands of {dollars} in investments straightforward to come back by — appeared obligated to indicate ends in their impromptu pitches in bars and low outlets. Business executives of all stripes promised they both at the moment made income or had been about to … quickly.
“I feel this can be a difficult 12 months,” mentioned Hemant Taneja, CEO of the enterprise capital agency General Catalyst, throughout one panel. He advised that enormous swaths of well being tech startups had been overvalued and that their shoppers might be extra desirous about whether or not they’re truly offering helpful companies.
The new message from potential buyers was clear. “The concept you can develop and never be worthwhile is useless, gone,” mentioned Dr. Jon Cohen, CEO of the psychological well being startup Talkspace, in an interview.
Some tried to have a good time each monetary and humanitarian success. BioNTech co-founder Uğur Şahin was interrupted by applause throughout a presentation because the developer, with Pfizer, of the mRNA vaccine recounted the pictures’ function in preventing the pandemic. And that was earlier than he touted his firm’s function in decreasing infectious illness, saving lives, and assembly world well being wants for tuberculosis and malaria.
The dialog later turned to the pricing of his firm’s flagship vaccine — which it is jockeying to set at greater than $100 a dose, up from a median authorities buy worth of $20.69. 100 bucks is a good worth contemplating the “well being economics,” BioNTech’s chief technique officer, Ryan Richardson, argued: the hospitalizations and severe outcomes averted.
A mind-bending remark
There was some cognitive dissonance on the convention. Consider drugstore big CVS — which is steadily increasing past its retail roots into medical insurance and first care. CVS Health CEO Karen Lynch mentioned that as a part of its well being enterprise the corporate is taking a look at all of the elements that underlie being properly. “Health is not simply concerning the engagement with the supplier; it is about all the opposite elements — together with housing and diet,” she mentioned. Left unaddressed was the sight typically greeting CVS prospects upon getting into a retailer: sweet, chips, and different processed meals.
For critics, it was a mind-bending remark. “The final I heard, CVS was a for-profit firm, not a social welfare company,” mentioned Marion Nestle, a researcher who’s a longtime critic of the meals trade. “It sells junk meals that make individuals sick and medicines to deal with these sicknesses. How’s that for a nifty enterprise mannequin!”
CVS spokesperson Ethan Slavin provided a really completely different imaginative and prescient, one during which CVS is in search of to be a premier well being and wellness vacation spot. “We’re all the time evolving our meals and beverage assortment to offer more healthy, on-trend merchandise.” It can be supporting applications to bolster meals availability in underserved areas, he added.
Some techies encountered new skepticism about “synthetic intelligence.” Ginkgo Bioworks co-founder Jason Kelly famous throughout his presentation that folks on the convention heard a lot about synthetic intelligence throughout the conferences, “they need to cease listening to it.” (Ginkgo’s AI, used to help pharmaceutical and biotech analysis, he mentioned, was completely different than the remaining.)
One surgeon, Dr. Rajesh Aggarwal, discovered conversations with financiers concerning the stealth startup he based, which focuses on metabolic well being, had been targeted on silver bullets. “Tell me if I make investments on this, I’ll 10x” the outlay, he mentioned, paraphrasing the bankers. Many, he mentioned, needed to “do some good as properly” for sufferers.
Aggarwal felt the buyers had been searching for easy options to well being issues. And one merchandise match that invoice: a brand new class of medicine — GLP-1 agonists, a sort of medicine that aids in weight reduction however will probably must be taken for lengthy durations. Some analysts are projecting these medicine might be value $50 billion. The bankers, Aggarwal felt, aren’t “desirous about well being care,” they’re “desirous about the {dollars} connected to the capsule.”
KHN (Kaiser Health News) is a nationwide, editorially impartial program of the Kaiser Family Foundation.