#50 🍩 What the Health - NVIDIA goes hard at health, Amazon's delivering Ozempic & is long COVID real?
Your health tech & innovation TL;DR roundup
Happy hump day friends!
Tis a short and sweet week. And we all deserve a little rest and treat
Today I thought we’d just start by sharing this all too (sadly) accurate analogy on the current state of the health system.
Though we all know an overhaul and change of tact be desperately needed (and have for literal decades) it seems the move to proactive and preventative is just a smidge… hard. With the disaster just compounding and any sign of really amending any of it getting further from sight 🙃
However, its nice to see consumer preferences - at least in some *cough* rich parts, swing back that way.
Anyway… on to the news today!
(And promise there's some more positive stuff 😉🔥)
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Noteworthy 🗞️
Funding
In news that shocks no one…
🎓 Aussie Unis are demanding 30% equity in startups based on on-campus research, making it challenging to raise capital & spin out good, competitive companies
📱 Hola Health, a fast-growing telehealth startup, raised $4.5m in a pre-Series A
🩸 Illumina & UniMelb gave $6.5m to 4 genomics projects:
Centre for Eye Research Aus: a database of inherited retinal diseases to inform new treatments for the most common causes of blindness
Peter Mac: a blood test for difficult cancer diagnoses of unknown primary origin
Royal Women’s and the Mercy: investigating the lining of the uterus to find new solutions for abnormal menstrual bleeding, infertility and pregnancy disorders
Royal Melb: predictive disease modelling for prostate cancer diagnoses
🍐 Bae Juice raised $1m to bring its hangover prevention drink to the US
🦄 LaunchVic picked their predicted next 10 unicorns for their 30X30 program, ft. Mindset Health (digital hypnotherapy) and Telecare (telehealth for rural Aussies)
💸 Science & Technology Aus reckon our lack of R&D investment is costing us $100b & 42,000 jobs
“If we fail to ramp up R&D, Australia’s standard of living will continue to decline.”
“Low investment in R&D is holding our country back it’s leading to our best ideas going overseas to our international competitors and when we give up our ideas – our intellectual property – it’s never coming back.”
Newsworthy
🚽 Aussies are using more coke, meth and MDMA but drinking less alcohol this year, according to new analysis of sewage for drugs
🐕 The Black Dog Institute has launched a new research centre that will use AI to detect depression earlier and deliver timely interventions
🏆 The World’s Best Hospitals list is out and the only Aussie hospitals to crack the top 100 were The Royal Prince Alfred (56th) and The Alfred (97th)
🤑 The Australian’s list of 250 richest Aussies includes founders of healthcare companies such as Chemist Warehouse, Pro Medicus, and PharmaCare
🫁 The National Cancer Screening Register is expanding to include lung cancer
🧪Doherty Clinical Trials, Aus’s first 1st purpose-built facility to deliver human challenge trials, launched to accelerate development of novel medicines and vaccines through bespoke early phase clinical trials
🥊 The Medical Board of Australia and the RACGP have criticised Eucalyptus’ asynchronous telehealth prescription model, calling it a “tick and flick” exercise
🚫 QLD’s CHO has called for the term “long COVID” to be scrapped, after a study suggested that “post-COVID symptoms are no worse than the after-effects of the flu”
However, the study has not been published with some pretty major methodological issues (e.g. it focused on a highly vaccinated population with Omicron, a variant less likely to inflict long COVID).
For a deep dive, see this video from Kaden Huckstep covering some of the issues with the science and how it has been reported
TLDR; One study, with poor methods - does not a concencus make..
But can create impact, which can be bloody dangerous
👮♂️ Medibank’s data breach has been linked to 11,000 cybercrimes by the Vic Police
Gov Goss
🚭 Vaping reforms were introduced that would ban selling vapes, and only allow a prescription for nicotine vapes to aid in quitting smoking
👩⚕️ New legislation proposes allowing nurse practitioners and midwives to prescribe through the PBS and bill for services through the MBS
📝 Dept of Health Secretary, Blair Comley started an initiative called “the AFR test” so that budget proposals will be written more clearly and “crisply”
I.e. so us plebs can actually understand wtf is going on
🏳️🌈 NSW introduced a bill to ban LGBTQIA+ conversion practices in the state
US & Beyond the Borders
🚚 Eli Lilly partnered with Amazon Pharmacy for home delivery of its weight loss, diabetes and migraine drugs
🍽️ ClassPass added healthy food and beverage partners to its platform in the US
🛠️ Mayo Clinic launched a new program (Solutions Studio) to speed up development and deployment of digital health products in hospitals
🏋️♂️ Equinox added US$1.8b in new capital and is building 25 new clubs
👓 UK surgeons used Apple’s VR goggles in an operation to repair a patient’s spine
🐷 A pig kidney has been transplanted into a living human for the first time
Scientists used gene editing technology to remove “harmful pig genes” and boost the organ’s compatibility by adding human genes
📉 Weight Watchers’ stock plummeted after Oprah announced leaving the board
💙 Aria CV, a medical device startup, announced that they’ve treated their first patient using its novel implantable device for preventing heart failure
🤖 Epic, the health records giant, is investing heavily in generative AI building a suite of 60 tools it hopes to sell to thousands of US hospitals
🇬🇧 Steve Rowe, the former boss of M&S, has been hired to help improve productivity in the NHS using digital technologies, AI, and electronic health records
🧠 Khosla Ventures led a US$14m Series A round in mental health triage startup Limbic, whose tools are currently used by the NHS and plan to expand to the US
💉 Healthcare startups are supposedly seeing a resurgence in VC interest after a slump in 2023
Sick Science
📦 Sydney scientists kept two human livers alive outside the body for a week
Using an organ-preserving machine nicknamed a "liver in a box," this innovative approach allowed researchers to test powerful new gene therapies directly on the donated organs, potentially revolutionizing medicine.
🌊 Memories are made… by the direction of brain waves?
Scientists found new info showing brain waves travel in one direction when memories are made, and the opposite when recalled. Understanding this can help with new approaches to brain computer interfaces, and diagnosing memory-related disorders.
🦠 Microplastics can potentially cause tumours?!
New research has found that microplastics in the gastrointestinal tract remain in cancer cells for much longer than previously assumed, as they are passed on to the newly formed cell during cell division. This study is also the first evidence that microplastics could promote the metastasis of tumours.
🫀 A new study is running rampant in the media - claiming intermittent fasting is bad for your heart… but is it really?
An unpublished study of 20,000 adults found those who followed an 8-hour time-restricted eating schedule, a type of intermittent fasting, had a 91% higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease. However, the study has several serious limitations.
Participants completed 2 interviews, less than 2 weeks apart, about what time they ate on the previous day. The researchers then calculated the participants’ average eating windows and assumed it was their typical schedule for the rest of the study (~8 years).
This is a massive assumption, and there are other reasons they might have restricted eating (e.g. food insecurity, eating disorders, illnesses). And if intermittent fasting is really harmful, it’s not clear why that might be.
TLDR: TBC
🤖 AI Updates…
🔍 Google Health gave updates on their AI projects, including AI for chest X-rays, a personalised health coaching LLM, and Google Lens for skin conditions
🧠 DeepMind cofounder Mustafa Suleyman is the new CEO of Microsoft AI
♟️ NVIDIA’s big moves in healthcare are becoming clearer, as they dropped a bunch of updates:
Announcing 25 new cloud-agnostic AI microservices to help healthcare developers make use of generative AI in their applications
Collabs with Johnson & Johnson and GE Healthcare for surgery and medical imaging
Investing > $50m into AI drug discovery projects working with the likes of Roche’s Genentech & Schrödinger in 2021
💥 AFR data shows there’s an AI funding boom, but Aussies are being left out, with local funding for new AI startups dropping more rapidly than the global average
It’s even worse for women:
“We’ve all heard about how only 2 per cent of venture capital goes to females, well, in AI it’s only 0.3 per cent.” - Lee Yearsley, CEO of aKin
🆓 Google and NVIDIA have a bunch of free courses on AI to upsill:
Google’s 10 courses include intros to LLMS, image generation and responsible AI
NVIDIA dropped 9 courses on neural networks, generative AI and data workflows
Startup Stuff 🚀
Have an idea or health solution for an underserved community?
Cogniss, AWS Health & The Validitron launched the Priority Population Digital Health Challenge - where you can pitch to a panel of healthcare leaders including the CMO of AWS, gain access to a 12-month program offering support through the creation, validation and deployment of digital health solutions for priority populations in Aus - More here
Researcher interested in mRNA medicine R&D?
Moderna’s 2024 Australia Fellowship Program is an all-inclusive learning and development opportunity with training and education covering areas essential for mRNA medicine R&D. In addition to supporting salary and expenses, it also offers a bespoke learning program that leverages Moderna’s in-house expertise - More here
Aussie based org with an overseas partner?
EOIs are now open for the Global Science & Technology Diplomacy Fund - Strategic Element with grants from $100k to $1m available for eligible Australian orgs collaborating on key areas of science and technology (e.g. AI, RNA vaccines) and therapies with priority partner countries across the Asia-Pacific region - More here
Need funding to support international clinical trials?
The 2024 International Clinical Trial Collaborations grant opportunity will support projects that promote Australia’s involvement in international research, and that provide high-quality evidence of the effectiveness of novel health treatments, drugs or devices. Up to $3m in grant funding is available - More here
Are you a Vic digital health company approaching proof of concept?
ANDHealth ACTIVATE is a purpose-built accelerator program for Vic digital & digitally enabled health companies. Throughout the 6-month program you’ll receive access to mentoring, world-class content, and access to national and international industry leaders - More here
Looking to expand to the EU or UK?
Join ANDHealth’s Delegation to London Tech Week and HLTH Europe to connect with key decision-makers, industry experts, and learn from companies that have already succeeded in these markets. You’ll receive complimentary VIP passes to London Tech Week, exclusive facilitated roundtables and network events, and on-the-ground support from the ANDHealth team - More here
Vic Medtech looking to fund commercialisation?
LaunchVic’s newly launched MedTech Market Growth Program will provide $50k matched funding to up to 20 medtech startups & scaleups to help with the skills, services and resources they need to push their life-saving products to market - More info & apply here
Deep tech business operating from Aus?
Cicada x Tech23 is Australia’s biggest deep tech festival, and they’re looking for 23 companies to share their vision on stage. Founders taking part will gain exposure to a wide network of investors, ecosystem leaders, and potential partners - More here
Events💥
Thu 4th Apr: Health Translation SA: Research Translation Essentials Course (Adl)
Tue 9th Apr: Cicada HealthTech Hub Masterclass: Pitching to investors and industry partners (Syd)
Tue 9th Apr: Raising the Bar (Syd)
Thurs 11th Apr: WTH x Jumar Bionicubator: The CSL Story (Melb)
Fri 12th Apr: NSSN: End-to-end Product development 101 Workshop - how to turn your lab prototype into a commercially ready device (Syd)
Tue 16th Apr: BioMelbourne Network: Innovations in Cardiovascular Health (Mel)
Sun 21st Apr: VicHealth: Intergenerational Masterclass on Health, Policy and Leadership (Mel)
1st - 2nd May: Blackbird Sunrise Festival (Syd)
7th - 8th May: Digital Health Festival (Mel)
Tues 21st May: ANDHealth Summit – Digital Health: Hype or Here to Stay? AI, Investment & Industry Trends (Adl)
Consumable Content 💎
🎙️ The Daily Aus: Will Australia’s tanning culture ever change?
Australian of the Year and cancer doc Prof Georgina Long discusses how we can change people’s minds about tanning
💻 Digital marketing, in case you missed it, is kind of bloody important.
Check out this piece in Forbes on How Digital Marketing Can Be A Game Changer For Healthcare Providers
In our last edition, we discussed a study that showed the impact of exercise (and specifically dancing) on depression. Proof is in the pudding and tbh we back this. Maybe tiktok dancers were onto something
And...a funny reel about a serious issue. We be haemorrhaging a lot of docs.
And whilst its great for the memes (and validates my personal life choices), it is not good for like, society 🙃 🥲
💡Got thoughts? Something to include next time?
Hit reply or reach out to emily@whatthehealth.io to let us know!
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Have a fab Easter long weekend and go enjoy some delicious things friends
👋 Emily,
Jas & team WTH
With thanks to our partners 💜
You might appreciate this podcast:
https://soberchristiangentlemanpodcast.substack.com/p/s1-ep-11-scgp-rebroadcast-4e5