#62 🍩 What The Health - India's free journal access, AI privacy concerns go too far (?) & Private health hospital cuts
Your health tech & innovation TL;DR roundup
Oh hey there friend,
HAPPY END OF YEAR!
It’s been a BIG one and a lot of fun. With no way we could have done it without each and every one of you - so, just wanted to say THANK YOU for being a part of it 🥹💜 And all that you all contribute - or even if you just passively lurk opening an occasional email or liking a Linkedin post, we still really love you.
As today is our final edition until we take a break til late Jan 2025, we thought it could be fun to see the year out with some stats before we say adios…
2024 saw
🍩 +8700 epic WTH Subscribers
🍩 >200,000 newsletter views
🍩 >1400 IRL event attendees
🍩 +16 IRL dinners and coffees
🍩 >6.5k messages sent in our private community
🍩 Priceless vibes and conversations
Also, thanks to everyone who came to our EOY affairs across Sydney and Melbourne the past week 🎄 As always, great to catch up.
Last but not least - Thanks to everyone who applied to the next cohort of the What the Health Private Community 💕 We’ll be going out with accepts soon so stay tuned with a kick-off date of late Jan.
Ok, onto the news…
🍩 TODAY’S ISSUE
Newsworthy
Sick Science
AI Updates
Startup Stuff
Events
Cool Content
💜 Brought to you with… Optain
🚀 Looking for a great new role? 👀 Interested in helping transform healthcare - through AI and Retinal Imaging?Optain Health is a software-as-a-medical device (SaMD) company based between Aus & the US - transforming care with AI-enabled retinal imaging technology. Using the eye as a window to systemic health, they’re aiming to improve the way eye and systemic conditions are screened, managed, and treated—to make care more accessible and easing healthcare system strain.
💼 And, they’re hiring for two pivotal roles!
QA/RA Specialist – Ensure compliance and quality as expanding globally.
SaMD Product Owner – Drive product development and market growth.
📍Ideally both based in Optain’s Australia headquarters in Melbourne, but flexible for the right candidate.
Want to know more? Or throw your hat in the ring?
Send your resume to recruiting@optainhealth.com
Want to get featured here in front of >8700 health-loving legends?
Shoot us a note for ad placement and partnership opportunities.
Noteworthy 🗞️
Funding
🔔 Umps, who provide remote monitoring & personal alarms, snagged $2m in a Series A round led by Breakthrough Vic
🧠 My Mirror, a mental health startup that provides immediate access to telehealth psych services, nabbed $4M
🌿 Cambium Bio, a regenerative medicine company, bagged $3M to advance its Phase 3 clinical trials for Elate Ocular, a treatment for dry eye disease
🥄 Spoony, a community platform revolutionising support for neurodivergent & disabled individuals, raised an undisclosed amount from trampoline
🧪 UNSW Sydney researchers secured >$27M in the latest round of the NHMRC Ideas and Development Grants funding - supporting 25 projects in medicine, science and engineering
Newsworthy
🏥 Healthscope, Aus’s 2nd largest private hospital operator, will terminate its contracts with 2 private health insurers affecting 6M people & 38 hospitals
🛡️Harrison.ai dismissed privacy concerns, following allegations by Crikey that it used radiology scans without explicit patient consent
And, this really highlights the issues with “consent” - potentially going too far and stopping us all getting access to innovations and better care?
🤝 ANDhealth partnered with Royal Melbourne Hospital, receiving frontline insights on what clinicians & healthcare providers need from tech while advising RMH on ensuring their tech keeps pace with patient care.
⚖️Australian Institute of Health and Welfare’s report found being overweight or living with obesity has overtaken tobacco smoking as the leading risk factor contributing to disease burden in 2024
Guess that’s why GLP-1s and the like really are a big deal
📊 Jama’s review of healthspan-lifespan gaps across 183 WHO member states reveals that the gap between total life expectancy and healthy years of life lived is increasing
Aus has a 12.1-year gap and NZ has a 11.8-year gap
💵 Bupa offers doctors & medical specialists working at Healthscope hospitals up to $500 if they take their patients to other facilities as a dispute over funding escalates
🌍 Sonic Healthcare bought one of Germany’s biggest medical lab groups, Dr. Kramer & Colleagues, for $700M, the latest in a string of acquisitions to grow its European business as earnings recover from a post-pandemic slump
💻 Tech-related roles got bumped up the list as a priority for skilled migration to Aus.
🧬 Nourish Ingredients, partners with Chinese biotech company Cabio Biotech in the first major alternative proteins partnership between Aus & China
🧓 RMIT Uni, Telstra Health & Digital Health CRC’s electronic screening & risk prediction tool for deterioration in aged care patients won the Digital & Data Health Innovation Award from Research Aus
Gov Goss
🏛️The Aus Gov appointed the National Health & Medical Research Council for 2024 – 2027
💨And committed an extra $107M for the regulation & enforcement of Aus’s world-leading laws on vaping products. So far, the focus on vapes has resulted in:
>7M vaping products seized by the TGA & the Aus Border Force;
> 8.5k vaping posts and profiles removed from social media;
24 joint enforcement operations between the TGA & state & territory governments;
>47 active investigations underway;
>220 infringement notices issued;
>$2M in fines issued; &,
civil & criminal court action across the country
💰 The MRFF’s Rapid Applied Research Translation initiative released grant opportunity info which will provide up to $40m for projects that:
conduct late-stage research that directly impacts clinical care, health services, and practices and has the potential to translate into existing policies and practices
use existing knowledge and evidence to quickly translate research findings into improved health care and interventions
address gaps in health care practice and interventions to improve health outcomes
involve all relevant stakeholders, including health care consumers and providers, in the planning, design, and implementation of the research
🔬 The National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) is investing ~$6m to support participation in international collaborative research on health issues spanning the Australia and the East Asian region
🏢 The WA gov has committed $15m to build a new medical research & innovation hub in Perth to drive job creation, breakthrough treatments & attract more investment
🚀 The WA gov is sending 12 startups, including Materia Health, to the US under a new accelerator program
US & Beyond the Borders
🇮🇳 India took out a nationwide subscription to 13,000 Journals - providing free access to research in a landmark US$715m deal
🍎 Tim Cook, Apple CEO, discussed the company’s healthcare vision in an interview with WIRED
“…if you zoom out way into the future, and you look back and ask what Apple’s biggest contribution was, it will be in the health area”
💊 Bayer expands into the IBS market by buying digital therapeutic Cara Care app
📊 ClassPass revealed its 2024 Lookback Report, finding that since 2023 fitness reservations have surged by 51%, while salon and spa reservations have risen by 38%
#healthiswealth
🧠 Neuralink, Musk's brain tech company, got the greenlight from Health Canada to launch the CAN-PRIME study, their first international clinical trial
😊 PainCheck, a facial recognition software, is being trailed across several U.K. care homes to help providers (LITERALLY) better recognise & manage pain
🏆 CB Insights announced the winners of the 2024 Digital Health 50 — a list of the world’s 50 most promising private digital health companies. 4 key themes emerged from this year’s cohort:
AI as foundational infrastructure: 36 companies are building AI products, ranging from operational automation high-flyers like Laguna to specialised healthcare LLMs like Hippocratic AI and insurance claim copilots like Alaffia Health.
Workflow efficiency: 19 companies are streamlining administrative or clinical tasks, spanning document processing startups like Tennr to ambient AI heavyweights, Abridge.
Diagnostic innovation: 11 companies comprised this year’s largest category, developing next-gen diagnostics across imaging (Airs Medical), pathology (Proscia), and non-invasive diagnostics (Alimetry).
Specialised care platforms: Virtual & hybrid care representation doubled in this year’s cohort, reflecting the shift from general telemedicine toward condition-specific virtual models in areas like mental health with Talkiatry and cancer care startups such as Resilience.
Sick Science
🩸Do we all have different ranges for blood markers?
This study in Nature on 1000s of adults showed that Complete blood count (CBC) results and ranges actually fluctuate around stable, patient-specific "setpoints." vs the universal “one-size-fits-all” reference range currently used. These setpoints could help personalise test result interpretation and reveal individual health patterns and risks, such as heart disease or diabetes, and improve test accuracy for diagnosing and treating conditions missed or misinterpreted.
🌐 Internet improves… mental health?
A study in Nature Human Behaviour examined ~87k adults aged 50+ across 23 countries, finding that regular Internet use is linked to fewer depressive symptoms, higher life satisfaction, &better self-reported health.
🧠 Sympathetic nerves that play favourites
A Nature study mapped nerve populations in the abdominal sympathetic ganglion complex (CG–SMG), showing they target specific organs like the gut or pancreas. One group of neurons controls gut motility, while another handles digestion & glucagon release. The findings show how sympathetic nerves work in distinct groups to regulate organ functions.
🥞 Breakfast = better health ft. smaller waists?
A longitudinal study of older adults in Spain found that eating 20–30% of daily energy at breakfast, paired with high-quality meals, led to lower body fat, healthier cholesterol levels, & better kidney function. Both low- & high-energy breakfasts, as well as poor-quality meals, were tied to higher triglycerides, bigger waists, & lower HDL cholesterol.
🤖 AI Updates
🎄 OpenAI is in the holiday spirit with a series of reveals, called “12 Days of OpenAI,” which will be streamed live at 10 a.m. PT each weekday through Dec 23.
🗳️Donald Trump has announced David Sacks, a venture capitalist and former PayPal executive, as his choice for “White House AI & Crypto Czar”
⚙️GE HealthCare released a new zero-click mammography system with AI features aimed at easing the pressures from a shortage of trained technologists
🏆 Fast Company, released their Next Big Things in Tech list for health techs. The healthcare AI winners are:
Proscia – AI for cancer diagnosis
Certify Health – AI credentialing tools
Color Health – digital cancer care support
Anumana – AI algorithms for electrocardiograms
Pangea Biomed – identifying patients for precision cancer treatments
A few 2025 Events…💥
13th - 16th Jan: J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference
Tue 21st Jan: SaMD Regulation with the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) (Online)
12th – 13th Mar: ARC APAC Summit (Melb)
13th – 14th May: Digital Health Festival (Melb)
Consumable Content 💎
🎙️Dollars & Sense: Less for More: Aus’s dud private health insurance system
“On this episode of Dollars & Sense, Greg and Elinor discuss the big structural problems with Australia’s private health insurance system and why public services like healthcare are best carried out by the public sector.”
🔮 Nikhil and the legends at Out-Of-Pocket published their 2025 predictions for healthcare and healthtech in the US
🚺 Daniel Welch, ex-CFO of Oura, reflected on how prioritising women’s health as a focus area enabled Oura to stand out in the wearable tech market
💰Exit & Outcomes published Pricing for 120+ Digital Health Programs products & services - if you want all the data, then this is for you. Super interesting.
📺 The database of how Health Tech Nerds: Lessons from Evaluating, Implementing, and Adopting Ambient AI
💡Got Feedback? Something to include next time?
We want to make this worthy of your time & the best possible.
Hit reply or reach out to emily@whatthehealth.io to let us know!
🚀 Want to work with us in 2025?!
Email to learn about our sponsor & partner opportunities 💌
Ok friends. That’s us done for 2024.
Wishing you a very happy, restful, and fun filled holidays and see you in 2025!
👋 Emily,
Mariah & team WTH
With thanks to our partners 💜
Want to get featured here in front of >8700 health-loving legends?
Shoot us a note for ad placement and partnership opportunities.