How many people will be rejuvenated by 2040?

Roey

The Age Reversal competition will incentivize the development and demonstration of interventions that rejuvenate the immune system and other systems in the body.

But this will only be the beginning of the race. If the developed interventions are not scalable enough, then only the wealthy would be able to enjoy them in the next decade or two.

We want to learn from you: what does "scalable enough" mean?

Imagine the year is 2040, and assume that XPRIZE Age Reversal has been successful. How many people will have undergone rejuvenation treatment (of the kind that were developed in the competition) by that year?

You can vote anonymously, but feel free to explain your vote in a comment!

NickOttens

@marky, @taboma, @MFossel, @Jun Suto, @rkoene, @GeorgePerry, @Soroush, @mattflynn, I'd like to ask your take on @Roey's question.

Imagine XPRIZE Age Reversal concludes successfully with a rejuvenation treatment in the next few years. By 2040, how many people around the world will likely have taken the treatment?

We're asking for a rough - but hopefully informed - guess to give us a sense of scale.

GeorgePerry

in the US 1-5 %

Jun Suto

I do not know if we are asking the right question. It heavily depends on the price point, the efficacy, and the invasiveness of and access to the therapy. If we imagine that it will be like a popping supplement, we can argue as much as 75% of the adult population which is about the level of the penetration of daily supplement use in the US in the adult population now. Now, we have some stem-cell "anti-aging" therapy offered in Malaysia like this https://www.cellmalaysia.com/ which is < US$20K, but at this price point and limited access, it is not easy to get it. Age reversal will have a strong connotation to the beauty - this tends to accelerate the pace, I believe. By 2040, we are looking at the world population of 9.2 billion and the aging population over 60 is reaching 2 billion. With a significant impact on alleviating the fiscal burden of the healthcare (or shall I say sick care) in each sovereignty, we may see further acceleration.
My optimistic guestimate, around 1 billion to 4 billion people (10~45%) in the world assuming the price point is low enough.

NickOttens

Thank you for the reply, @Jun Suto! You're right, of course, that a lot depends on exactly what the treatment will look like. Our thinking currently is to only allow supplements, over-the-counter and repurposed drugs, or SORDs, in the XPRIZE. However, our hope is that a successful XPRIZE Age Reversal will help kick-start a wider longevity industry, so by 2040 there isn't just one treatment of the kind that was developed in the competition available.

@GeorgePerry, could you elaborate? Why 1-5%?

NickOttens

@adampowell, @Liz_Parrish, @DGlass, and @iraspastor, I'd like to ask your input on this question as well, given your expertise in insurance and pharma. If XPRIZE Age Reversal is successful, and a rejuvenation treatment becomes commercially available in the next few years, how many people around the world will have undergone such a treatment by the year 2040?

iraspastor

It's very difficult to say.
It's going to be based significantly on the degree of later stage clinical funding that emerges, and which hopefully will persist as more institutions become interested in the investment theme.
However we can't ignore that recent events over the past year may portend some problems.
In the recent months we've seen the late stage clinical failures of "longevity biotech unicorns", with both Unity's UBX0101 (https://www.fiercebiotech.com/biotech/buzzy-anti-ageing-biotech-unity-drops-leading-program-after-flop-shares-freefall) and Samumed's lorecivivint (https://www.medpagetoday.com/rheumatology/arthritis/86677), not to forget ResTORbio's meltdown (https://www.thepharmaletter.com/article/restorbio-routed-by-failure-of-lead-candidate), as well as the failure of many of big pharma beta-amyloid drugs.
Rejuvenation is not an easy thing to do and clinical translation is not going to be as simple as some may believe.
But hopefully we will get there over time.
But I will have to say close to 0% by 2040.

NickOttens

@Danil, @Avik, @mducker, @Masa, @Zoltan_Istvan, @centenariandoc, @viamati, @bbergstein, @ellendaly, @nanditabthakur11, @Stephen, @andersimfu, @Sskemp, @KamalMohan, please vote in our poll! If an XPRIZE Age Reversal successfully incentivizes the development and demonstration of interventions that rejuvenate the immune system and other systems in the body, how many people around the world will likely have undergone such a treatment by the year 2040?

NickOttens

@CollyPride, @ThomasS04, @kcs008, @marc, and @Nikolai, I'd like to invite you to weigh in here as well and vote in our survey.

We're trying to get a sense of how many people might reasonably have undergone a rejuvenation treatment by the year 2040 if XPRIZE Age Reversal is a success.

JoseCordeiro

@NickOttens @Roey I am on the positive side of accelerating technologies. As Ray Kurzweil says, in one decade we should reach Longevity Escape Velocity, and by 2045, rejuvenation technologies should be available for all those who want them...

NickOttens

@CollyPride, @ThomasS04, @kcs008, @marc, @Nikolai, @Danil, @Avik, @mducker, @Masa, @Zoltan_Istvan, @centenariandoc, @viamati, @bbergstein, @ellendaly, @nanditabthakur11, @Stephen, @andersimfu, @Sskemp, @KamalMohan, @adampowell, @Liz_Parrish, @DGlass, now that we have a better idea what our prize competition will look like (see Whole-body approach to age reversal), I'd like to ask you again to vote in our poll. Assume that the competition successfully incentivizes the development of an age-reversal treatment; how many people around the world do you expect would have undergone such a treatment by the year 2040?

We really have no way of arriving at a figure scientifically, so that's why we're relying on the "wisdom of the crowd". It may be a wild guess, but if we average out everyone's wild guesses, we'll at least get some idea of the impact this prize might have.

You can vote anonymously!

nicolas_cher

If a person is rejuvenated, almost everyone will want to do the same, and the pressure (political, economical, social and humanitarian) to implement it would be inmense. I think it's practically unimaginable to think that after 5 years the first person is rejuvenated, almost all the people of the world won't be rejuvenated. That's why I voted for "More than 1 billion".

markjayct

I suspect it will take time to reach a majority of the bodies on the planet. Consider the logistics--once we get it--of distribuitng and administering a COVID-19 vaccine, to billions of people globally right now. That's not even considering that a huge portion of the population needs to be convinced to recieve it. That problem will probably be many fold more complex for longevity therapies. Thiese possibilities are discussed in my new Seeking Delphi Podcast featuring Sergey Young (from the XPrize innovation board), David Wood, and Jose Cordeiro. It is a first in a series of programs entitled "The Longevity Dialogues.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T7t9efoQvKs

NickOttens

Thanks, @markjayct!

sjatkins

A lot depends on how soon the technology is proven. Once it is the demand will be huge and entrepreneurs will be falling all over themselves to make the tech cheap enough to satisfy that demand. And of course it will be much easier if some possibilities such as deep medical nanotechnology come online. I guesstimate 2030 for prove of tech then huge demand met in the next decade thereafter even without early arrival of complete enough nanotechnology.

NickOttens

Thanks, @sjatkins!

@Schoemaker, @Margi, @Xman142, @Masa, I'd like to ask your opinion on this question as well: Assuming our XPRIZE successfully incentivizes the development of a rejuvenation treatment, how many people around the world will likely have undergone such a treatment by the year 2040?

The consensus so far seems to be leaning toward as many as 1 billion people or more. Is that overly ambitious? Or am I being too conservative?