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By pharmatrax
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Search engine giant Google is intensely focusing its efforts and heavily investing in the health-tech space. More than 500 people now work at Google Health as its parent company Alphabet tries to improve search results that consumers see when they consult “Dr. Google”. The tech giant is counting on new businesses as growth slows in its core digital advertising revenues. A bet on health tech could prove very lucrative for the company, while also helping low-income communities manage their health better
The Breakdown You Need To Know: For Google, it’s health-tech ambitions date back more than a decade to 2006. However, CultureBanx noted its original “Google Health” product was canned back in 2012. Google then spent several years developing artificial intelligence to identify diseases with the intent of predicting outcomes and reducing costs. Alphabet’s CEO Sundar Pichai stated health care offers the biggest potential for the company to use AI to improve outcomes over the next 5 to ten years, according to CNBC.
It’s not just Google that’s all in on health-tech, Apple and Amazon are focusing on fighting diabetes as another possible revenue source. Health-tech is big business and projected to reach $149 billion by 2025, with the diabetes device market set to claim around $38 billion by 2026. African American’s who over-index in this disease could start seeing lower treatment costs, and it would allow these tech companies to capture a big chunk of the diabetic business.
Diabetes is not a cheap disease to treat, with insulin sellers constantly increasing prices as much as 353%. WebMD found that average insulin costs for type 1 diabetes increased from $12,467 in 2012 to $18,494 in 2016. African Americans have the second-highest rate of diabetes, a chronic condition that affects how the body regulates blood sugar, at nearly 13%, according to the CDC.
Beyond Basic Health: Alphabet has a number of health-related “Other Bet” businesses that are independent of Google Health, including Verily, the life sciences group. Medical device maker Dexcom is partnering with both Apple and Google to shake up the diabetes space. Former Google life Sciences company Verily wants to make its presence felt in this sector by developing new hardware with Dexcom, to continuously monitor blood sugar levels. Apple is working with the company to build tools for its Watch and iPhone, that will integrate with diabetic devices for easier monitoring. Amazon plans to use its popular Alexa-enabled products to help diabetics verbally check their blood sugar levels.
Privacy Protection: Google claims to be interested in healthcare because it’s for the greater good of humanity. The health division isn’t connected to Google’s ad business, but some major red flags have already been raised around Google Health’s access to medical records. Currently, the federal government is investigating whether Google and Ascension, the second-largest health system in the U.S. are protecting patient data sufficiently.