Not sure if you considered it as a potential benefit but my understanding is that right now the government and health care systems/insurers spend an inordinate amount of money mainly to extend life for the last 5-10 years of an elderly person now. This imposes broad costs on state run health systems and private insurers which need to charge people more from younger ages to cover these expected costs. It’s possible that more elderly people are inclined to engage in cryopreservation just before they enter this “sickly period” (for lack of a better term) if they believe in the future they could be revived helping to spare a huge amount of costs on medical systems today.
P.S. Great writeup; I’ve thought occasionally about trying to build a business in the space focused on longevity and making cryo more approachable for the average person. I know some folks in Germany started a startup around it which gives me some hope that it isn’t too crazy an idea for venture funders and has some potential for returns.
I agree that brain preservation could potentially be cost-saving for healthcare systems if combined with medical aid in dying and people were interested in this rather than pursuing painful care that is likely futile. However, my guess is that healthcare systems in general are not very cost-efficient from an effective altruism perspective, so it’s hard to see how this would affect overall QALYs.
Not sure if you considered it as a potential benefit but my understanding is that right now the government and health care systems/insurers spend an inordinate amount of money mainly to extend life for the last 5-10 years of an elderly person now. This imposes broad costs on state run health systems and private insurers which need to charge people more from younger ages to cover these expected costs. It’s possible that more elderly people are inclined to engage in cryopreservation just before they enter this “sickly period” (for lack of a better term) if they believe in the future they could be revived helping to spare a huge amount of costs on medical systems today.
P.S. Great writeup; I’ve thought occasionally about trying to build a business in the space focused on longevity and making cryo more approachable for the average person. I know some folks in Germany started a startup around it which gives me some hope that it isn’t too crazy an idea for venture funders and has some potential for returns.
Thanks for your kind comments! Much appreciated.
I agree that brain preservation could potentially be cost-saving for healthcare systems if combined with medical aid in dying and people were interested in this rather than pursuing painful care that is likely futile. However, my guess is that healthcare systems in general are not very cost-efficient from an effective altruism perspective, so it’s hard to see how this would affect overall QALYs.