Due to a recent study: “The vast majority of people consider it important to take their health into their own hands to relieve pressure on healthcare systems: Spain 84 %, UK 77 %, Italy 75 %, Germany 63 %” (Source: GSK). What does this mean for the individuals and what does this hold for the future of our health system? For many of us the Covid pandemic is the first time, that a health topic has become the #1 topic in our lives, shadowing everything else. Who can forget the days when it was the only topic pre-dominant on news websites, that only weeks before were full of articles about climate change, politics or sports. One key feature of the SarsCoV2 Virus is not it’s “kill rate” (mortality connected to the infection), but the fact that all of us, all around the world can easily catch it, same as with other “colds”. In the past weeks and months taking care of our family’s health and also our own physical and mental fitness, became a #1 goal for many of us. Obesity and other chronic diseases being early spotted as negative factors driving mortality, gaining “fitness” through work-out in fresh air or in-doors has become a major topic.

Game changers and games changing

This might explain why companies like “Peloton” have become a major success recently and their market capitalization by far exceeds traditional companies (at the time of writing: Peloton with a market cap of about USD 30B is equal to Ford Motor company and several times the value of Lufthansa. The latter being considered giants in the field of moving people around, compared to a “stationary bike”). We might see a whole new economy evolve around “connected home gyms”, wearable smart devices and related services. Was “going to the gym” as past-time we planned once or twice a week and skipped every so often, we soon could be immersed in technology and ongoing activities that are meant to improve our fitness, immune status and in the long-run living healthy.

What does this mean for our health system?