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Good afternoon, readers.
Gene editing and data privacy will be some of the top issues which determine the future of health in the coming decade.
Don’t take my word for it—Listen to experts like Jennifer Doudna, a pioneer of the CRIPSR gene-editing technology, and Richie Etwaru, a tech startup CEO who is advocating for the “31st Human Right” of data privacy, including in medicine.
Those are just some of the insights in Fortune‘s new package on the 25 ideas which will shape the 2020s.
Here’s a taste: The first CRISPR-based medication will be approved within the next decade, according to Doudna. “I think it’s been incredibly exciting for those of us in the field to see recent announcements around developments using Crispr in treating cancer and in treating blood disorders like sickle-cell anemia,” she tells Fortune, adding that ethical concerns and manufacturing costs will be a major source of tension.
Richie Etwaru, the founder and CEO of Hu-manity.co, is a data privacy evangelist. His ideas about the lack of trust between consumers and corporations are fascinating–as his company’s underlying business model of transforming that “I Agree” button that we all click for our various apps without truly understanding the consequences.
“In the future, in industries such as healthcare and beyond, companies will not buy data to own, they’ll lease data for use. Data integrity decays very quickly. You’re not interested in a data lake, you’re interested in a data stream—The trust issue breaks down with every subsequent party in the supply chain,” Etwarue tells me.
If you want the full breakdown from Doudna, Etwaru, and others on what the next decade in business and government will look like, you’ve got everything you need right here.
Read on for the day’s news.
Sy Mukherjee
sayak.mukherjee@fortune.com
@the_sy_guy
DIGITAL HEALTH
A biotech goes from hero to (almost) zero. The biotech business can be cold. And uBiome is a case study of the freeze. The company, at one point, had a $600 million valuation. Alas, the DNA-testing firm went bankrupt and is now reportedly selling its existing patents for... 1% of their original value, according to STAT News. The new owner will be South Korean biotech Psomagen. uBiome stands as a cautionary tale for the biotech industry. The company was founded on the premise that testing, well, poop could lead to a better understanding of the "microbiome" and help people make better health decisions based on the analysis. It filed for bankruptcy following an FBI investigation. (STAT News)
THE BIG PICTURE
Obamacare faces its latest court quagmire. A closely-watched case involving the Affordable Care Act reached a turning point when a federal appeals court ruled that a major component of the health law is unconstitutional. The case, which was brought forth by a GOP Congress, argued that the "individual mandate" was unconstitutional and that, therefore, the entire law should be struck down. The 5th Circuit appellate court didn't go quite that far—it ruled that just the mandate should be stricken–but that means the case will now go back to lower courts for legislation that's been in place for nearly a decade. (Reuters)
REQUIRED READING
The 2010s Were the Decade That Forced CEOs to Get Political, by Geoff Colvin
Why Facebook's Libra Hangs in Limbo, by Robert Hackett
The Pessimism of Harvard Business School Alumni, by Alan Murray