Hot topic: What if weight loss drugs are just the first longevity game-changers?

Back in mid-January Optimum’s Hot Topics column took a look at life expectancy data and asked the rather depressing question: “Will you live longer than your parents – or not?” 

Why so downbeat? Because besides stalling life expectancy figures, a slew of other data also seemed to hint that longevity might have peaked: steadily growing obesity rates, increasing inactivity, and studies showing each successive generation is less healthy than the last. 

Maybe it was just the time of year though.  

For there is a powerful counterargument that says life expectancy will continue to rise – not because we all start adopting healthy lifestyles, but because new drugs will be more effective than ever at keeping us alive. 

A fascinating article in the FT notes that pension companies are now fretting over the possibility that mass adoption of weight loss drugs like Wegovy and Mounjaro might do just that. 

They are worried that these drugs will cause a sudden and large-scale boost to longevity among today’s older people, meaning they’ll have to pay out annuities for much longer than they’d anticipated.  

Stuart McDonald, a partner at specialist pensions consultancy LCP, described it as a potentially “game-changing development”. 

In the US, one in eight adults has used GLP-1 weight loss drugs and there are now hints that obesity rates are dropping – particularly among university graduates, who are the most likely to have access to such medication.  

Dropping obesity levels would lead to lower levels of cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes, and certain cancers. GLP-1s also seem to have a direct and beneficial effect on these conditions too. 

But this development begs another question: could this just be the start? As our understanding of human biology advances – and does so at an accelerating pace due to AI / ML – could we begin to unearth new classes of drugs that have systemic effects on human health?  

While the trend of recent years has been towards ever-more personalised medicines, could we be on the brink of developing more fundamental medicines that are – to a greater or lesser extent – disease-agnostic?  

Of course, West Coast tech bros are already funding a number of life extension companies that seek to develop drugs which slow down the ageing process itself.  

This isn’t about that. This is the slightly more earthly aim of developing drugs which work to cut the odds of a range of diseases developing. For instance, medicines that cut the chance of a wide range of cancers developing, or a range of neuro-degenerative diseases. 

There’s nothing fanciful about that. There’s growing evidence that the humble aspirin can cut the chances of colorectal, ovarian, and pancreatic cancers from first developing (and stop them spreading too). A recent Cambridge University-led study has figured out why: aspirin appears to be a basic form of immunotherapy. 

With academic scientists and biotechs now working on a plethora of ways new immunotherapy approaches, including some that are potentially indication-agnostic, there is the growing possibility that new pan-cancer treatments might arise. 

Similarly, others are working on methods to maintain brain health, which could delay the onset of a number of age-related neurodegenerative diseases. 

If these come to fruition then we’d have cracked the three biggest killers in the developed world: cardiometabolic, cancer, and neurodegenerative.  

That would really worry the actuaries.