Why is this important?
Much decision-making about health, and especially about behavior related to health, ultimately occurs at the individual level. Markets both stimulate and respond to consumer demand. Investment in the development of an ecosystem of health—from healthy options in food and activity to personalized technology tools—will pay off by making the healthy choice the easy, appealing, and accessible choice. Innovation can be accelerated through private-public partnerships, and such collaboration will necessitate clear and mutually agreed-upon outcomes subject to independent audit and public reporting to avoid real or perceived conflicts of interest.
Pathways
Establish federal research and commercialization funding mechanisms and incentives to develop innovative and profitable products, services, and technologies for healthier lifestyles.
Deploy financial and environmental incentives for consumers that expand the successful adoption of healthier products and services.
Forge effective private-public collaborations that generate positive, measurable health outcomes and impacts through innovative and transparent financing and operations.
Measures of Success
Short Term (2017)
- New business competitions have been organized at universities o focus on health and prevention innovations.
- The CDC and NIH Foundations have developed a strategy to build private-public partnerships by investing federal dollars to accelerate private sector innovation for prevention, similar o those that have led to pharmaceutical advances.
- A framework that proactively addresses ethical, legal, and social issues with respect to the use of data collected by personal prevention technologies has been established through a systematic review and extensive public consultation, and adopted across sectors.
Medium Term (2020)
- Local governments and pension funds invest in community health-related innovations and social enterprises.
- A federal agency, similar to ARPA-E in the Department of Energy, has been established to fund research and commercialization or technologies and businesses that support health and prevention.
- Financial and behavioral incentive programs that provide broad access to health and prevention initiatives across society have been tested and scaled up.
Long Term (2025)
- GDP driven by health—related not only to the treatment of disease but also focused on building sustainable healthy communities—is increased by 20 percent over current levels.
- Health and prevention products and services are a major market segment and a long-term driver of the consumer economy.
- A thriving private sector built on innovation becomes a powerful and profitable voice for prevention and health promotion.
