26 BARRON’S September 28, 2020
insights and technology platforms for
precision-oncology drug development,
and creating deep pipelines that offer
multiple shots on goal.
How will today’s pandemic change
the industry longer term?
Casdin: The pandemic has driven a
dramatic increase in telemedicine.
The willingness of patients to engage
with their physicians over Zoom or
the equivalent service will
fundamentally shift how we engage
with health care forever, perhaps
leading to improved quality of care
and compliance. We also can imagine
ways that digital health impacts the
life-science industry, improving how
drugs are developed in clinical trial.
Just the response of the industry to
develop a vaccine has changed the
pace of innovation.
Yoon: I hope this crisis will convince
people how important our public-
health infrastructure and
biopharmaceutical industry are. Life
expectancy is lengthening, and we’re
curing more diseases because of
innovations borne by this industry,
with the help of basic research and
government funding. I hope this
pandemic reminds people that the
investment needs to continue, because
we are still very early in our
understanding of human biology and
what that means for human health. To
defund health-care investment would
be the equivalent of defunding the
internet when Netscape’s first web
browser came out. Consider the
amount of innovation that has come
out of the technology sector in the 25
years since. That sort of innovation is
still in front of the life-science
industry. That’s what gets me excited
about waking up every day and
looking for new companies to invest in
across the health-care system.
Celniker: During the pandemic, our
collaborations with academia have
increased. People aren’t traveling all
over the country to attend
conferences, so we have time to get on
extended phone calls and Zoom chats
and brainstorm novel ways to apply
the discoveries coming out of many
different laboratories. As Eli
mentioned, you’re not going to change
people’s desire to accelerate
innovation and get their ideas in front
of investors. People expect things to
happen quickly now, as they have
happened over the past six months.
And, as Eddie suggests, that speaks to
the absolute need to fund basic
science that can be translated into
commercial products. Hopefully, we
will see that kind of funding
enthusiasm, based on what has come
out of the Covid period.
Porges: To torture my military
analogy further, we are going to win
this battle. Sometime in the next 18
months, a combination of technology,
capital, expertise, and brilliant people
is going to win the battle. It is
surprising to me, however, that there
has been so little discussion thus far
about what the peace will look like
after the war. I’m talking about how
we structure our public-health
system, and reinvest in infectious-
disease prevention, monitoring, and
testing. It is happening organically,
but we aren’t seeing any kind of
national strategy. We had it 20 or 30
years ago, but it eroded, and we’re
going to need to reinvest in these
things. There is another coronavirus
that has already been identified in bats
in China that could spread into
humans. We’re seeing one every few
years. This is a consequence of how
we’re living. It’s not just an isolated
event, so we’d better have all this
infrastructure deployed next time.
Well said, everyone. Thank you. B
Edward Yoon
Humana
HUM
$387.00
Oak Street Health
OSH
$45.12
Alignment
Healthcare*
*Privately held
Prices as of 9/24/20
Source: FactSet