GDP Shocker: a Drop of 2.9%! Why Healthcare Spending Went Down

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about science fiction, so nobody really believed that young blood could extend lives. If they had, it would have certainly been a simple hypothesis to test. In fact, 73 years after Methuselah’s Children was serialized in Astounding Science Fiction, the experiment was performed last month at the Stanford University School of Medicine – using mice.

Interestingly, the senior author of the Stanford blood study, Tony Wyss-Coray, PhD, noted that the experiment could have been done 20 years ago. Actually, it could have been done long before that. The procedure was relatively simple.

The team gave 18-month-old mice components of blood from 3-month-old mice eight times in 24 days. Then they gave the aged mice a kind of rodent IQ or memory test, which showed significant improvements.

The overview of the study, published in the journal Nature, states:

As human lifespan increases, a greater fraction of the population is suffering from age-related cognitive impairments, making it important to elucidate a means to combat the effects of aging. Here we report that exposure of an aged animal to young blood can counteract and reverse pre-existing effects of brain aging at the molecular, structural, functional and cognitive level. Genome-wide microarray analysis of heterochronic parabionts – in which circulatory systems of young and aged animals are connected – identified synaptic plasticity–related transcriptional changes in the hippocampus of aged mice.

In other words, the brains of the older mice given transfusions of plasma (the cell-free portion of blood from the young mice) did not simply perform better, they exhibited physical signs of a reversal of aging. Clearly, this is a pretty big deal. To reiterate the last sentence of the summary: “Our data indicate that exposure of aged mice to young blood late in life is capable of rejuvenating synaptic plasticity and improving cognitive function.”

Many of the stories about the Stanford study focused on the likelihood that specific factors in the young blood responsible for the rejuvenation can probably be isolated and used on their own. A prime suspect is the protein expressed by the growth differentiation factor 11 (GDF11) gene. GDF11 protein production decreases with age; prior research has shown that it has rejuvenating effects in parts of the body other than the brain.

I’ve written several times in my weekly alerts, for example, about the Amy Wagers and Richard Lee Harvard experiment. Reported in Cell, it showed that age-related damage to heart muscle in older mice will reverse when GDF11 proteins are transferred from younger mice. This is of enormous interest to researchers because, as you probably know, heart muscle does not normally regenerate in older animals.

It’s not surprising, therefore, that Wyss-Coray is the cofounder of Alkahest, a biotech startup exploring the possibility of commercializing some therapy based on his experiments. I don’t think that Alkahest is likely to be the leader in this field, however.

The reason is that therapies based on the Wyss-Coray experiments would be less than optimal. If you are given an exogenous dose of a naturally occurring protein, it tends to upset the regulatory axis that balances all the interactive and complex forces at work in our bodies.

I’m convinced, therefore, that there are better ways to restore rejuvenating GDF11 to youthful levels. One way is to introduce youthful stem cells, engineered from the patient’s own induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which express GDF11 at high levels.

Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells

One of the most exciting developments in modern medicine is the creation of induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells. As it happens, I’ve had skin cells taken from inside my left arm transformed into iPS cells by one of the companies in our portfolio. Those iPS cells are identical to the embryonic stem cells that I came from. Because they have my DNA, there’s no chance of immune rejection, which is one of the advantages they have over cells derived from embryonic stem cell lines.

My iPS cells were then engineered to become youthful heart muscle cells. Based on animal experiments, we have every reason to believe that those cells would become part of my body and repair any damage that my heart may have suffered. Here’s a shot of my youthful cardiomyocytes beating in the lab.

Those same iPSCs, however, could also be engineered to become the type of cell, already developed and patented, that produces high levels of GDF11. Placed into my circulatory system, they would replicate and produce their rejuvenating proteins permanently. This would eliminate the need for periodic transfusion or pills. Another method, owned by a different company in the portfolio, is to put DNA plasmids engineered to express GDF11 into a group of cells so that they permanently produce the protein.

This type of therapy is inevitable. Friends of mine who keep track of high-end anti-aging clinics tell me that extremely wealthy clients are paying for youthful blood transfusions right now. The cost, they tell me, is astronomical. Superior results, however, could be attained using induced pluripotent stem cells or DNA vaccines for far less money.

It’s ironic that most ancient cultures and religions seemed to treat young blood as a sacred symbol of power and life. Historically, there are many stories about victors and vampires who drank blood to acquire youth and strength. Ancient instincts were correct, however, in that youthful, healthy blood does have power, as the ancient kings and warlords of mythology believed.

There’s a race going on right now to see who delivers that power and life first. As Dr. Wyss-Coray noted in the paper about his experiment, “As human lifespan increases, a greater fraction of the population is suffering from age-related cognitive impairments, making it important to elucidate a means to combat the effects of aging.” Personally, I suspect that Alzheimer’s and other sources of cognitive impairments will be cured in the next decade. The human desire for increased health and time, however, is limitless, so we’ll continue to follow these life-extending biotechnologies closely as they develop.

(To learn more about Pat’s Breakthrough Technology Alert and other Mauldin Economics publications, click on this link, where you will find an offer to subscribe to all of our publications at a significant discount. This is a permanently low price, and the offer will go away after Monday.)

The Strategic Investment Conference Presentations

The first group of presentations and select videos from the 2014 Strategic Investment Conference is now available! Videos of two of our most popular speakers, Kyle Bass and David Rosenberg, are available, as well as numerous other presentations and summaries. If you are a Mauldin Circle member, you can access the videos by going towww.altegris.com to log in to your “members only” area of the Altegris website. Upon login, click on the “SIC 2014” link in the upper-left corner to view the videos and more. If you have forgotten your login information, simply click “Forgot Login?” a nd your information will be sent to you.

If you are not already a Mauldin Circle member, the good news is that this program is completely free. In order to join, you must, however, be an accredited investor. Please register here to be qualified by my partners at Altegris and added to the subscriber roster. Once you register, an Altegris representative will call you to provide access to the videos, presentations, and summaries from selected speakers at our 2014 conference.

Nantucket, New York City, Maine, and San Antonio

What would be considered a normal schedule for me would see me doing all of the above-named cities in less than a month, rather than according to my current travel schedule, which lets me spread them out over three months! I will be in Nantucket at a private conference in the middle of July, then in New York July 13-16. Then, as always, I (along with my son Trey) will be in Grand Lake Stream, Maine, the first Friday in August. I think this will be my eighth annual summer expedition to northern Maine and Leen’s Lodge for David Kotok’s big to-do. Then in the middle of September I will join a number of friends and a great roster of speakers at the Casey Research Conference in the Hill Country outside of San Antonio. I’m sure there will be other trips here and there, but I am anticipating being at home a little more for the next few months.

One of the benefits of being home is that I can get into a regular routine at the gym. I and a partner are working with a personal trainer at the gym in our building. His training style is a little different for us and has me doing things that I quite frankly haven’t thought about doing in 40 years. Wind sprints, steps, all sorts of novel ways to torture the body and get your heart rate up, and yes, old-fashioned weights now and then. This morning he introduced me to boxing gloves. The last time I had on boxing gloves, I was a sophomore in high school when our gym coach had us put on gloves and I went into a ring for about three minutes. I took them off with a vow to never touch them again. It was an exhausting three minutes trying to avoid getting pummeled. At least this morning the big brute wasn’t hitting back, but it was quite the workout. I really do need to get in better shape.

I’m cooking for a group of friends and family, so I need to hit the send button and get the prime rib started. Have a great week.

Your wishing I could avoid the healthcare system altogether analyst,

John Mauldin
John Mauldin
[email protected]

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