Individuals watching the Tremendous Bowl at the moment will hear a tantalizing pitch: You, too, can dwell just like the wealthy. All you want is a solution to order up well being care the way in which they do.
A brand new advert scheduled to air throughout the large recreation, from the telehealth firm Hims & Hers, opens with the provocation “Wealthy individuals dwell longer.” A dizzying montage spoofing America’s wealthiest and most wellness-obsessed characters follows: An ageless man bathes in pink mild within the method of Bryan Johnson, the multimillionaire who rose to fame for his fanatical efforts to dwell eternally. A bald man doffs a cowboy hat as a rocket blasts off—clearly an allusion to Jeff Bezos, who in recent times has develop into extremely buff and backed a buzzy age-reversal start-up. Surgeons pull the sagging face of a lady taut as a drum, maybe a reference to the Kardashian matriarch Kris Jenner’s infamous 2025 facelift. Dan Kenger, the chief design officer at Hims & Hers, advised me in an e mail that the actors within the business symbolize solely “symbols of an intimidating, members-only healthcare tradition.” However the parallels to actual life are too apparent to disregard. “They get the most effective of every part,” the voiceover continues. “So why don’t you?”
Hims & Hers is greatest identified for providing weight-loss and hair-restoration remedies, however the advert positions the corporate as a gateway to a unique world of well being care—one with concierge docs who can be found on demand to supply personalised, cutting-edge therapies. “America’s healthcare is a story of two methods: one elite, proactive tier for the rich, and a damaged, reactive one for everybody else,” Kenger mentioned. Hims & Hers’ precise choices, which embody diagnostic blood testing and hormone remedy, could also be extra mundane than a facelift, however the advert emphasizes one factor all of them share: They’re all obtainable to you, for a worth.
Telehealth platforms corresponding to Hims & Hers provide sufferers the flexibility to pay out of pocket to shortly search therapy for his or her illnesses. Typically, they assert that sufferers should seek the advice of nearly with a medical supplier earlier than receiving a prescription, however this requirement isn’t featured prominently in most adverts. The brand new spot from Hims & Hers notes that its docs are round to speak, and—within the positive print—mentions {that a} session with a supplier is required earlier than receiving therapy. However until you’re squinting on the display, the message that comes throughout is that well being care is primarily a transaction between affected person and firm.
Usually, telehealth platforms have come to basically perform as a sort of Amazon for medicine, making it simpler for individuals to get prescriptions for managed substances corresponding to Adderall and testosterone. The businesses sidestep the excessive price related to many name-brand medicine by utilizing compounding pharmacies to supply cheaper, almost similar variations of the medicines. In principle, a licensed supplier writes the prescription after an intensive medical evaluation. However in simply the previous two years, two completely different telehealth practices have been sanctioned for inappropriately prescribing stimulants. (Hims & Hers has not confronted any federal investigations for its prescribing practices.)
Final 12 months, Hims & Hers ran a Tremendous Bowl advert equally centered on democratizing care—particularly GLP-1s for weight reduction. It asserted that America’s weight problems epidemic is brought on by “the system,” which retains individuals sick by making well being care unaffordable. When name-brand GLP-1s corresponding to Wegovy first began being prescribed for weight reduction, in 2021, they had been inaccessible for many Individuals due to their steep price and insurance coverage suppliers’ restricted protection. Rumors that celebrities had been utilizing the medicine for beauty causes sparked a mixture of outrage and envy, and as Individuals of extra humble means started to see the outcomes the medicine may result in, many started scrambling for cheaper sources—an ideal alternative for Hims & Hers and its friends.
However Individuals aren’t clamoring for simply GLP-1s anymore. Medicines corresponding to testosterone and peptides—a largely untested class of medication with a variety of purported well being advantages—are in excessive demand too. Like GLP-1s, they’ve been touted by rich, high-profile figures, together with Gwyneth Paltrow, Joe Rogan, and Well being Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Hims & Hers has positioned itself to fulfill these calls for. Final 12 months, the corporate launched its low-testosterone therapy program and acquired a peptide-manufacturing facility. It plans to make use of that manufacturing unit to make its personal “personalised” medicine.
Such language evokes the concierge remedies loved by the wealthy. However in telehealth-platform parlance, personalization often refers to making a model of a name-brand treatment that matches a affected person’s wants by, say, altering the dose, including different energetic components, or providing it in a unique format. These compounded variations aren’t reviewed by the FDA—in actual fact, the FDA introduced Friday that it had requested the Justice Division, out of concern for shopper security, to analyze Hims & Hers for promoting compounded GLP-1 tablets. The transfer is a part of the DOJ’s wider plan to take “decisive steps” to limit the advertising and marketing of compounded GLP-1s.
The medical group is worried that telehealth platforms too simply enable sufferers to take unsafe medicine—or medicine they merely don’t want. The Weight problems Society, a scientific group, warns individuals to not use compounded GLP-1s, as a result of they could not comprise the suitable energetic components. (As I wrote just lately, males’s-health consultants are additionally anxious concerning the cardiovascular and reproductive penalties of pointless testosterone-replacement remedy.) Once I requested Hims & Hers concerning the DOJ investigation, a spokesperson directed me to a public assertion posted yesterday on X, through which the corporate mentioned it will cease promoting compounded GLP-1 tablets. “We stay dedicated to the tens of millions of Individuals who rely upon us for entry to protected, inexpensive, and personalised care,” the assertion mentioned.
The Hims & Hers advert is shrewd in its heavy-handedness. It validates Individuals’ frustration with well being care and positions itself as a deliverer of justice. (The advert is narrated by the rapper Frequent, identified for his socially acutely aware music; in its Tremendous Bowl advert final 12 months, the corporate used Infantile Gambino’s “This Is America,” a track about systemic racism and gun violence, to pile onto its message of a damaged system.) Pew Analysis Heart knowledge launched just a few days in the past present that 71 % of Individuals are anxious about the price of well being care.
On the identical time, Individuals can’t appear to cease imitating billionaires’ wellness habits: untested peptides, NAD+ IV drips, Erewhon smoothies, red-light masks, keto diets. A slew of different deliberate Tremendous Bowl adverts selling new visions of well being illustrates simply how central the pursuit of wellness has develop into to American life and the American financial system, even when the advantages of so many of those practices are questionable at greatest. Hims & Hers is correct in its prognosis that a lot of this nation’s hole in well being and longevity boil right down to wealth. However the therapy it prescribes appears to be an unlikely remedy.