People watching the Tremendous Bowl right this moment will hear a tantalizing pitch: You, too, can dwell just like the wealthy. All you want is a technique to order up well being care the best way they do.
A brand new advert scheduled to air through the huge recreation, from the telehealth firm Hims & Hers, opens with the provocation “Wealthy folks dwell longer.” A dizzying montage spoofing America’s wealthiest and most wellness-obsessed characters follows: An ageless man bathes in crimson gentle within the method of Bryan Johnsonthe multimillionaire who rose to fame for his fanatical efforts to dwell perpetually. A bald man doffs a cowboy hat as a rocket blasts off—clearly an allusion to Jeff Bezos, who in recent times has turn 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, instructed 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 perfect of the whole lot,” the voiceover continues. “So why don’t you?”
Hims & Hers is finest recognized for providing weight-loss and hair-restoration therapies, however the advert positions the corporate as a gateway to a special 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 stated. 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 accessible to youfor a worth.
Telehealth platforms similar to Hims & Hers supply sufferers the power to pay out of pocket to rapidly search remedy for his or her illnesses. Usually, they assert that sufferers should seek the advice of just about with a medical supplier earlier than receiving a prescription, however this requirement isn’t featured prominently in most advertisements. The brand new spot from Hims & Hers notes that its docs are round to speak, and—within the tremendous print—mentions {that a} session with a supplier is required earlier than receiving remedy. However except you’re squinting on the display screen, 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 primarily perform as a form of Amazon for medicine, making it simpler for folks to get prescriptions for managed substances similar to Adderall and testosterone. The businesses sidestep the excessive price related to many name-brand medicine through the use of compounding pharmacies to supply cheaper, almost similar variations of the drugs. In concept, a licensed supplier writes the prescription after an intensive medical evaluation. However in simply the previous two years, two totally 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 targeted on democratizing care—particularly GLP-1s for weight reduction. It asserted that America’s weight problems epidemic is attributable to “the system,” which retains folks sick by making well being care unaffordable. When name-brand GLP-1s similar to Wegovy first began being prescribed for weight reduction, in 2021, they have been inaccessible for many People due to their steep price and insurance coverage suppliers’ restricted protection. Rumors that celebrities have been utilizing the medicine for beauty causes sparked a mixture of outrage and envy, and as People 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 People aren’t clamoring for simply GLP-1s anymore. Drugs similar 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 satisfy these calls for. Final 12 months, the corporate launched its low-testosterone remedy program and purchased a peptide-manufacturing facility. It plans to make use of that manufacturing unit to make its personal “personalised” medicine.
Such language evokes the concierge therapies 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 lively substances, or providing it in a special 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 client securityto research 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 of compounded GLP-1s.
The medical neighborhood is anxious that telehealth platforms too simply permit sufferers to take unsafe medicine—or medicine they merely don’t want. The Weight problems Society, a scientific group, warns folks to not use compounded GLP-1s, as a result of they might not include the suitable lively substances. (As I wrote just latelymales’s-health specialists are additionally apprehensive in regards to the cardiovascular and reproductive penalties of pointless testosterone-replacement remedy.) After I requested Hims & Hers in regards to the DOJ investigation, a spokesperson directed me to a public assertion posted yesterday on X, during which the corporate stated it could cease promoting compounded GLP-1 tablets. “We stay dedicated to the tens of millions of People who rely upon us for entry to secure, reasonably priced, and personalised care,” the assertion stated.
The Hims & Hers advert is shrewd in its heavy-handedness. It validates People’ frustration with well being care and positions itself as a deliverer of justice. (The advert is narrated by the rapper Widespread, recognized for his socially 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 information launched a number of days in the past present that 71 p.c of People are apprehensive about the price of well being care.
On the similar time, People 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 advertisements selling new visions of well being illustrates simply how central the pursuit of wellness has turn into to American life and the American economic system, even when the advantages of so many of those practices are questionable at finest. Hims & Hers is correct in its analysis that a lot of this nation’s hole in well being and longevity boil all the way down to wealth. However the remedy it prescribes appears to be an unlikely remedy.
