Be prepared to hear more about the Riyadh-based Hevolution Foundation. Their work is intended to discover ways to delay the aging process, admittedly a more rational idea than searching for the fountain of youth. The effort is no sideshow. According to a recent article in the MIT Technology Review, the House of Saud plans to spend as much as a billion dollars a year to support research on the biology of aging.
Saudi Arabia can certainly afford the indulgence. The royal family may be worth some $1.4 trillion, give or take a few hundred million. The number grows by the day with Arab light crude selling at buoyant market prices.
The Hevolution Foundation is set to fund basic scientific research at previously unheard of levels. The MIT article notes that the division of the US Institute on Aging that supports this type of research limits its annual outlay to $325 million. In addition to academic research, we expect to see biotech companies focused on geroscience to be likely candidates for outsized tranches of venture capital.
For Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the motivation here is straightforward:
Global Panache. Research on aging is a stepchild of the medical community. Certainly over recent years, governments have prioritized coronavirus-related issues. There is an obvious gap in scientific studies for Saudi Arabia to make its mark.
National Demographics. Saudi Arabia is a youthful country with an average age of about 31. Yet, its population of 35 million is notoriously unhealthy. The nation harbors one of the highest diabetes rates in the world because of a rich diet and sedentary lifestyle.
Domestic Economy. Expanding medical tourism is an easy win for Saudi Arabia, which would no doubt like to overshadow the UAE on this front. Islam has some 1.9 billion adherents worldwide, representing a natural audience for advanced healthcare expertise.
One early win for Hevolution could come from underwriting research on the use of metformin, a low-cost drug commonly used to treat type-2 diabetes. Early-stage work indicates that taking metformin appears to help patients live longer-than-expected. Intensive, scientific studies on the impact of this drug have oddly lacked the sort of robust funding that the foundation appears willing to provide.
Hevolution was chartered at the end of 2018 as a move to help burnish the Kingdom’s reputation. The foundation’s global agenda, however, was put on hold because of the extent of diplomatic fall-out from the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Riyadh would likely have been further embarrassed by the return of any outsized research grants from notable scientific organizations. The passage of time in part has helped repair this reputational damage. ■
Our Vantage Point: We expect Saudi Arabia to increasingly flex its muscle in scientific circles, as a foil to its growing prominence in sports and other cultural affairs. These efforts will accelerate internationally after the soon-expected visit of President Biden to Riyadh.
Learn more at the MIT Technology Review
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