Our health is all we have. But now Google wants it too | Phillip Inman

Our health is all we have. But now Google wants it too | Phillip Inman

Healthcare is going to be one of the biggest corporate battlegrounds of the next 20 years.

In the UK, public and private health spending already accounts for 10% of national income (GDP). In the US, health spending eats up around 17% of the economic pie. As the last of the baby boomers settle into retirement by 2030, those figures are expected to rise by at least half and, if social care is added, possibly double by 2040.

No wonder the tech giants are pitching themselves not so much as mobile phone providers, search engines or chip makers, but as health companies that stand by their customers, administering vital data about their heart rate, their cholesterol and how they can access the best online advice on conditions ranging from acne to Covid-19.

This week, the EU is expected to tell Google that its $2.1bn purchase last year of fitness-tracker company Fitbit will be investigated in an antitrust probe. Brussels wants to determine whether the US search engine is accessing health data to enhance its vast advertising business.

Google makes its own smartwatch operating system, as do Apple, Samsung and several Chinese tech firms. The health data they acquire through the various devices they run on