Post Corona: From Crisis to Opportunity

by Scott Galloway

The Great Dispersion Covid-19 is accelerating dispersion across many economic sectors. Amazon, of course, took the store and dispersed it to our front door. Netflix took the movie theater and put it in our living room. We’re going to see this dispersion across other industries, including healthcare. Most people who survived Covid-19 never set foot in a doctor’s office. During the pandemic, people with psychological conditions saw their therapists and had medications adjusted without leaving home. This was enabled by changes to insurance rules, which had largely frowned on telemedicine and remote prescribing. Those changes are not likely to be undone, and a flood of innovation and capital will pour into the opportunity well they have drilled. The high-def camera on your mobile phone is a decent diagnostic tool already, but it’s a small step to consumer-friendly diagnostic tools arriving on our doorsteps, used, and shipped back. Specialists will be consulted across town, across the country. Teladoc Health, the largest independent U.S. telemedicine service, is adding thousands of doctors to its network.6 The transition to electronic health records was a major thrust for Obamacare and may be the program’s most lasting and important legacy, as electronic records enable a dispersal of an industry ripe for disruption.