Trisha Thadani, The Washington Post, January 12, 2026
LAS VEGAS — Just beyond the flashing slot machines and cigarette-saturated casino air, thousands of the health obsessed gathered in a convention hall here to demonstrate their hacks for living longer lives. They infused ozone into their blood streams, stood on vibrating mats, swallowed samples of supplements and took scans of their livers.
The gathering of wellness clinic operators, doctors and antiaging enthusiasts last month offered a vivid snapshot of a booming industry built upon the promise of longer, healthier and more vibrant lives. At the center are customers, fed up with or skeptical of the current health care system, who are willing to take risks with unproven treatments and spend extraordinary sums of money to extend their lives.
“There’s always something new in the longevity business,” Veronica Zarco, a partner at a clinic in Miami Beach, said after testing out a $60,000 light bed. “So we want to be on top of our game.”
Longevity medicine has exploded into the mainstream in recent years, fueled by billions of dollars in private investment, influential allies in the federal government and lobbyists promoting it at both the state and national levels. But the fervor around the industry has also outpaced rigorous scientific evidence and federal regulations that would ensure basic standards throughout the sector.
At its core, antiaging medicine revolves around the reality that the older we are — the weaker our hearts, the more brittle our bones — the more susceptible we become to afflictions like cancer, heart disease and dementia. [….]
Human aging is increasingly recognized as a key area of research, with major institutions such as Brown and Harvard universities studying ways to slow or reverse natural declines. Numerous clinical studies are also exploring strategies to extend overall health. At the same time, critics warn that longevity medicine exists in a regulatory gray area where influencers can promote unsafe protocols and clinics exaggerate the benefits of their treatments.
“A lot of this space is dominated by medical influencers, and not scientists,” said Douglas Vaughan, director of the Potocsnak Longevity Institute at Northwestern Medicine. “We’re still in the discovery mode, and we are trying to find the truth and interventions that are scalable, affordable and effective for the 99 percent.”
The Food and Drug Administration — which is responsible for approving new drugs and ensuring they are safe and marketed appropriately — does not classify aging as a disease, identifying it instead as a natural, universal process. As a result, there is no regulatory pathway to approve medications specifically targeted to aging.
Meanwhile, the big money keeps flowing in.
Global investment in longevity companies surged to $8.49 billion in 2024, a 220 percent increase from the previous year, according to industry analysts at Longevity.Technology. Much of that investment was centered in the United States, analysts say.
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Silicon Valley figures have been behind some major investments in recent years: In 2021, Altos Labs, a biotech start-up focused on antiaging launched with $3 billion in funding from wealthy investors that reportedly included Jeff Bezos. The company says its aim is to rejuvenate cells to a more youthful state in a way that would prolong a healthier life.
[….]
Momentum around the industry hit a tipping point last year, as powerful allies of the industry ascended into the federal government. Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longevity enthusiast himself, has described his own antiaging routines that include a “fistful” of vitamins, testosterone and a stem cell treatment he once received in Antigua. Kennedy has called for an overhaul of FDA funding and regulations, and said last year that if people want to take an experimental drug, they “ought to be able to do that.” A top adviser to Kennedy, Calley Means, was the closing speaker at the Las Vegas conference, LongevityFest, considered one of the largest annual gatherings of the industry.
The Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement that it “urges individuals to consult with their health care provider before using any new supplement or product” and that “the FDA does not comment on or speculate about future or potential policy decisions.”
Robert Goldman, who co-founded the group that started LongevityFest, the American Academy of Anti-Aging Medicine (A4M), said companies and investors will continue flocking to the sector as the population ages. In the past few years, he said, the industry has experienced an “explosion we’ve never seen,” and he predicted it will continue to grow “at a rate that will boggle your imagination.”
“Sixty will be the new 40, and 90 will be the new 60,” Goldman said.
Cashing in
The boom in consumer demand has inspired as many as 800 longevity clinics to spring up around the country, according to some estimates. These clinics often charge as much as tens of thousands of dollars for a single visit.
Common offerings include infusions of NAD+, a molecule found in all cells that clinics often claim can help with energy, brain function, antiaging or recovery; hyperbaric oxygen chambers, a pressurized chamber where customers breathe pure oxygen; and chelation therapy, a treatment that removes heavy metals from the body. None of those treatments have been proven in large-scale human trials to slow aging.
Many longevity customers say their interest was borne out of frustration with the American health care system, which will prescribe a battery of medications when people are sick but doesn’t do enough to prevent their physical decline in the first place. One of those people is Johnny Adams, a 75-year-old who has ventured into the unproven — and sometimes dubious — edges of longevity medicine in his search for a healthy life as he ages. [….]
As he experiments with various therapies, Adams said he measures basic metrics with cognitive and physical tests. Along with these objective measures, he said, an important metric is also “How do I feel?”
“Do I feel better? Do I experience a joy of living?” he said. “Even if it is placebo, I’ll take it.”
[….]
Still, some of the conference’s biggest vendors and presenters have previously run into issues with state and federal regulators.
Between 2022 and 2025, Olympia Pharmaceuticals, which customizes prescription medications and specializes in longevity and weight-loss products, was repeatedly cited by the FDA for deficiencies. In one complaint, a person who took a peptide provided by the pharmacy “thought they were going into cardiac arrest,” according to an inspection.
As one of the biggest sponsors of the event, Olympia had its brand plastered on signs throughout the conference hall and on the lanyards of attendees. In a response to questions about its inspection records, Olympia said “each complaint was documented, assessed, and addressed in accordance with established procedures and adherence to federal regulations.”
Calroy Health Sciences, which sells a seaweed extract that it claims can help clear plaque from arteries and was another major sponsor, received a warning letter from the FDA in 2022 for making misleading claims about a product on its website. Responding to a request for comment, Calroy cited a 2023 FDA letter that said the matter had been resolved.
The majority of physicians who presented during the conference appeared to be in good standing with state and federal regulators, according to a Post review of medical board records. But some had been the subject of disciplinary actions.
For example, Frank Shallenberger, whom A4M features on its website as “a pioneer in integrative and anti-aging medicine,” has been reprimanded three times by the Nevada medical board between 1995 and 2023 for deficiencies including misdiagnosing a patient and improperly prescribing controlled substances, including hormone replacement therapy to himself and his wife.
[….]
‘An existential moment’
Means, the close Kennedy ally, told conference attendees that the country is in “an existential moment” when it comes to health care, but there is also “legitimate concern about patients having the right information.”
He said the current administration has a “significant bias toward trusting patients in the world of personalized medicine and patient autonomy,” he said. “Even if there are risks.”
[….]
The Alliance for Longevity Initiatives, formed in 2022 to advance aging research in the United States, is lobbying the federal government to recognize aging as something that is treatable. The group, which has spent at least $283,000 in federal lobbying since 2022, according to OpenSecrets, in April held its second summit on Capitol Hill and congressional briefing that included opening remarks from Mehmet Oz, the administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. A bipartisan House Longevity Science Caucus, initially formed in February 2023, was also relaunched in April.
The lobbying group played a key role in crafting and passing two Montana bills last year that lowered barriers for clinics and physicians to provide healthy patients with experimental drugs and therapies that do not have FDA approval. The laws also added oversight and enforcement to the use of such therapies.
[….]
‘Why not try it?’
Diana Zuckerman, president of the nonprofit National Center for Health Research, has heard plenty of stories about how an unconventional therapy changed the life of a patient or that of a loved one. There are those who suffered from cancer, heart disease or long covid, unable to find solutions to their issues until they said they discovered certain offbeat treatments that weren’t available in conventional settings, or the United States.
While some may have appeared to benefit from an unconventional therapy, she said, it is important to rigorously test these treatments with randomized, double-blind studies in humans.
“You’ve spent all this money, you want to feel some benefit has accrued, so you really believe that you feel better,” she said. But “there are costs for all these things.”
Erskine Thompson, 60, is unbothered by such costs.
[….]
“If a lot of people say it makes them feel better,” he said, “then why not try it?”
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