Opinion: MAHA and insurance companies both want to treat human bodies like cars

The author opens with a scenario of a car beeping at a driver and sending driving data to an insurer, illustrating how telematics—surveillance-based auto insurance—has become standard. Insurers promise savings for sharing minute-to-minute driving data, but a report by the Maryland Insurance Administration found mixed premium changes with no real overall savings. This model, the author argues, is now being applied to human bodies: White House health officials and insurance executives are pushing wearables in mainstream medicine, with health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. telling House members in 2025 that his vision is for every American to wear a wearable within four years, claiming tracking sleep, heart rate, glucose, and other metrics will help people 'take control' of their health.

The author raises three ethical questions. First, there is little evidence wearables will lower overall costs; they may simply provide an ulterior profit motive for insurers. Second, sharing minute-by-minute bodily data with corporations raises major privacy concerns about how the data will be used and stored. Third, the wearable push promotes a highly individualized view of health that ignores how social structures and inequalities shape disease risk, and instead of thoughtful health policy, HHS wants to 'slap an Apple Watch on your wrist.'

Despite these unanswered questions, health and life insurers have already introduced telematics-style tracking. Programs such as John Hancock's Vitality (developed by South African third-party company Discovery Limited) and UnitedHealthcare's Wellness Rewards offer discounts, gift cards, and points for 'good' behaviors. The piece concludes that MAHA (Make America Healthy Again) has been gearing up to promote this model further.