“FOREVER YOUNG” CLINICS OPEN GLOBALLY

Want to be Forever Young, like the Alphaville song implores? Forget billionaires and their freezing machines, it all appears to be going more and more mainstream. You might recall earlier this year that Bloomberg reported on tech billionaire Bryan Johnson, who is investing north of $2 million a year on reversing the ageing process. He is doing this through a combination, yes, of diet and exercise, but also cryotherapy and blood transfusions. His milliondollar numbers seem more than a little extreme – and out of reach to all of us – but it’s a great indicator of how much money globally is being funnelled into the quest to reverse ageing.

On the lo-fi end of the spectrum, anti-ageing is a fast-growing segment in the $1 trillion personal care and beauty segment, while on the other end of the scale, there’s the effort to “delay human death” – projected to be worth a whopping $600 billion by 2025, according to the Global Wellness Institute.

And more than just a day at the spa and a few rejuvenating treatments, the global medical spa market is blurring the lines between wellness and healthcare. The Longevity Suite

– a super-high-tech medi spa group in Europe – is opening biohacking clinics across Italy with plans for expansion. The treatment menu can read like something out of a superhero movie. You can book for a Total Body Cryo-suite, which means heading into a cryo chamber set between

-85 and -100 degrees Celsius. The benefits are meant to include: reduced inflammation, detox, increased energy and reduced recovery time. But there’s everything from LED light treatments to detox nutrition programmes, IV drips and ozone therapy... The list goes on.