An empire of wellness
Sarah sat in her windowless room, staring at dozens of sensor readouts across her hundreds of clients. Everything was stable. Everything was as expected. She took a deep breath, beginning to grow relaxed herself.
She was suddenly interrupted by a window appearing on her screen, covering up all the other views in order to urgently demand her attention. Sensor data was reporting something anomalous, and her job was to stop that from happening.
The name in the title bar was familiar: Clark Sterling.
His sensors were exceeding the nominal baseline he had established at his last checkup, and that was bad. All the biometrics were high — not just his heart heart or blood pressure. The swarm of nanobots relayed every conceivable metric instantly, from his telomere length to neurotransmitter levels.
That was the promise that Eternity Assurance ensured. They spared no expense when it came to monitoring their assets. It was a consequence of modern medicine. With each new advancement, the cost of maintaining life grew and people had even greater desire to live. They’d pay anything to extend their life, and life insurance agents were eager for the arbitrage.
Clark was currently BASE jumping off Shanghai Tower. A quick search through his social media found the camera feed of from his helmet overlooking the megacity. It made her stomach churn.
“Mr. Sterling, I’m registering a spike in cortisol and adrenaline. Please abort the jump immediately,” she interjected, speaking through bone conducting audio through the nanobots. She hoped that her voice could break through the bliss of adrenaline.
Clark chuckled, his sound echoing from the livestream.
“Now Sarah, where’s the fun in that?”
He stretched out his arms, extending his wingsuit as he started leaning forward towards the edge.
She grew anxious. She had only a few seconds left to stop this.
Her fingers expertly dashed across the interface, pulling up the control panel for Clark’s nanobot swarm. She activated Program Six, triggering them to release a calming cocktail of neuroregulators. They subtly began to take effect across his nervous system, nudging his risk tolerance to acceptable levels.
Clark, who had been laughing, suddenly became stoic.
“Spoilsport,” he let out with a reluctant mutter as he stepped away from the ledge.
Sarah leaned back in her seat, feeling herself grow relieved as well. She was too good at this job, and had been assigned the toughest cases. To keep clients happy, she had to balance longevity with a joie de vivre. She couldn’t fault him for pushing boundaries, but she had to be the voice of reason in his head.
Eternity Assurance had to keep customers alive, and paying. The cost of a payout continued to rise due to their competitors. The arms race continued pushing companies to extend life even farther as they boasted business-ending death benefits.
As Clark made his way back to the elevator to live another day, Sarah began compiling a report. Another near-miss was just another day on the job for her. She wondered if she’d ever get tired of the thrill.
This idea came from a tweet I read recently. I think I agree with the premise, that life insurance companies may become increasingly interested in keeping you alive using increasingly personal technology. In fact, I quickly found John Hancock life insurance offering discounts on an Apple Watch, using your fitness data to reduce premiums.
It feels a bit invasive. I don’t know that I want my insurance provider looking over my shoulder so closely. At the same time, if the outcome is longer and healthier life, I guess I’ll have time to get over it.