Global Wellness Institute

With global economic growth, more people in emerging markets are entering the middle class and as they do, they adopt “American” eating habits – in particular, consuming too much soda. This has meant skyrocketing obesity, and most experts agree that taxing “sugar bomb” beverages is the only way forward.

But this has led to increasingly violent clashes between countries/cities that propose taxes and “Big Sugar” that spends hundreds of millions of dollars to fight new legislation.

Read about how this battle will intensify in the next few years, putting the fight against obesity and sugary drinks at the very forefront of wellness.

An issue to watch in 2018 is whether more wellness-associated brands will have to enter politics and thus risk becoming embroiled in tricky partisan issues. Recent example: Patagonia, the iconic outdoor U.S. retail brand (embodying many qualities associated with well-being) recently filed a lawsuit against the current U.S. Presidential administration after it removed federal protection on two million acres of national parks land – and other companies have also taken sides on the issue.

 

These are challenging times for wellness brands. “Staying outside of politics” may be their favoured option, but it’s likely that they’ll increasingly be forced to take a stance and manage it from a reputational perspective…

At the recent Global Wellness Summit, Elissa Epel, PhD, Professor at the University of California, San Francisco, analysed the latest from telomere science: those caps at the end of our DNA whose shortening is causally predictive of disease and aging. What forces negatively impact our telomeres? And what can we do to lengthen them? Learn how everything from adversity in pregnancy, chronic stress, lack of social connection, poor sleep, and diets high in meat are associated with shorter telomeres.