Bryan Johnson, the tech whiz turned anti-aging aficionado, shells out around $2 million a year trying to outsmart the Grim Reaper. However, his latest move has the internet rolling on the floor laughing.
After nearly five years of popping rapamycin, Johnson decided to hit the brakes. Why? Just a minor thing—he suspected the drug was fast-tracking his aging instead of halting it.
The man who came on a mission to roll back aging sped it up instead.
Bryan Johnson is the brain behind Braintree, one of the main payment processing companies bought out by PayPal for $800 million. Post-acquisition, Johnson hard-pivoted into anti-aging, becoming the human guinea pig for just about every cutting-edge therapy out there.
But he just realized that his anti-aging potion might be a potion of aging instead.
Social media did not hold back. An X user compared Johnson to Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation, hilariously quipping: “He looks like Data.”
Proving that brevity really is the soul of wit, a user hit with:
“I reiterate: lmao.”
Then there was the philosophical take:
“This is how the scientific method works, and you owe Bryan Johnson thanks for being the experimental subject so that the rest of us can learn.”
Thanks for taking one for the team, Bryan.
One user noted, “Looking at his bottle of anti-aging serum and noticing the label has slightly curled, unfurling it to reveal 'anti-anti-aging serum'.”
“So other people are seeing Tobey Maguire crossed with Data as well,” another added.
Someone said: “Poor guy is aging at 60 seconds per minute and can't stop it.”
“He looks like how aliens think humans look like,” someone commented.
A user reacted with a GIF stating: "This is going backwards".
A user went on to ask: "Why would you want to live forever anyway."
So, why did Bryan Johnson ditch the rapamycin?
Well, let’s break down the side effects that had him rethinking. In a detailed X post, he stated:
- Skin and Soft Tissue Infections: Johnson faced occasional infections, raising red flags about what the drug was doing to his immune system.
- Abnormal Blood Lipid Levels: His blood fat levels went haywire, and not in a good way.
- Elevated Blood Sugar Levels: Potential early signs of insulin resistance? Not the kind of future-proofing he had in mind.
- Increased Resting Heart Rate: A racing heart isn't exactly the hallmark of eternal youth.
Originally an immunosuppressant drug that was used to prevent organ rejection in transplant patients, rapamycin has caught attention in the anti-aging community recently. Studies, especially those involving mice, hint that it might help extend lifespan.
Bryan Johnson went all in, claiming to follow "the most aggressive rapamycin protocol of anyone in the industry," by taking 13 milligrams every two weeks in a bid to roll back his biological clock.
What did Bryan Johnson's experiment teach us?
Despite tweaking his dosage—trying everything from weekly to biweekly—the side effects wouldn’t budge. With no other underlying health issues to blame, Johnson concluded rapamycin was the sneaky culprit.
“Despite the immense potential from pre-clinical trials, my team and I came to the conclusion that the benefits of lifelong dosing of rapamycin do not justify the hefty side effects,” he stated.
Dr. Oliver Zolman, Johnson’s longevity specialist, added fuel to the fire in the Netflix documentary Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever. He highlighted the severe bacterial infections rapamycin could cause, like pneumonia, cellulitis, and pharyngitis.
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