Use Apple Maps to find vaccine providers
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Find vaccines nearby with VaccineFinder, a free, online service developed by Boston Children’s Hospital available on Apple Maps.
Amazon Enters the Medical Care Industry With Amazon Care
Amazon Care, Amazon’s Telehealth Solution is rolling out in all 50 states for its employees this summer, and opening up to other employers.
Amazon Care Telehealth solution
Frustrated with soaring medical costs and inadequate healthcare solutions, Amazon chairman and founder Jeff Bezos wanted to find a new healthcare solution that he could offer to Amazon’s large workforce and also to people all over the country. Amazon Care is the company’s bold new venture in this direction offering virtual healthcare services on demand, with dedicated ‘care’ teams of doctors and nurses, including clinician support day and night, weekends and on holidays and in-person, at-home care for tests, labs and treatment. The company also offers contact-free prescription delivery.
24/7, 365 Days of the Week Non-Emergency Medical Care
Amazon Care www.amazon.care is focused on offering non-emergency care immediately with virtual visits 24/7 and 365 days a year. This includes addressing sickness, fatigue, depression, anxiety and daily cares that may be exacerbated with the Covid-19 pandemic situation. This can be hugely helpful when sudden situations could become problematic such as babies getting sick overnight with high fevers.
Amazon’s Care Team works with Care Medical, an independent medical practice consisting of a dedicated group of licensed doctors, nurse practitioners and registered nurses to help individual health goals. This includes working with familiar faces for ongoing care. All clinicians have experience working with both adults and children, focused on “whole person care.” Questions can be answered right from the app.
Launched yesterday March 17, 2021 to serve other Washington-based companies, Amazon Care has been in operation for 18 months so far for Amazon employees and their families to access high-quality medical care quickly and easily. This service enables video or chat conferences as quickly as 60 seconds or less to medical professionals, eliminating lengthy wait times.
Amazon Care began as an app-based pilot program to Amazon employees in September 2019 and then rolled out to their workforce in Washington by September 2020.
Image via Amazon Care
Amazon Care offers two services:
Virtual Care: Connecting via the Amazon Care app for both Android and iOS for quick immediate medical help with a nurse or doctor using messaging or video
In-person care: Medical professionals come to the patient’s home to provide in-person care from routine blood draws to listening to a patient’s lungs.
The service also offers contactless prescription delivery right to a patient’s door. This summer, Amazon Care will expand to all 50 states to offer virtual care for its employees and to other companies. The service is speedy and effective, eliminating delays. Amazon Care, wellness clinics and pharmacy all work independently.
As a workplace benefit, Amazon Care offers immediate access to a range of urgent and primary care services, including COVID-19 and flu testing, vaccinations, treatment of illnesses and injuries, preventive care, sexual health, prescription requests, refills, and delivery, and additional wellness needs such as nutrition, joint and muscle health evaluations, sleep programs, pre-pregnancy planning and more. As Covid-19 has restricted travel with doctors also limiting access, Amazon Care adjusted in Seattle to offer vaccines in families’ homes.
Amazon Care offers free access to primary care physicians, labs and prescription delivery to all Amazon employees.
Image via Amazon Care
“My 3-year-old daughter woke up at 2 a.m. with a terrible cough, so bad that her breathing sounded restricted. Of course we were worried about COVID-19 and certainly did not want to go to an urgent care center or emergency room if we could avoid it. Using Amazon Care, we were able to connect with a clinician in under a minute who provided medical advice that helped us get through the night. She also prescribed a medication that was delivered to our doorstep by 9 a.m. the next day. Thanks to Amazon Care, we were able to manage her illness without ever having to leave the house.”
Patients can schedule follow up visits with their clinician as needed using the app. Patients receive care summaries and follow-up reminders after visits. When patients have in-person visits, they get estimates of when the clinician will arrive as well to their homes.
Amazon Care offers secure, HIPAA-compliant service so that employees and their families/dependents can visit with the same medical professionals, building long-term relationships and familiar connections. Seeing familiar faces is often important to a patient, but also in terms of care, essential for proper diagnosis and ongoing treatment for chronic diseases, such as diabetes, asthma, hypertension and more.
Idea Incubated First At Amazon and Then Expanded Out
Image via Amazon Care
Healthcare costs are usually the biggest expense for large employers such as Walmart after wages. Americans spent over $880 billion in healthcare costs just in 2020. Frustrated with soaring costs, Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos, launched a joint venture with Warren Buffett and Jaime Dimon called Haven. Haven did not get enough traction and disbanded in 2021, but in the meantime, Amazon’s secret lab Grand Challenge that develops long-term solutions, created Amazon Care working with Amazon’s HR department to better understand what employees were looking for.
Amazon worked closely with Haven on several pilots, trying out copay plans in 2020. Leveraging its knowledge from Haven and its own workforce, Amazon developed Amazon Care focused on non-emergency healthcare and Amazon Pharmacy to deliver medications via Amazon Prime.
Amazon Care is operated by Care Medical, a medical organization that works exclusively with Amazon and provides all the doctors, nurses and necessary support staff. Care Medical has been filing paperwork in numerous states since early March, as reported by Stat News.
Digital health options have been growing rapidly since the Covid-19 pandemic, but Amazon’s approach differs in providing both telemedicine and pharmacy services. It is also working on health wearables, connected devices and diagnostic labs. Taking care of non-emergency medical care 24/7, 365 days of the week along with prescription delivery and diagnostic testing eliminates two of the largest expenses that involve visits to the hospital and nursing home, according to Jeff Becker, healthcare analyst at CB Insights who spoke to Business Insider.
In the Booming Medical Industry Business, Existing Telehealth Medical Companies Take Note
In the $3.8 trillion healthcare industry, existing telehealth providers took note of Amazon’s announcement. While this is the company's first entry into healthcare services beyond delivery of prescriptions and devices, Amazon’s launch reverberated through the industry as Amazon, a $1.6 trillion tech and shipping behemoth, has the capability and speed to deliver at scale. Shares in rival telehealth company Teladoc dropped more than 7%, while Amwell was down more than 5%.
Amazon has already upended industries that it entered as a newcomer, such as grocery shopping and delivery with its Amazon Fresh delivery service offered free of charge with an Amazon Prime subscription and its purchase of Whole Foods.
Disney Offers 100+ New Movies and Shows, Many Going Straight to Disney+, Adapting to Covid19
With shows like Marvel’s WandaVision, The Mandalorian and movies like Mulan, Soul, Raya and the Last Dragon and more, Disney+ has now over 94.9M subscribers
Image via Disney
Besting Wall Street estimates of 55 million subscribers in five years and achieving its own 4-year goal in just 14 months since its launch in 2018, Disney+ has now reached over 94.9 million subscribers, according to its Q1 2021 earnings report. Other Disney owned streaming properties also increased their subscriber base such as Hulu with over 39.4 million subscribers and ESPN Plus with 12.1 million subscribers. The growth is substantial, considering Disney’s new CEO, Bob Chapek, announced that Disney+ had 87 million subscribers in December 2020 at its investor presentation and in less than two months, the service has catapulted forward even further at 94.9 million subscribers worldwide.
Largely buoyed by the popularity of The Mandalorian’s final episodes in December 2020 and the launch of Pixar’s Soul during the holiday season, Disney+ show strong growth and has led the company to alter its four-year plan to 230-260 million subscribers, according to Variety.
Disney+ Turbo-Charged Streaming Engine
In December during its four-hour investor day, Disney announced a slew of new movies and shows, totaling over 100, for the next few years. This includes 11 films and 11 tv shows from Marvel, including the popular Wandavision streaming tv show that launched January 15th of this year with Elizabeth Olsen (Avengers) as “Scarlet Witch/Wanda” and Paul Bettany (Avengers) as “Vision.”
Additional projects include ten Star Wars spinoffs, of which two are Mandalorian spin-offs that follow the adventures of C-3PO and R2-D2; and a Star Wars new movie “Rogue Squadron,” directed by Patty Jenkins. Patty Jenkins is known for the Wonder Woman franchise and will be the first female director for a primary Star Wars movie in the franchises’s 43-year history.
Disney has 15 Disney movies such as new movies of popular franchises Ice Age, Night at the Museum, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Sister Act and Cheaper by the Dozen. 2007 musical Enchanted returns with a sequel by Amy Adams and Tom Hanks stars in a live-action version of Pinocchio as Geppetto.
Pixar brings its own repertoire with more Cars movies. Marvel has a range of new movies including a “Ms. Marvel” series about an American teenage superhero of Pakistan origin. National Geographic has its own range of shows, including an endurance athlete series with Chris Hemsworth known worldwide as “Thor.” There are also many sport dramas slated as well, including one on Giannis Antetokounmpo, the Milwaukee Bucks basketball star.
Bob Iger, Disney’s longtime CEO and now executive chairman, successfully united many brands under Disney including Marvel, Pixar, National Geographic, 20th Century Studios, ESPN and Hulu. He knew the importance of Disney+ vividly upon his retirement, which he shared in an interview last year in February 2020.
“I want to make sure that our creative pipelines are vibrant. That is very, very important, especially as we roll out Disney+ around the world.”
Even close to the end of the four-hour presentation, Disney did not have enough time to show everything.
The well established company has surprised Wall Street by its adroitness in shifting to changing consumer preferences. With the Covid-19 pandemic, many feared that the company’s beloved parks and entertainment venues would be shuttered for good due to coronavirus restrictions. Disney+ has assuaged all doubts and led to significant excitement about the entertainment veteran.
Disney+ has quickly gained ascendancy in the streaming wars through its low monthly price at $7, although the cost will go up slightly to $8 in March this year; its remarkably popular series The Mandalorian; increased viewership as a result of coronavirus stay home orders and entertainment venue capacity restrictions. Disney sent the popular theatrical release Hamilton to its streaming platform as Covid-19 prevented theaters from running, leading to a surge in demand. As high as 30 million subscribers come from India, where they are also charged a lower monthly subscription fee.
Interestingly, Netflix, the entertainment streaming service that made streaming so popular that it has its own phrase “Netflix and chill,” took 10 years and 2 months to reach 95 million paid subscribers while Disney+ took just 14 months. Netflix currently has 195 million subscribers worldwide. Disney+ expects tor each 230-260 million subscribers in 2025.
Challenges of Running Disney+
Running streaming services are not inexpensive. Disney+ programming costs cost $2 billion in 2020. Disney said its annual content budget will be $8.5 billion by 2024. Building out streaming services costs a great deal. Disney owns four streaming platforms: Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+ and Star+. Star+ is an international version of Hulu for Latin America that is soon to be launched later this year.
Additional hurdles Disney has faced include losses in its direct to consumer business such as theme parks, reaching $2.8 billion in 2020 and the loss of licensing fees since it has consolidated its vast content library under its own label, Disney+ instead of leasing or selling to other streaming companies.
Another concern lies in the quality and consistency of new content given that content is being distributed at a much faster rate.
“As we increase our output, the emphasis will always be on quality, not volume.”
Finally, Disney+ faces an onslaught of competition from two powerful stalwarts, Netflix and Amazon, that spend billions of dollars on original programming annually as well as new arrivals from entertainment companies with significant content empires such as Warner Media, Viacom CBS, NBC Universal and Discovery. HBOMax is now integrated with AT&T, featuring favorites like Game of Thrones and Friends. Paramount has joined the fray with its own Paramount Plus, building on its self-described “mountain of content,” that is scheduled to launch March 4.
Content on FX, Hulu and Star+
FX, the sci-fi channel, is creating new content based on the popular “Alien” movie franchise and many large projects including “Shogun.”
Hulu has several new shows in development including the new series Nine Perfect Strangers, which is a mystery tale from David E. Kelley and features Regina Hall, Nicole Kidman and Melissa McCarthy.
Star+ contains content from Disney-owned properties such as ABC, FX, Freeform, Searchlight and 20th Century Studios. Disney purchased 20th Century Studios from Rupert Murdoch in 2019. Star+ will appear as a standalone service in Latin America by June of this year and also have ESPN sports coverage through bundle options.
Star+ will also offer mature programming such as Deadpool 2, Family Guy and more for international markets such as Europe, Canada and Australia to reach audiences beyond just families. When the Star channel is added, the cost of Disney+ will go up to about $11/month.
“Our goal is to increasingly put the consumer in charge and let them decide when and how they want to enjoy our one of a kind entertainment offerings.”
Growing Shift from Theater to Direct Streaming Release
The pandemic has forced numerous theaters nationwide to close and accelerated the shift to direct streaming, as well as to push back releases for large films.
Disney has debuted big budget theatrical releases such as “Mulan” on Disney+ with a premium access feature at $30 for lifetime access. “Raya and the Last Dragon” follows this model, arriving in March for a premium fee.
Walt Disney, the founder of Disney, sums it up best.
“If you can dream it, you can do it. Always remember that this whole thing was started with a dream and a mouse.”