Sequencing is Dead...?
Obviously not, but some things happened recently and it’s all been bouncing around in my head…
Givens
I had to interact with hospitals again. This is always interesting,
Hospital 1
I had been feeling a bit bloated. So as you do in Japan, I popped in to see an internal medicine specialist. They set me up with:
A contrast CT
Colonoscopy
Gastroscopy
I apparently have a beautiful large intestine and stomach and everything is fine.
Hospital 2
As regular readers will know, I had a struggle getting any diagnostic tests performed for my son (profoundly intellectually disabled). That process required a certain amount of “shouting” before being introduced to a geneticist, a series of “lesser” tests and then sequencing. A process which took years.
What analysis was actually performed is somewhat opaque.
So I’ve been trying to get access to data1, a process that is also taking years and involves a series of long, legalistic letters discussing patient data access rights under Japanese legislation…
The Market
So all these things have been knocking around in my head. The ease with which I could get a contrast CT. The difficulty in getting any tests for my son…
The ambivalence of investors to sequencing companies long read companies…
And short:
That ambivalence partly being due to both long read companies running at a significant loss and showing limited growth.
And the only profitable sequencing company seemingly in slow decline: