A millionaire biohacker taking extreme measures to extend his life is stopping taking a longevity drug over worries it sped up ageing.
Bryan Johnson is famed for his bold attempts to reverse ageing and extend his life, including injecting plasma from his teenage son.
He also recently made headlines for starring in his Netflix documentary Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants To Live Forever.
On his conquest for youth, Johnson spends a jaw-dropping $2 million annually on his anti-ageing efforts, involving a vegan diet, avoiding sun exposure, daily exercise, and even more unconventional methods, like shock treatments on his genitals.
The 47-year-old made over $300 million when he sold his mobile and web payment company Braintree to PayPal in 2013.
Bloomberg / Contributor / Getty
And since then, he has gained plenty of attention for his ambitious Project Blueprint that combats ageing. Alongside this, he markets his own (highly pricey) supplement stacks and personalised health plans under the Blueprint brand.
Now he’s revealed one of the 54 supplements he takes daily was doing the exact opposite of what he wanted, it was making him older, not younger.
The drug known as Rapamycin was originally designed as an immunosuppressant to help with organ transplants and treat certain cancers and rare diseases like tuberous sclerosis complex.
It’s been heavily researched for its potential anti-ageing benefits through targeting the mTOR pathway – a key player in ageing and related diseases.
However, rapamycin didn’t turn back the clock, instead it started piling on years – not to mention, a bunch of side effects.
“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,” Johnson wrote on X (formerly Twitter).
Bryan Johnson / YouTube
He explained the list of side effects he experienced such as skin infections, abnormal lipid levels, high glucose readings and an increased resting heart rate.
“With no other underlying causes identified, we suspected Rapamycin, and since dosage adjustments had no effect, we decided to discontinue it entirely,” he added.
“Additionally, on October 27th, a new pre-print indicated that Rapamycin was one of a handful of supposed longevity interventions to cause an increase/acceleration of aging in humans across 16 epigenetic aging clocks.”
Johnson had been on the drug for nearly five years- experimenting with different doses – following what he called the most aggressive rapamycin protocol in the industry.
The biohacker concluded that more research is needed as the ‘experimental compounds’ are ‘constantly evolving’.
Featured Image Credit: Bryan Johnson/YouTube / Bloomberg/Contributor/Getty
Biohacker millionaire spending $2,000,000 per year to de-age shares one simple way everyone can improve their health
The biohacker is trying to turn back his biological clock
A biohacker millionaire who spends $2 million a year to de-age himself has shared one simple way everyone can improve their health.
Bryan Johnson is attempting to turn back his biological clock and he has an easy tip that doesn’t cost a fortune.
The venture capitalist saw his biohacking journey begin in 2020 after experiencing health problems.
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Bryan Johnson is trying to turn back his biological clock (YouTube/@BryanJohnson)
The 47-year-old has a strict daily routine of dozens of pills and a rigorous diet.
Johnson is monitored daily by a team of doctors and now he is lifting the lid with a new Netflix documentary titled Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever.
Speaking to People, he said: “It began when I was 21 years old. I was a missionary, and I lived among extreme poverty in Ecuador.
“I felt really compelled to want to do something that would improve the world. I didn’t know what.
“So the goal became make a whole bunch of money by age 30, and then with that money, find something interesting to do.”
Once he had sold his company Braintree, Johnson said that it ‘coincided with having to rebuild myself from a decade of depression, leave my religion [Mormonism], having divorce, like just try to rebuild myself from scratch — and then this bigger question, what do I do?’
The biohacker offered a simple tip everyone can do to improve their health (Kyle Grillot/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
Johnson then put $100 million into ‘synthetic biology, genomics, nanotech’ and built a brain interface, which he said was ‘the world’s best way to easily and robustly measure the brain… and then I started Blueprint to measure myself. And it all kind of came together into this one simple thesis, which is, don’t die’.
But since not everyone can spend millions a year on their health, the businessman has provided a cost-free way normal people can improve their chances of living for longer.
“Sleep is a professional activity,” he said. “Take sleep as seriously as you do your job.
“You show up on time, you respect it, you’re very rigorous about it, you’re disciplined, you take pride in it.”
He added: “If I eat late or too much food, [it] will decimate my sleep.”
The health-enthusiast recommends trying out a ‘wind-down routine’ which is a ‘30 to 60-minute window to wind down from work, not be on your screen, not doing work, to reconcile what you’re happy about, what you’re sad about, what you’re anxious about. You need some kind of calming mechanism’.
“Sleep is the most powerful drug in existence for anybody,” he insisted.
Don’t Die: The Man Who Wants to Live Forever is available to watch on Netflix now.
