ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product? • Hacker News Board

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#161

Post by bwb » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:32 PM UTC

jsheard wrote: post #22

bwb wrote: post #12

ChatGPT has made a material difference in my ability to understand health problems, test results, and to communicate with doctors effectively. My wife and I were talking last night about how helpful it was in 2025. I hope that it continues to be good at this. I want regulators to keep an eye on this and make smart laws. I don't want it to go away, as its value is massive in my life. (One example, if you are curious:…

On the other hand, sometimes you end up like this guy. Are you feeling lucky? https://arstechnica.com/health/2025/08/after-using-chatgpt-m...

You have to use your head, just like online forums or with doctors :)

I've had doctors tell me to do insane things. Some that caused lasting damage. Better to come with a trust-but-verify attitude to humans and AI.

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#162

Post by alpinisme » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:32 PM UTC

Workaccount2 wrote: post #96

alpinisme wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insurance that is maximally responsive to patient health changes in terms of cost (ie making healthier people pay less) ends up being an inefficient way of just having people pay for their healthcare directly. And it naturally means the people with highest premiums are the least likely to be able to afford it (the elderly, the disabled, those with chronic conditions that make them less likely to maintain high earning…

The obvious retort to this is: "If I focused on my health, ate clean and exercised daily, why should I also be subsidizing Billy "video-games-are-my-exercise" fatass's chronic health conditions?" This is why there is a hyperfixation on shifting blame away from (failing) individuals. The logic breaks when Billy has to admit he just hates exercising. And yes, before you comment, I know "maybe Billy has (condition outsi…

In some respects, the ideal world is one in which everyone’s premiums are tied to a free and easy Apple Watch-like device that silently tracks exercise, blood sugar at a frequency that can tell when you ate a big dessert, air quality (and the presence of smoke or pollution), blood alcohol content, whether you are in speeding cars, whether you are participating in dangerous sports, etc. Such a system would directly confront individuals with the cost of their behaviors in an economic way, probably leading many or even most people to improve their habits in the aggregate.

But such a system comes at other costs that most people intuitively feel infringes on core values they have.

Edit to add: this system would actually have some great advantages over an “existing conditions” tax in that now you pay low rates until you have diabetes, all during the time you are leading the unhealthy lifestyle. But once you have it you are not rewarded for starting to exercise and eat healthy and get it under control. In the hypothetical scenario above, you’d be punished economically during the period you were building bad habits and you would be able to restore sane costs after course correction

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#163

Post by bwb » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:34 PM UTC

codexjourneys wrote: post #155

rconti wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can be helpful, but also untrustworthy. My mother-in-law has been struggling with some health challenges the past couple of months. My wife (her daughter) works in the medical field and has been a great advocate for her mother. This whole time I've also been peppering ChatGPT with questions, and in turn I discuss matters with my wife based on this. I think it was generally correct in a lot of its assertions, but a…

Totally agree, it can be a bit of an echo chamber. I had an infection post-dental-work. Bing Chat insisted I had swollen lymph nodes from a cold that would resolve on their own, then decided I had a salivary gland infection. After a follow-up with a real-world ENT, it was (probably accurately) diagnosed as a soft-tissue infection that had completely resolved on two rounds of antibiotics. The AI never raised that poss…

Ya I wouldn't trust it for diagnosis at this point. But it can help you get pointed in the right direction so human, tests, and the scientific process can try to figure out the rest.

Doctors struggle with diagnosis as well. I have stories and I bet everyone has stories about being passed from doctor to doctor to doctor, and none of them talk to each other or work holistically.

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#164

Post by bwb » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:38 PM UTC

ryan_n wrote: post #37

bwb wrote: post #12

ChatGPT has made a material difference in my ability to understand health problems, test results, and to communicate with doctors effectively. My wife and I were talking last night about how helpful it was in 2025. I hope that it continues to be good at this. I want regulators to keep an eye on this and make smart laws. I don't want it to go away, as its value is massive in my life. (One example, if you are curious:…

That's awesome that it's helped you so much, chronic back pain is awful. Is it possible though, that this could be interpreted as a failure of the trainer to come up with a successful treatment plan for you? "Sudden" relief after 10 years of therapy just because you changed the program seems like they were just having you perform the wrong exercises no?

The trainer was a godsend, got me to ~95% pain-free, and taught me all kinds of things. He is amazing.

But 2025 was maybe down to 90% pain-free, and I want to get stronger. So I did a big rewrite of my entire workout plan and checked everything. AI wasn't perfect, but it was amazing when you already know some.

It is still a tool I had to direct, and it took a few days of work. But I'm amazed at where it got me to. It took the injury into consideration and my main sport, and built around that. In the past I tried do this online and couldn't do it given the numerous factors involved. It was not perfect, but over the course of a few days, I was able to sort it out (and test with a trainer on the approach a few weeks after).

I've been 100% pain free for 6 weeks in a way I haven't felt in a long time.

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#165

Post by ImPostingOnHN » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:41 PM UTC

wiseowise wrote: post #35

lotsofpulp wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is someone seeking for a way to deal with an inherited or environmentally caused illness giving up control of their body?

Don’t forget that majority of the commenters on this platform live in a country that views suffering in pain from incurable disease as a “god intended way” (and a horse dose of morphine). Take it with a grain of salt.

Setting aside that you're factually incorrect, this sort of negative stereotyping of others based on their nationality (or ethnicity, or race) is inappropriate, especially on this forum. We don't need more bigotry here.

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#166

Post by FireBeyond » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:44 PM UTC

Workaccount2 wrote: post #96

alpinisme wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Insurance that is maximally responsive to patient health changes in terms of cost (ie making healthier people pay less) ends up being an inefficient way of just having people pay for their healthcare directly. And it naturally means the people with highest premiums are the least likely to be able to afford it (the elderly, the disabled, those with chronic conditions that make them less likely to maintain high earning…

The obvious retort to this is: "If I focused on my health, ate clean and exercised daily, why should I also be subsidizing Billy "video-games-are-my-exercise" fatass's chronic health conditions?" This is why there is a hyperfixation on shifting blame away from (failing) individuals. The logic breaks when Billy has to admit he just hates exercising. And yes, before you comment, I know "maybe Billy has (condition outsi…

> "If I focused on my health, ate clean and exercised daily, why should I also be subsidizing Billy "video-games-are-my-exercise" fatass's chronic health conditions?"

Then why are you not asking your insurer why they cover a lot less preventative health or other options. For example, Kaiser flat out refuses to prescribe GLP-1s for weight loss, others insurers are the same with gym subsidies or not covering nutritionists.

But they'll happily pay for your gastric bypass.

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#167

Post by bwb » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:44 PM UTC

jmyeet wrote: post #50

bwb wrote: post #12

ChatGPT has made a material difference in my ability to understand health problems, test results, and to communicate with doctors effectively. My wife and I were talking last night about how helpful it was in 2025. I hope that it continues to be good at this. I want regulators to keep an eye on this and make smart laws. I don't want it to go away, as its value is massive in my life. (One example, if you are curious:…

This kind of comment scares me because it's an example of people substituring professional advice for an LLM where LLMs are known to hallucinate or otherwise simply make stuff up. I see this all the time when I write queries and get the annoying Gemini AI snippet on a subject I know about and often I'll see the AI make provably and objectively false statements.

You have to use critical thinking + it helps to have some info on the subject + it shouldn't be used to perform self-surgery :)

I spent about 12 hours over 2 days, checking, rechecking, and building out a plan. Then I did 2-hour sessions on YouTube, over several weeks, learning the new exercises with proper form (and that continues as form is hard). Followed by an appointment with a trainer to test my form and review the workout as a hole (which he approved of). No trainer really knows how this injury will manifest, so a lot is also helped because I have 10 years of exp.

This isn't a button click, and now follow the LLM lemming. This is a tool like Google search but better.

I could not have done this before using the web. I would have had to read books and research papers, then try to understand which exercises didn't target x muscle groups heavily, etc. I just couldn't do that. The best case would have been a trainer with the same injury, maybe.

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#168

Post by bwb » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:45 PM UTC

metalliqaz wrote: post #13

bwb wrote: post #12

ChatGPT has made a material difference in my ability to understand health problems, test results, and to communicate with doctors effectively. My wife and I were talking last night about how helpful it was in 2025. I hope that it continues to be good at this. I want regulators to keep an eye on this and make smart laws. I don't want it to go away, as its value is massive in my life. (One example, if you are curious:…

Anything you say can and will be used against you.

I've been on the web since it was born. When will this happen? :)

How is this manifesting in reality?

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#169

Post by ImPostingOnHN » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:47 PM UTC

Workaccount2 wrote: post #144

ImPostingOnHN wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The entire purpose of health insurance is spreading risk across a wide and diverse risk pool. > why should I also be subsidizing Billy "video-games-are-my-exercise" fatass's chronic health conditions?" Nobody is asking you to: enrolling in insurance is a choice in the USA. Also, replace "chronic health conditions" with "unavoidable inherited genetic risk factors". We don't want Billy to be screwed for life just becau…

The most cataclysmic thing that could happen to healthcare would be chronically healthy individuals creating their own health insurance.

Not really (in fact that doesn't even make sense), but in any case, I think you replied to the wrong post. Your reply doesn't seem to have anything to do with the post it replied to

Re: ChatGPT Health is a marketplace, guess who is the product?

#170

Post by linkregister » Sat, Jan 10, 2026, 5:48 PM UTC

well_ackshually wrote: post #126

simianwords wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do corporations use my google searches as data to hire me?

Do you have any proof they don't? Do you have any proof the "AI System" that they use to filter out candidates doesn't "accidentally" access data ? Are you willing to bet that Google, OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, won't sell access to that information? Also, in some cases: they absolutely do. Try to get hired in Palantir and see how much they know about your browsing history. Anything related to national security or requi…

The last time I went through the Palantir hiring process, the effort on their end was almost exclusively on technical and cultural fit interviews. My references told me they had not been contacted.

Calibrating your threat model against this attack is unlikely to give you any alpha in 2026. Hiring at tech companies and government is much less deliberate than your mental model supposes.

The current extent of background checks is an API call to Checkr. This is simply to control hiring costs.

As a heuristic, speculated information to build a threat model is unlikely to yield a helpful framework.