Traversing the Healthcare Metaverse

Facebook announced last year that it was committed to putting $10 billion into the virtual world: its metaverse division. And last week, news broke that Microsoft was nearing a $70 billion deal to buy Activision Blizzard, the video game publisher of World of Warcraft and other top-selling games. As Microsoft's biggest entry into gaming, the deal indicates the company is betting big on the growth of the virtual space, as it works to compete with tech rivals like Facebook. It's clear that the metaverse -- a new virtual reality sector that reimagines the internet as a 3D experience that users can be a part of -- is being hyped by tech titans as the future of the internet, but what does it mean for the future of healthcare? The COVID-19 pandemic ushered in a new healthcare consumer conditioned to home delivery of medicines and receiving healthcare online through telehealth visits (including Medicare recipients).