The Next Big Thing with Keith D. Terry: Episode “7,000 Diseases. 4,800 Drugs. The Gap in Modern Medicine“, May 7, 2026
Note: to access the podcast instead of the video, click here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/7-000-diseases-4-800-drugs-the-gap-in-modern-medicine/id1715532858?i=1000766591837
What if the biggest problem in medicine is not discovery… but what gets funded? There are more than 7,000 diseases worldwide and fewer than 5,000 approved drugs. That gap is not just a statistic. It reveals a deeper issue in how healthcare innovation actually works. In this episode of The NEXT BIG THING with Keith D. Terry, we break down one of the most overlooked opportunities in modern medicine: drug repurposing. This conversation explores how existing drugs, already approved and proven safe, may hold answers to diseases that still have no effective treatments—and why those solutions often never reach patients. In this episode, you will learn:
- Why many promising treatments never make it past early research
- How financial incentives shape what gets developed in healthcare
- What drug repurposing is and why it matters now more than ever
- The truth about off-label use and how it impacts real patients
- How AI is accelerating the discovery of new treatments
- Why some of the best medical solutions may already exist
This is not just a conversation about healthcare. It is about how systems prioritize, how innovation actually happens, and why millions of people are still waiting for solutions.