A Healthy Attitude
By Consuelo Valverde and Fred Albert
April 2023
Manuel Manzur has seen the future. And it’s all about wellness.
As the Co-Founder and CEO of Prixz, Manuel helped develop Mexico’s largest on-demand health platform, selling and delivering prescriptions and wellness products, and offering telemedicine and diagnostic services in a country where healthcare coverage is spotty and pharmacists often cut corners. Since Prixz began in 2018, the startup has also changed the way prescriptions are processed, with electronic transmission to speed fulfillment and allow doctors to monitor a patient’s compliance. “In Latin America, it’s not common to have electronic prescriptions integrated with pharmacies,” notes Manuel.
More recently, Prixz introduced a payment plan that allows customers to pay for high-cost medications over time with zero interest. The company also launched a subscription plan for certain products, so that patients receive their refills automatically.
“Wellness is the future,” Manuel says.
But Manuel believes the company should look beyond treatment to preventative care. “Medicine … is a small part of the entire healthcare ecosystem,” he observes. “Wellness is the future.” Demand has been strong for skin care products and similar items that promote wellbeing, and Manuel is considering offering food products that contribute to good health and prevent the onset of illness.
“Healthcare in the public sector is very bad and the private sector is available to very few people, so we have to look for new formulas,” he says. “One through prevention, and the other through treatment — how to treat it as much as possible at home.”
The latter issue will become increasingly important in Latin America, as the elderly tend to stay at home instead of going to a nursing home, putting more of the burden on their children. This may not have been a problem in years past, but couples are having fewer children these days. “If there are two parents who only have one child, it will be difficult for the child to take care of everything,” Manuel says.
He predicts that technology will play an increasing role in the care of the elderly, monitoring wellbeing through home devices rather than in-person nurses or caregivers. At the same time, Manuel notes, people are living longer these days. “There are going to be more older people in better condition, but they are still going to have to be under treatment.”
“It is okay to make mistakes. But it is intolerable not to learn from them.”
Over the course of his career, Manuel says he has learned to experiment and not be afraid to make decisions. “There’s always a certain amount of trial and error starting a company. You will never get it right the first time,” he says. “In fact, I think that one of the requirements to be an entrepreneur is to be resilient. It is okay to make mistakes. But it is intolerable not to learn from them.”
