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Program Overview

The theme of this year’s Annual Meeting is Toward a Well-Being Future in which Each and Every One of Us Has ‘Ikigai’. We have seen a recent increase in the number of Japanese words that are accepted around the world, and “Ikigai” has been added to this list for several years. Recent studies have shown that people who have a higher sense of purpose in life, those who feel that what is important in life makes life worth living, tend to have a lower risk of death and cardiovascular disease and have a longer healthy life expectancy. In recent years, attention has also focused on “well-being,” a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being; the Growth Strategy Action Plan has set the goal of realizing a society in which people can experience “well-being” in Japan.

In this context, healthcare must be designed to help people remain not only physically and mentally healthy, but also socially and economically well and fulfilled. In the past, the mainstream of pharmaceutical and medical device industries has been the development of products to treat diseases. More comprehensive healthcare is required to create a world where people can live and realize “well being” by connecting with society despite living with their illnesses. This healthcare design change must create a new drug discovery ecosystem different from the past.

What people find as “Ikigai” in their life is unique to everyone, and each person has his/her own “well-being.” Therefore, to achieve a society where each person can realize his/her own “well-being” with his/her own “Ikigai,” we must bring together people from all walks of life in industry, government, academia, and the private sector – people from inside and outside of the pharmaceutical industry, and people from Asia and other countries outside of Japan.

We hope that this year’s DIA Japan Annual Meeting will provide the forum where people from all walks of life, organizations, roles, industries, and countries, can gather to discuss the co-creation of a society in which each person can realize their own unique “well-being” by creating a place where everyone can freely discuss their own thoughts without excluding or being excluded from anyone else’s ideas.