The 2023 Rodney Wylie Lecture

The Rodney Wylie Eminent Visiting Fellowship Lectures brings a globally respected visitor to the University each year to provide intellectual leadership and engage with alumni and the community through its annual public lecture series.

The power and potential of genetics to improve healthcare

For all the common human diseases, and the common cancers, genetic variation is one key part of the differences between individuals in disease susceptibility. Environmental and lifestyle differences also play a central role for some of these diseases, while in others genetics is the primary risk factor.  Until recently, we have had no way of quantifying the genetic component of risk for common diseases like heart disease, stroke, and diabetes, or breast, prostate, and bowel cancer.

It turns out that there isn’t one, or even a few, genes for each of these diseases. Instead, for each disease, there are millions of positions in our DNA which contribute to our risk of developing the disease. Individually, each of these positions has only a very small effect, but together they can have a substantial impact. Some people can be 30 times more likely than others to develop the disease, solely because of the cumulative impact of their genetics.

A single test can now quantify someone's genetic risk for each of the common diseases, when they are still healthy, years ahead of symptoms developing. Where appropriate, the genetic risk can be combined with other clinical risk factors to get a much better overall picture of their risk. Health systems already have pathways for people at increased risk of disease, through prevention, screening, and treatment programmes. But currently, there are large numbers of people who are at high risk who are completely invisible to healthcare systems, because we haven’t been able to quantify their genetic risk.

These developments will usher in a new era in medicine where we can be much more nuanced in our understanding of individual risk, and do a much better job of getting the right people into existing screening, prevention, and treatment programmes. This is good for the individual, as it either avoids disease entirely or catches it early when outcomes are much better, and good for health systems both in the short term in getting more value from their existing prevention and early-detection programmes, but also over the longer term in avoiding much higher costs after acute episodes. Moving healthcare upstream, to better prevention, is also essential to making health systems more sustainable in the longer term.

Watch the 2023 Lecture

About John Wylie AC

Mr John Wylie AC is Chairman of the Australian Sports Commission and President of the State Library of Victoria Board.  

In 1983, John graduated from UQ with a Bachelor of Commerce with first class honours. After graduating, he spent time as a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford University where he completed a Master of Philosophy.  In the 1990s, he was the Australian Chairman of investment bank Credit Suisse First Boston. In 2000, he co-founded Carnegie Wylie, a corporate advisory and private equity investment firm acquired by Lazard in 2007.  John was Managing Director and Head of Corporate Advisory for Lazard Australia until his retirement in 2014. 

John is known as a leading Australian investment banker and has advised companies and governments globally for over 25 years.  He was made a Member of the Order of Australia in 2007, and a Companion of the Order of Australia in 2022 for eminent service to the community through leadership in the sporting, cultural, philanthropic and business sectors.

As former Chairman of the Melbourne Cricket Ground Trust, a position he held for 14 years, John chaired the MCG Redevelopment Steering Committee for the 2006 Commonwealth Games.

John is married to Myriam Boisbouvier, who was appointed France’s honorary consul in Victoria in 2011.