Humanity can send robots to Mars, but our collective plan for getting old is sti
By Maria Gharib · October 29, 2026 · Curated by George's Blog
Humanity can send robots to Mars, but our collective plan for getting old is still “we’ll deal with it when it happens.”
EXCELLENT STRATEGY, EVERYONE.
Meet Lily Vittayarukskul, the latest woman featured in Mindstream’s Most Interesting Women in AI series.
At 16, Lily was interning at NASA, dreaming of becoming an aerospace engineer.
Meanwhile, most of us at 16 were struggling to submit homework on time.
But when her aunt was diagnosed with terminal cancer, Lily witnessed firsthand how devastating the costs and decisions surrounding long-term care could be for a family.
And that experience changed everything.
She went on to build Waterlily, an AI platform that uses 500 MILLION data points to help families predict their future care needs and costs.
All from a three-minute questionnaire.
Since launching, Waterlily has expanded across all 50 US states and raised $9.2 million.
And I find her story incredibly moving.
One of my favourite things about writing this series is meeting women whose ambitions go far beyond building another AI product.
Lily wants to change how the world prepares for ageing, so fewer families have to go through what hers did.
I’ve had the privilege of telling her story for Mindstream, and I really hope you’ll read it.
Read Lily’s full story here: https://lnkd.in/eVD8gePy
And perhaps it’s time we all stopped treating getting old like a calendar invitation we can decline.