Ignorance is bliss — so was I brave enough to take the Ezra full-body scan?

Do you want to know exactly how and when you'll die? I suppose the answer depends on whether you can do anything about it.

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A new wave of private, preventative health screenings is emerging, and although they might not be able to tell you exactly when your number is up, they certainly narrow it down. The guiding principle is early detection: if you can spot when something's gone wrong in plenty of time, chances are you can do something about it.

But is ignorance bliss? I've mostly lived on a need-to-know basis, and it's served me remarkably well. I'm now past 40 and haven't had any major health issues yet. As a reformed party boy and smoker, though, knowing what's going on inside me seems increasingly important. The spectre of every bacon sandwich, drag of a cigarette and Jägerbomb I've consumed begins to haunt me more as I shuffle towards middle age. Someone very close to me is awaiting the results of a CT scan on the NHS too. Debilitating pain appeared out of nowhere and an emergency visit to A&E followed. The first wave of tests revealed some very worrying data. It is absolutely terrifying.

I decided to take the leap and head to Ezra, the full-body MRI-based early-detection health screening service founded in America in 2018 and which launched here this year.