July 9, 2025 • 31 mins
In our extended conversation, Dr. Sanjay Gupta talks about preparing for the next pandemic, whether to put fluoride in the water, and what we eat that makes us sick.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:08):
This is Gavin Newsom, and we continue with doctor Gupda.
I want to talk in Sanjay, because you've been I mean,
you've been one of the great thought leaders and written
so much about longevity, and you talk about nutrition and
health and some of the remarkable breakthroughs that are just
(00:28):
they seem just shockingly common sense, I mean just sort
of foundational, just leading with common sense, eating well, sleeping well, hydrating, uh,
you know, socialization, et cetera. But you've been writing particularly
about some breakthroughs and some examples of real successes as
(00:50):
it relates to longevity and wellness that give I think,
distill a sense of well being at least people like
me that with an aging grain population, that we should
be more optimistic than I think some of us have
painted the future.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
With what we know now, not not any new medical
breakthrough or some big development. I think we could greatly,
greatly expand life expectancy and health span. That's a term
I'm sure you've heard, but health span versus lifespan, it's
the number of really functional years you have left. I
think the data has become very compelling on this. I
(01:27):
think anecdotally we've known this for a while. By looking
at other countries around the world and saying they spend
a lot less. They do pretty simple things. They walk
to their meet friends as opposed to driving. They eat right,
They fresh foods, healthier foods. They sleep well. Some of
the healthiest communities in the world have either non existent
(01:48):
healthcare systems, are very very small healthcare systems. So and
that's heart disease, that's dementia, that's diabetes, all at a
fraction of the rates that we have in the United States.
They don't have anything that we don't have. What's happening
to us is not because of what we're not doing.
It's because of what we are doing to our bodies.
(02:09):
But I'll tell you something interesting, Governor, if you talk
about longevity overall or aging sort of as a construct,
what scientists will stay, including Eric Topol, who you may
know in your state, aging is really made up of
several different things. It's not just revolutions of planets. It's
how well your immune system is working, how much inflammation
(02:30):
you have, how much something that you have known as senescence,
how many cells that are in a sinesseence stage. There's
seven different things like this that you can sort of
think about that actually make up aging that will determine
your health span, far more important than your genetics. We
can control many of those things. We can improve our
(02:52):
immune function, we can decrease our inflammation, we can decrease sinessence,
and there's all these different ways to do it now
that have great data behind that. There are certain medications
and I'm not you know, Hockey any medications here, but
like something like met Foreman even, which is something that's
gotten a lot of attention Nil's Bursley, who's a longevity
research out of SINAI will say met Forman is probably
(03:15):
the closest thing we have to targeting all these different
cardinal issues of aging, which I find really really interesting.
I wouldn't call it a breakthrough. I would call it
a recognition of what aging really is, what is really
happening to the human body, especially as we get older,
wire function decreases, and what can be done about it.
(03:37):
You're quite right, it comes down to the big three,
how we nourish ourselves, how we move, and how we rest.
But you know, there's there's more nuance to it now
based on a lot of the data people like Eric
and Nill's are collecting.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
And at the core. I mean you've you know, you've
you've written about I mean when it comes inflammation, obviously,
sugars issues are around dairy meats. I mean, what's I mean,
what yeah, you are You're solidified in that sort of
core sort of understanding that limiting obviously sugar seems to
make a lot of sense. I don't know if everybody's
(04:10):
familiar with dairy as a component concern, uh, and and
and then we can have the great meat debate as well.
But are these sort of these foundational in terms of
addressing particularly issues around Alzheimer's and dementia. I mean, I
know Dean Ornish is out here in sas Alito. Uh,
California has been pushing a lot in that space. What's
(04:31):
what's your sense on the basis all your research and work, well.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Sugar i'd put into its own category, like illuding to
sugar is toxic. I mean, I did a piece for
sixty minutes years ago called the Toxic Truth, and it
was all about sugar, and it is. It is remarkable
to me what sugar does to the body. We are
our bodies just don't know how to process the amount
of sugar that we eat. Nowadays, it basically hits our
(04:56):
liver like a tsunami. And I think what's what's rising
to people is that because the body can handle all
that sugar, it turns out these byproducts, which are typically
what are called LDL particles low density lipoprotein particles. You
would typically think my LDL is going to go out
because I ate a cheeseburger, which is true, but it
(05:17):
might go up even more from a sugary drink. That's
how toxic sugar can be to the body. So sugar
I'd almost put into its own category. But I think
with regard to the other things darian even meat. I
do eat meat. I'm not a total vegetarian. I hope
Dean's not listening because he's you know, he's vegan. But
I think it really has to do with how those
(05:37):
foods are processed. It's all the other junk that's added
to a lot of those foods that I think make
them really problematic and increase inflammation. What Dean was able
to show, and I thought it was fascinating, was that
going on a vegan diet was greatly associated with decreasing
inflammation in the body and in the brain, and could
(05:59):
if it could stall and potentially reverse Alzheimer's disease. That
that was a big deal. I mean, people, once you
get diagnosed with dementia, it is a downward spiral from
there on out. He was able to show that you
could at least stall it, if not reverse it, by
simply changing diet and increasing activity as well. But diet
(06:20):
was the big thing, and we've anecdotally sort of known
this to be true, but I think he was really
able to show this, and I think that's that's certainly
made me reconsider my eating. So I've cut back on meat.
But you know, I I we you know, I got
three teenagers. You got to you got to balance your
your life with what you know. I mean, if we
(06:42):
were going to live forever, Kevin, if that was a
can I call you Gavin, by the way.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
Please do the the the if if if we if
there was a possibility we could live forever, that immortality
was attainable, I might live my life differently, but I
think you've got to balance your joy with your your lifestyle.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
And and I'm a very healthy exercise every day intensely,
but also take long walks with my wife and my
dogs and stuff like that. So I have more moderate
activity as well, eat healthily, don't eat sugar and ill,
don't drink alcohol. Alcohol is terrible. I mean, yeah, why
do well anyways? But but the the.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I'm in the wine business. You're talking to the wrong guy.
But I completely appreciate your point.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
My guess is when you drink wine and I and
I have. I have drank wine, and I can appreciate it.
It's virtues. But do not do not get a terrible
night's sleep.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
I mean, now, if I have any this works against
my personal interests. I've not got to say no sugar
and whether of course there's a byproduct of the wine
as well. But by the way, are you a coffee drinker?
Everybody's got is a mushroom coffee. People are in what's
going on with coffee? Should I be drinking coffee?
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Yeah? I didn't know about the mushroom coffee. But I
don't know.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
Everyone's saying you should try mushroom coffee.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
I don't know. I'm asking you. I I like so,
I you know, it's a funny. Funny thing is I
really did not drink coffee up until a few years ago,
and it was for no particular reason other than I
just didn't like the taste of it. I am. It
was unusual because most surgical residents and medical students, they
started drinking coffee, you know, sort of you know, early twenties,
(08:24):
and they become part of their lifestyle. I just never
liked it. But during the pandemic, actually is when I
started drinking coffee. I was waking up at four thirty
in the morning every day and working till eleven thirty
at night, you know, for a couple of years in
a row. And my wife actually introduced me to this coffee.
I don't know if we're allowed to talk about brands,
but I really like it. It's called Purity Coffee and
(08:47):
Pure coffee. It's just it's it's got no none of
the additives that we were talking about. It's it's pesticide free,
and to me, it tasted really clean. When I drank
coffee and the asked it, I always felt like I
could almost taste the aftertaste to it, and this was
just a really good coffee. And then I started really
(09:08):
doing a deep dive into coffee, and I think, you know,
it's associated with all these different health benefits, cardiac dementia, inflammation, overall.
So I drink a cup of days, sometimes two cups
a day, and I think it's I think it's been
really good for me.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
All right, Well, I think I mean as a guy
who's got a few cups behind him in front of
him on the.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Side, just black coffee, or what are you drinking?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
It's just black coffee. No, I'm not adding any of
that cream, any of that nonsense.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
And it takes a little bit to get used to
the taste I think of just a black coffee. But
once it's there, ye.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Once you're there on the other side, you can hold strong.
How worried should I be about this floride movement now
we're seeing I mean Utah, Florida, there's big debates in
Louisiana other states to take floride out of the water?
Where did that? Where did this even come from? How
(10:01):
important is I read in the past one of the
great success stories in the last half century in terms
of just you know, tell me give me your over
under on fluoride.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Yeah. Well see, this is why I appreciate about podcasts
like this, because there's a nuance to this, and you
can actually get into the nuance a bit. Fluoride in
really high doses can be problematic. It can cause something
known as skeletal fluorosis. I'm talking about ingested fluoride. So
you're taken it into your body through usually through water.
(10:31):
It can cause skeletal fluorosis, which can make your bones
in your skeleton weak. It can cause dental fluorosis. I
don't know if you've ever seen governor people who have
white streaks in their teeth. Yeah, sometimes that is a
dental fluorosis. That's an indication of high fluoride levels. And
I think most recently and interestingly, there's been concerns about neurotoxicity.
(10:52):
There were studies done, all of them outside this country
where fluorid levels are much higher than the United States,
where they showed that moms, for example, during pregnancy, if
they had high fluorid exposure, their kids later in life
was associated with a lower IQ. So that was obviously concerning.
These are hard studies to do, and there was some
(11:13):
you know, getting the methods right on these studies is challenging,
but I think there was enough of a concern about
that for people to really start paying attention. To give
you a little bit of context, the levels that we're
talking about are at least twice as high as the
levels in the drinking water in the United States, so
quite a bit higher. And in medicine we always use
(11:35):
this phrase the dose makes the poison things in any
just about anything in a high enough dose could potentially
be problematic. But it's you know, it definitely gets people's attention.
What I would say when you talk about the fact
that it's touted as one of the greatest public health
achievements of the last century. I saw that as well,
(11:56):
and I think that there's a kernel of truth to that.
But the nuance is most of the data that exists
on the benefits of fluoride exists before nineteen seventy five.
Nineteen seventy five was a timeframe when dental care became
much more widely available and fluoridated toothpaste, So prior to that,
fluoridating the water probably had an incrementally a much bigger
(12:18):
benefit than it does today, So it doesn't provide as
much benefit. I think it's low risk because the levels
don't get as high as they used to, and they
don't get as high in the United States, as I
should say, as they do in other countries. But it's
also lower reward, So fluoride today lower risk, lower reward
(12:38):
than it used to be. Iceland does not fluoridate their water.
England does not floridate their water. Israel does not fluoridate
their water. In Iceland, the kids all do twice a
month fluoride rinses, and England, interestingly, they fluoridate milk, so
it's not water. So you're floridating milk. They like, we
don't want to put it in the water supply kids
(13:00):
you know, who drink milk, they should still get their
florid That was sort of their thinking. Calgary in Canada,
they stopped fluoridating their water back in twenty eleven, I believe,
but then brought it back because cavity rates went up
and there was a new study that said, in the
United States, how much of an impact would it have
to take a fluoride out of the water, And they
(13:21):
said it could potentially be, you know, twenty five million
more cavities within the next five years, fifty million cavities
within the next ten years. So, you know, I think
we need better dental care overall, and this is almost
a policy discussion. I think people it's hard to get
dental care. It's hard to get dental coverage. But I
think if we had fluoride rinses, if kids got better
(13:44):
dental care, then I think the incremental benefit of fluoride
goes down even more. Sexually, Kennedy's been talking about florid
for a long time, heavy metals in general, but fluoride
in particular for a long time. And you know, as
with these other things we're talking about, there's a nuance
to it. I don't think it's as big a public
health issue now as it was fifty years ago, sixty
(14:06):
years ago. But and we can even model how much
of an impact it would have. But I think it
really speaks to the fact that we need better dental
care overall.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Boy, I really appreciate the nuance of the response, and
it just look, it goes to I think our frustration
just generally as consumers and as people that you know,
just are so desperate just for the facts and a
deeper understanding. And you talked earlier about the politics and
these binaries and how everything is seen through a political lens.
(14:38):
It's just the larger issue of misinformation. I mean, you know,
obviously COVID seemed to expose a lot of that stress
and anxiety. And you know, obviously our politics has been
I think profoundly shaped sort of post COVID framework, and
I think in some respects significantly so obviously with RFK
as HHS Secretary in terms of health care policy today,
(15:02):
what's your you know, as you reflect back and you
know your own experience living through sort of helping us
all through the pandemic experience in COVID, how do we
get back to the kind of platform that we need
in order to row in the same direction as a country,
(15:23):
to be prepared again, my gosh, for another novel virus
moving forward, where we're not at each other's throats, we're
not talking down to each other, past each other. Help
give us a sense of how we get back into
the trust and truth space.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
You know, I think it's I think it's tough, for sure,
And as a medical reporter, you know, I think I
have a really front row seat to how this is
all sort of unfolded. I'd say one thing, just for
historical reference, is that if you go back and you
look at the nineteen eighteen flu pandemic, that was a
time when obviously we didn't have cell phone, social media,
you know, rapid sort of spread of information, but there
(16:01):
was still a lot of distrust overall of basic public
health recommendations. There was a fair that was supposed to
take place, I believe in Saint Louis and or maybe
in Philadelphia. Philadelphia and Saint Louis were the two cities.
One city said, how can we possibly do a big
fare like this in the middle of a pandemic? And
the other city said, we don't think it's a big deal.
(16:22):
We'll do the fairs. They took it on, and they
had twelve times the rate of fluid deaths as the
city that chose not to do it. Point being that
there has been this skepticism that I think exists just
in human nature forever, you know. And I'll go so
far as to say this Governor, maybe some of that
skepticism is necessary, you know. I think that I think that,
(16:47):
you know, if we look at human beings like organisms,
some people just have their antennas raised really really high.
And I think when you're antenna's raised really really high,
two things happen. You see things that aren't there. You
just see things and the blurry off in the distance,
and you think that there's an attack coming and it's
not coming. But on the other hand, sometimes you see
(17:08):
things before everyone else does as well. And so I
think there are people whose intendos are raised really high,
who are just concerned citizens. I think there are you know,
SCHD starters who sort of fall into that category as well,
but not all of them. It's a heterogeneous group of
people who are who are going to be resistant to
basic public health measures. It's it's a much more diverse
(17:29):
group of people than I think I realized. That's one
thing I think with regard to misinformation and even disinformation,
purposeful misinformation, I think my largest concern right now is
that we're getting to the point and I hope it changes,
and I'm optimist. I'm an optimist. I think it will change,
(17:51):
but I think right now we're at a point where
nobody believes anything. Yeah. I was talking to my youngest daughter.
It's about a year year and a half ago, and
I was very close to Senator John McCain and she
showed me some meme on TikTok or Instagram or something
about John McCain. She knew that we were close, and
(18:12):
especially after he had his brain tumor and things, and
this was a funny meme, but it somehow suggested that
he was alive and that his whole death was a hoax, right, crazy,
crazy stuff. And I said, hey, Sole, okay, funny, right,
but you know that's not true, right, And she said, yeah,
it's here on Instagram whatever. And I said, yeah, but
(18:32):
you know it's not true. And she said to me, Governor,
she said, any of this stuff is true, Dad, And
it really got me thinking, like what happens to a
generation of people that grow up without a locus of trust?
I mean, forget who they trust. You know, they should
trust you, they should trust me, they should trust experts.
I think, I really do believe that, But maybe they
(18:54):
don't trust anybody. And I think unless you can touch somebody,
unless you know somebody personally, you don't really trust them anymore,
which I think is is really problematic, and I think
that's where we're headed. It starts to hyperlocalize suspicion of everybody,
and I think that's where we're headed. So I think,
for me, you know, as as a reporter, instead of
(19:17):
constantly combating misinformation, which is like playing whack a mole
all day long, just continuing to try and put out
good information and explain things in a way that is
accessible to people, and you know, leans into the nuance
and the uncertainty of things as a country. If the
question you're asking is about preparing for the next pandemic,
(19:40):
I would say the precautionary principle is important, and that
is that is how we do many things in our country.
We have, you know, more than a dozen aircraft carriers
right now that are circumnavigating the globe and they're keeping
us safe. We don't pay a lot of attention to that.
It's not something we have in the forefront of our minds,
but they're out there basically displaying the precautionary principle. A
(20:04):
virus is a national security threat. We saw what it
did to our country. If we're able to apply the
precautionary principle at a policy level, so things just go
into effect, as opposed to Seattle's doing this and New
York is doing this, and Alabama's doing this, and Florida
is saying we're not going to do any of that,
and it was just a mess. Instead, if we actually
applied the precautionary principle as a country treated as a
(20:26):
national security threat, which it is, I think we'd be
much better prepared. But you know, right now we're in
a position where you have people who believe COVID was
a hoax the entire thing. So we have some work
to do, I think before we get there.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
Because I think you know, there were obviously mistakes we
did make. There was lessons that we do need to learn,
and there were decisions that need to be reconciled going forward.
And I think for denial about that that we're not
going to build that level of trust moving forward for
those that feel very very differently.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
No question, And I think you know one thing that
I think was a real learning point. I think you know,
as doctors, if we're you know, recommending I was in
the operating room all day yesterday, you know, taking out
brain tumors and doing things like that, we know that
it leaves a toll on people to do that, to
recommend chemotherapy. We know the impact of that on their lives.
(21:18):
We think that the benefit is that it could cure
their cancer, but we know it's going to be it's
gonna be tough sledding for them for a while. How
do you convey that at a societal level, you know,
closing schools. The impact of that, you know, that was
tough on my kids, you know, so so to really
I think be very mindful of the the the impact.
(21:38):
I'm not saying that the decisions are wrong, but being
really mindful of the impact of those decisions on people.
It's it's tough, you know. As doctors, I think we're
a little bit more trained toward it, and because we
have to like look at risk reward for everything. But
I think assessing risk and balancing that reward as a
country is hard. And I think that gets back to
where we started, this precautionary principle. We don't know, Let's
(22:01):
be cautious, let's be careful, Let's not accelerate around the
blind curves here, Let's let's hit the brakes a little bit,
you know. And I think that's that's still to me,
that still makes sense.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Final question, I'm curious, you know, you speaking of sense,
speaking of risk, speaking of trust, where are we to
make sense of AI and medicine. We're seeing just runaway
costs and healthcare. It seems like every other industry is
found efficiencies, every other industry. Costs seem to go down.
(22:39):
It seems like more technology is introduced to the healthcare sector.
Our costs seem to go up and up and up.
Is AI over hyped in terms of medical expenses? Is
it over hyped in terms of research and discovery? Is
it under hyped as it relates to imaging benefits and
just sort of supercapacity to address chronic disease and solve
(23:02):
for some of life's great evils and cancers.
Speaker 2 (23:05):
I think it's going to be magnificent ultimately what AI
can do for healthcare. It's going to need guardrails, but
I think even those are, you know, very trainable. I mean,
there's great companies, one of them out to California called
Open Evidence, where you're already starting to see like for me,
I'll give you an example. A guy comes into the
(23:27):
office with back pain and leg pain and he's got
a herniated disk and their lumbar spine in the lower back.
Do they get an operation? Do they not get an operation?
I could ask ten different spine surgeons and maybe get
eleven different answers. AI could look at nine billion pieces
of data within a fraction of seconds that here are
(23:47):
fifty thousand other people who are just like the person
you're describing, and here are their various outcomes based on
evaluating their medical records and doing this all in a
de identified way. My resident's already walking around talking to
their phones as they're walking into a patient room to
figure out the best approach to to, you know whatever
whatever al's they're they're patients, you know, so it's it's
(24:09):
already changing. I think, I said on the Subcommittee for
AI for the National Academy of Medicine, and I think
one of the things that really struck me is we
were creating these these guardrails, was this idea that we
still have to think of AI from a trust but
verify sort of model. It's it's wildly effective at finding
(24:31):
breast cancers, for example, on mammograms, but sometimes it airs
wildly as well. And you know, these hallucinations as people
call them. I think they're already starting to get better
about that. I think it's gonna you know, we we've
been talking about big data, you know, for decades now.
AI is actually going to be able to make sense
of that big data and I think make it valuable
(24:53):
for patients. I'll tell you a quick anecdote. You know,
if you've been to the hospital lately or a clinic,
and you got a letter from you know, sort of
summarizing your care. It probably was generated by an AI platform.
That's interesting. And most of and when they when they
blinded these letters and they compared them to actual letters
written by doctors or nurses and then gave them to
(25:14):
random people, what they found was the AI letters were
often referred to as more human the human letters, which I.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Thought was that just is that the state of doctors,
is that the quality of you know.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
I think if you if you said to me, hey,
you know, my daughter's going to get married, you know,
in July, you know, and I'm really excited about that,
but you're here for your herniated disk, I may have
deprioritized that information, whereas an AI platform may have listened
to that and said, hey, Governor, I hope the wedding
went well with your daughter. And you know, just these
human touches. You had these moments where humans were looking
(25:48):
at these AI letters and they were pausing at the
moment that they read these human touches, and it was
almost like humans learning from machines how to be more human.
I think. So I'm bullish on AI. I think, and
you know, I think one thing about New technologies. Is
that there's always a disparity in terms of haves and
(26:09):
have nots when they first come out. Before mimmography, black
women and white women had similar rates of breast cancer.
After mimmography, breast cancer rates went down overall, but much
more so for white women than Black women. We see
those disparities with AI already, so we have to address disparities,
make sure this is very available and accessible to people.
(26:30):
But I think it's gonna it's gonna change healthcare. We're
gonna come up with new treatments and the right clinical
decision making much more quickly as a result of AI.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
In thirty years, you're still doing brain surgeries or as
a robot doing them?
Speaker 2 (26:43):
No, I'm still doing I'm still doing them. You'd be proud,
you know. I say this as a as a brain
surgeon who always carries around brain with me. I got
it right here. Yeah, I don't know that a robot
is yet able to fully grapple with three and a
half pounds of the most enigmatic tissue in the known universe.
(27:03):
I still think humans have to do that. Eventually, we may,
we may get there, but right now I just think
the you know, the dexterity and sort of the types
of operations that we do. But look in cardiac surgery
and prostate cancer surgery, you have Da Vinci, you have
robots that that stuff. For a while, we'll get there.
I'll be retired, I think by that point, hopefully. I
(27:24):
don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
If you keep if you keep to your wellness program,
you're going to be fine. Go hardly, hardly. I'm gonna
watch ka. I already have my instructions on on my
meat consumption in the s acknowledge. I'll acknowledge them.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Will be in the wine business, and that drinks so
much wine?
Speaker 1 (27:41):
No, I mean that's an issue. I mean it's an
objective issue. But I shouldn't be I can't be promoting well,
maybe I should be promoting my businesses. Apparently that's not
an issue anymore.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Hey, can I ask you what's going on with you?
Real quick? Like, what's what's what's up? After you know? Sacramento?
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, it's it's sure as hell. I ain't going to
be medical school. I have no capacity there. But it's
it's to be determined, all of it to be determined
the time of profound uncertainty. And I'm just trying to.
You know, I'm trying not only to not get fined today,
but not get arrested tomorrow in the next few months.
It's crazy what's going on in this country. But I
(28:18):
will say, though on a serious note, just you know,
it's also remarkable how just trying to just absorb what's
happening with healthcare policy from the MEATA, we didn't even
get into medicaid cuts. We didn't even get to the
broader issues associated with the quote unquote reorg at HHS
and all the cuts to you know, just people out
(28:38):
there promoting vaccines, HIV issues and treatments. I mean, this
is a lot going on, and it's hard to absorb
just one hundred plus days in.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
I know, and as a reporter, I mean just every
day there's something new and it changes. It's so ephemeral,
like you get all ready to report on it. An
hour later it's it's it's different. But you know, in
the good fight, you know, I think certainly as reporters
were information matters, good information matters. Fewer people are consuming it,
you know, we we're well aware of that, right. Yeah,
it doesn't mean me stop trying, you know, keep that.
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Well, Well, I love what I mean to your point.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
I mean, I made the point earlier.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
But your podcast is fabulous and it's great to see you,
you know, out there doing especially with the just those
sort of short clips where you're answering those tough questions,
but doing with the kind of nuance I thought, and
I mean that sincerely, your response on the floor ide.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
Is just something we don't hear.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
And it's hard to have a segment that is that
COMPREHENDI because it just provides a different level of appreciation
for perspective on this. It's it's not just as simple
as yes and.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
Noah, it's not. And you know, I'm a dad, you know,
I mean, first and foremost in a husband, but a dad,
you know who I think like I do put myself
in the position of those people who are the honest skeptics.
I'm an honest skeptic. You know, most scientists are on
a skeptics I think, and I think that I think
(30:01):
that that helps you know, I would I do that
for my kid? Would I do that for my mom?
I think it makes it there you go.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
No, it's in by the way, we had the exactly.
I remember that conversation you mentioned with your wife do
we do all of the shots at once.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Or do you you fish?
Speaker 1 (30:13):
I quite literally had that conversation with four kids four
different times.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
We concluded all four times, let's just get it done.
But but but that it's a legitimate sensitivity. I wouldn't
call it quote unquote hesitancy in this sort of weaponized sense,
but just human And you have to acknowledge that that perspective.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
I don't mock those people at all. I mean, well,
there are people who mock them. I that's not gonna work.
I mean maybe that's the number one thing about misinformation.
The mocking doesn't That doesn't work. It just it just
creates tribes and politicizes it even further. So try not
to do that.
Speaker 1 (30:50):
God Bless, I couldn't agree more. Hey, I really appreciate
you taking the time. This was fabulous. Thanks for all
you do and keep doing what you're doing. You're your
your are a bright light in this darkness. Uh, And
I appreciate you taking the time.
Speaker 2 (31:07):
He's a lot coming from you, Governor. Thank you
This is Gavin Newsom, and we continue with doctor Gupda.
I want to talk in Sanjay, because you've been I mean,
you've been one of the great thought leaders and written
so much about longevity, and you talk about nutrition and
health and some of the remarkable breakthroughs that are just
(00:28):
they seem just shockingly common sense, I mean just sort
of foundational, just leading with common sense, eating well, sleeping well, hydrating, uh,
you know, socialization, et cetera. But you've been writing particularly
about some breakthroughs and some examples of real successes as
(00:50):
it relates to longevity and wellness that give I think,
distill a sense of well being at least people like
me that with an aging grain population, that we should
be more optimistic than I think some of us have
painted the future.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
With what we know now, not not any new medical
breakthrough or some big development. I think we could greatly,
greatly expand life expectancy and health span. That's a term
I'm sure you've heard, but health span versus lifespan, it's
the number of really functional years you have left. I
think the data has become very compelling on this. I
(01:27):
think anecdotally we've known this for a while. By looking
at other countries around the world and saying they spend
a lot less. They do pretty simple things. They walk
to their meet friends as opposed to driving. They eat right,
They fresh foods, healthier foods. They sleep well. Some of
the healthiest communities in the world have either non existent
(01:48):
healthcare systems, are very very small healthcare systems. So and
that's heart disease, that's dementia, that's diabetes, all at a
fraction of the rates that we have in the United States.
They don't have anything that we don't have. What's happening
to us is not because of what we're not doing.
It's because of what we are doing to our bodies.
(02:09):
But I'll tell you something interesting, Governor, if you talk
about longevity overall or aging sort of as a construct,
what scientists will stay, including Eric Topol, who you may
know in your state, aging is really made up of
several different things. It's not just revolutions of planets. It's
how well your immune system is working, how much inflammation
(02:30):
you have, how much something that you have known as senescence,
how many cells that are in a sinesseence stage. There's
seven different things like this that you can sort of
think about that actually make up aging that will determine
your health span, far more important than your genetics. We
can control many of those things. We can improve our
(02:52):
immune function, we can decrease our inflammation, we can decrease sinessence,
and there's all these different ways to do it now
that have great data behind that. There are certain medications
and I'm not you know, Hockey any medications here, but
like something like met Foreman even, which is something that's
gotten a lot of attention Nil's Bursley, who's a longevity
research out of SINAI will say met Forman is probably
(03:15):
the closest thing we have to targeting all these different
cardinal issues of aging, which I find really really interesting.
I wouldn't call it a breakthrough. I would call it
a recognition of what aging really is, what is really
happening to the human body, especially as we get older,
wire function decreases, and what can be done about it.
(03:37):
You're quite right, it comes down to the big three,
how we nourish ourselves, how we move, and how we rest.
But you know, there's there's more nuance to it now
based on a lot of the data people like Eric
and Nill's are collecting.
Speaker 1 (03:48):
And at the core. I mean you've you know, you've
you've written about I mean when it comes inflammation, obviously,
sugars issues are around dairy meats. I mean, what's I mean,
what yeah, you are You're solidified in that sort of
core sort of understanding that limiting obviously sugar seems to
make a lot of sense. I don't know if everybody's
(04:10):
familiar with dairy as a component concern, uh, and and
and then we can have the great meat debate as well.
But are these sort of these foundational in terms of
addressing particularly issues around Alzheimer's and dementia. I mean, I
know Dean Ornish is out here in sas Alito. Uh,
California has been pushing a lot in that space. What's
(04:31):
what's your sense on the basis all your research and work, well.
Speaker 2 (04:33):
Sugar i'd put into its own category, like illuding to
sugar is toxic. I mean, I did a piece for
sixty minutes years ago called the Toxic Truth, and it
was all about sugar, and it is. It is remarkable
to me what sugar does to the body. We are
our bodies just don't know how to process the amount
of sugar that we eat. Nowadays, it basically hits our
(04:56):
liver like a tsunami. And I think what's what's rising
to people is that because the body can handle all
that sugar, it turns out these byproducts, which are typically
what are called LDL particles low density lipoprotein particles. You
would typically think my LDL is going to go out
because I ate a cheeseburger, which is true, but it
(05:17):
might go up even more from a sugary drink. That's
how toxic sugar can be to the body. So sugar
I'd almost put into its own category. But I think
with regard to the other things darian even meat. I
do eat meat. I'm not a total vegetarian. I hope
Dean's not listening because he's you know, he's vegan. But
I think it really has to do with how those
(05:37):
foods are processed. It's all the other junk that's added
to a lot of those foods that I think make
them really problematic and increase inflammation. What Dean was able
to show, and I thought it was fascinating, was that
going on a vegan diet was greatly associated with decreasing
inflammation in the body and in the brain, and could
(05:59):
if it could stall and potentially reverse Alzheimer's disease. That
that was a big deal. I mean, people, once you
get diagnosed with dementia, it is a downward spiral from
there on out. He was able to show that you
could at least stall it, if not reverse it, by
simply changing diet and increasing activity as well. But diet
(06:20):
was the big thing, and we've anecdotally sort of known
this to be true, but I think he was really
able to show this, and I think that's that's certainly
made me reconsider my eating. So I've cut back on meat.
But you know, I I we you know, I got
three teenagers. You got to you got to balance your
your life with what you know. I mean, if we
(06:42):
were going to live forever, Kevin, if that was a
can I call you Gavin, by the way.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
Please do the the the if if if we if
there was a possibility we could live forever, that immortality
was attainable, I might live my life differently, but I
think you've got to balance your joy with your your lifestyle.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
And and I'm a very healthy exercise every day intensely,
but also take long walks with my wife and my
dogs and stuff like that. So I have more moderate
activity as well, eat healthily, don't eat sugar and ill,
don't drink alcohol. Alcohol is terrible. I mean, yeah, why
do well anyways? But but the the.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
I'm in the wine business. You're talking to the wrong guy.
But I completely appreciate your point.
Speaker 2 (07:27):
My guess is when you drink wine and I and
I have. I have drank wine, and I can appreciate it.
It's virtues. But do not do not get a terrible
night's sleep.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
I mean, now, if I have any this works against
my personal interests. I've not got to say no sugar
and whether of course there's a byproduct of the wine
as well. But by the way, are you a coffee drinker?
Everybody's got is a mushroom coffee. People are in what's
going on with coffee? Should I be drinking coffee?
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Yeah? I didn't know about the mushroom coffee. But I
don't know.
Speaker 1 (08:01):
Everyone's saying you should try mushroom coffee.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
I don't know. I'm asking you. I I like so,
I you know, it's a funny. Funny thing is I
really did not drink coffee up until a few years ago,
and it was for no particular reason other than I
just didn't like the taste of it. I am. It
was unusual because most surgical residents and medical students, they
started drinking coffee, you know, sort of you know, early twenties,
(08:24):
and they become part of their lifestyle. I just never
liked it. But during the pandemic, actually is when I
started drinking coffee. I was waking up at four thirty
in the morning every day and working till eleven thirty
at night, you know, for a couple of years in
a row. And my wife actually introduced me to this coffee.
I don't know if we're allowed to talk about brands,
but I really like it. It's called Purity Coffee and
(08:47):
Pure coffee. It's just it's it's got no none of
the additives that we were talking about. It's it's pesticide free,
and to me, it tasted really clean. When I drank
coffee and the asked it, I always felt like I
could almost taste the aftertaste to it, and this was
just a really good coffee. And then I started really
(09:08):
doing a deep dive into coffee, and I think, you know,
it's associated with all these different health benefits, cardiac dementia, inflammation, overall.
So I drink a cup of days, sometimes two cups
a day, and I think it's I think it's been
really good for me.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
All right, Well, I think I mean as a guy
who's got a few cups behind him in front of
him on the.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Side, just black coffee, or what are you drinking?
Speaker 1 (09:31):
It's just black coffee. No, I'm not adding any of
that cream, any of that nonsense.
Speaker 2 (09:37):
And it takes a little bit to get used to
the taste I think of just a black coffee. But
once it's there, ye.
Speaker 1 (09:41):
Once you're there on the other side, you can hold strong.
How worried should I be about this floride movement now
we're seeing I mean Utah, Florida, there's big debates in
Louisiana other states to take floride out of the water?
Where did that? Where did this even come from? How
(10:01):
important is I read in the past one of the
great success stories in the last half century in terms
of just you know, tell me give me your over
under on fluoride.
Speaker 2 (10:10):
Yeah. Well see, this is why I appreciate about podcasts
like this, because there's a nuance to this, and you
can actually get into the nuance a bit. Fluoride in
really high doses can be problematic. It can cause something
known as skeletal fluorosis. I'm talking about ingested fluoride. So
you're taken it into your body through usually through water.
(10:31):
It can cause skeletal fluorosis, which can make your bones
in your skeleton weak. It can cause dental fluorosis. I
don't know if you've ever seen governor people who have
white streaks in their teeth. Yeah, sometimes that is a
dental fluorosis. That's an indication of high fluoride levels. And
I think most recently and interestingly, there's been concerns about neurotoxicity.
(10:52):
There were studies done, all of them outside this country
where fluorid levels are much higher than the United States,
where they showed that moms, for example, during pregnancy, if
they had high fluorid exposure, their kids later in life
was associated with a lower IQ. So that was obviously concerning.
These are hard studies to do, and there was some
(11:13):
you know, getting the methods right on these studies is challenging,
but I think there was enough of a concern about
that for people to really start paying attention. To give
you a little bit of context, the levels that we're
talking about are at least twice as high as the
levels in the drinking water in the United States, so
quite a bit higher. And in medicine we always use
(11:35):
this phrase the dose makes the poison things in any
just about anything in a high enough dose could potentially
be problematic. But it's you know, it definitely gets people's attention.
What I would say when you talk about the fact
that it's touted as one of the greatest public health
achievements of the last century. I saw that as well,
(11:56):
and I think that there's a kernel of truth to that.
But the nuance is most of the data that exists
on the benefits of fluoride exists before nineteen seventy five.
Nineteen seventy five was a timeframe when dental care became
much more widely available and fluoridated toothpaste, So prior to that,
fluoridating the water probably had an incrementally a much bigger
(12:18):
benefit than it does today, So it doesn't provide as
much benefit. I think it's low risk because the levels
don't get as high as they used to, and they
don't get as high in the United States, as I
should say, as they do in other countries. But it's
also lower reward, So fluoride today lower risk, lower reward
(12:38):
than it used to be. Iceland does not fluoridate their water.
England does not floridate their water. Israel does not fluoridate
their water. In Iceland, the kids all do twice a
month fluoride rinses, and England, interestingly, they fluoridate milk, so
it's not water. So you're floridating milk. They like, we
don't want to put it in the water supply kids
(13:00):
you know, who drink milk, they should still get their
florid That was sort of their thinking. Calgary in Canada,
they stopped fluoridating their water back in twenty eleven, I believe,
but then brought it back because cavity rates went up
and there was a new study that said, in the
United States, how much of an impact would it have
to take a fluoride out of the water, And they
(13:21):
said it could potentially be, you know, twenty five million
more cavities within the next five years, fifty million cavities
within the next ten years. So, you know, I think
we need better dental care overall, and this is almost
a policy discussion. I think people it's hard to get
dental care. It's hard to get dental coverage. But I
think if we had fluoride rinses, if kids got better
(13:44):
dental care, then I think the incremental benefit of fluoride
goes down even more. Sexually, Kennedy's been talking about florid
for a long time, heavy metals in general, but fluoride
in particular for a long time. And you know, as
with these other things we're talking about, there's a nuance
to it. I don't think it's as big a public
health issue now as it was fifty years ago, sixty
(14:06):
years ago. But and we can even model how much
of an impact it would have. But I think it
really speaks to the fact that we need better dental
care overall.
Speaker 1 (14:16):
Boy, I really appreciate the nuance of the response, and
it just look, it goes to I think our frustration
just generally as consumers and as people that you know,
just are so desperate just for the facts and a
deeper understanding. And you talked earlier about the politics and
these binaries and how everything is seen through a political lens.
(14:38):
It's just the larger issue of misinformation. I mean, you know,
obviously COVID seemed to expose a lot of that stress
and anxiety. And you know, obviously our politics has been
I think profoundly shaped sort of post COVID framework, and
I think in some respects significantly so obviously with RFK
as HHS Secretary in terms of health care policy today,
(15:02):
what's your you know, as you reflect back and you
know your own experience living through sort of helping us
all through the pandemic experience in COVID, how do we
get back to the kind of platform that we need
in order to row in the same direction as a country,
(15:23):
to be prepared again, my gosh, for another novel virus
moving forward, where we're not at each other's throats, we're
not talking down to each other, past each other. Help
give us a sense of how we get back into
the trust and truth space.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
You know, I think it's I think it's tough, for sure,
And as a medical reporter, you know, I think I
have a really front row seat to how this is
all sort of unfolded. I'd say one thing, just for
historical reference, is that if you go back and you
look at the nineteen eighteen flu pandemic, that was a
time when obviously we didn't have cell phone, social media,
you know, rapid sort of spread of information, but there
(16:01):
was still a lot of distrust overall of basic public
health recommendations. There was a fair that was supposed to
take place, I believe in Saint Louis and or maybe
in Philadelphia. Philadelphia and Saint Louis were the two cities.
One city said, how can we possibly do a big
fare like this in the middle of a pandemic? And
the other city said, we don't think it's a big deal.
(16:22):
We'll do the fairs. They took it on, and they
had twelve times the rate of fluid deaths as the
city that chose not to do it. Point being that
there has been this skepticism that I think exists just
in human nature forever, you know. And I'll go so
far as to say this Governor, maybe some of that
skepticism is necessary, you know. I think that I think that,
(16:47):
you know, if we look at human beings like organisms,
some people just have their antennas raised really really high.
And I think when you're antenna's raised really really high,
two things happen. You see things that aren't there. You
just see things and the blurry off in the distance,
and you think that there's an attack coming and it's
not coming. But on the other hand, sometimes you see
(17:08):
things before everyone else does as well. And so I
think there are people whose intendos are raised really high,
who are just concerned citizens. I think there are you know,
SCHD starters who sort of fall into that category as well,
but not all of them. It's a heterogeneous group of
people who are who are going to be resistant to
basic public health measures. It's it's a much more diverse
(17:29):
group of people than I think I realized. That's one
thing I think with regard to misinformation and even disinformation,
purposeful misinformation, I think my largest concern right now is
that we're getting to the point and I hope it changes,
and I'm optimist. I'm an optimist. I think it will change,
(17:51):
but I think right now we're at a point where
nobody believes anything. Yeah. I was talking to my youngest daughter.
It's about a year year and a half ago, and
I was very close to Senator John McCain and she
showed me some meme on TikTok or Instagram or something
about John McCain. She knew that we were close, and
(18:12):
especially after he had his brain tumor and things, and
this was a funny meme, but it somehow suggested that
he was alive and that his whole death was a hoax, right, crazy,
crazy stuff. And I said, hey, Sole, okay, funny, right,
but you know that's not true, right, And she said, yeah,
it's here on Instagram whatever. And I said, yeah, but
(18:32):
you know it's not true. And she said to me, Governor,
she said, any of this stuff is true, Dad, And
it really got me thinking, like what happens to a
generation of people that grow up without a locus of trust?
I mean, forget who they trust. You know, they should
trust you, they should trust me, they should trust experts.
I think, I really do believe that, But maybe they
(18:54):
don't trust anybody. And I think unless you can touch somebody,
unless you know somebody personally, you don't really trust them anymore,
which I think is is really problematic, and I think
that's where we're headed. It starts to hyperlocalize suspicion of everybody,
and I think that's where we're headed. So I think,
for me, you know, as as a reporter, instead of
(19:17):
constantly combating misinformation, which is like playing whack a mole
all day long, just continuing to try and put out
good information and explain things in a way that is
accessible to people, and you know, leans into the nuance
and the uncertainty of things as a country. If the
question you're asking is about preparing for the next pandemic,
(19:40):
I would say the precautionary principle is important, and that
is that is how we do many things in our country.
We have, you know, more than a dozen aircraft carriers
right now that are circumnavigating the globe and they're keeping
us safe. We don't pay a lot of attention to that.
It's not something we have in the forefront of our minds,
but they're out there basically displaying the precautionary principle. A
(20:04):
virus is a national security threat. We saw what it
did to our country. If we're able to apply the
precautionary principle at a policy level, so things just go
into effect, as opposed to Seattle's doing this and New
York is doing this, and Alabama's doing this, and Florida
is saying we're not going to do any of that,
and it was just a mess. Instead, if we actually
applied the precautionary principle as a country treated as a
(20:26):
national security threat, which it is, I think we'd be
much better prepared. But you know, right now we're in
a position where you have people who believe COVID was
a hoax the entire thing. So we have some work
to do, I think before we get there.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
Because I think you know, there were obviously mistakes we
did make. There was lessons that we do need to learn,
and there were decisions that need to be reconciled going forward.
And I think for denial about that that we're not
going to build that level of trust moving forward for
those that feel very very differently.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
No question, And I think you know one thing that
I think was a real learning point. I think you know,
as doctors, if we're you know, recommending I was in
the operating room all day yesterday, you know, taking out
brain tumors and doing things like that, we know that
it leaves a toll on people to do that, to
recommend chemotherapy. We know the impact of that on their lives.
(21:18):
We think that the benefit is that it could cure
their cancer, but we know it's going to be it's
gonna be tough sledding for them for a while. How
do you convey that at a societal level, you know,
closing schools. The impact of that, you know, that was
tough on my kids, you know, so so to really
I think be very mindful of the the the impact.
(21:38):
I'm not saying that the decisions are wrong, but being
really mindful of the impact of those decisions on people.
It's it's tough, you know. As doctors, I think we're
a little bit more trained toward it, and because we
have to like look at risk reward for everything. But
I think assessing risk and balancing that reward as a
country is hard. And I think that gets back to
where we started, this precautionary principle. We don't know, Let's
(22:01):
be cautious, let's be careful, Let's not accelerate around the
blind curves here, Let's let's hit the brakes a little bit,
you know. And I think that's that's still to me,
that still makes sense.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Final question, I'm curious, you know, you speaking of sense,
speaking of risk, speaking of trust, where are we to
make sense of AI and medicine. We're seeing just runaway
costs and healthcare. It seems like every other industry is
found efficiencies, every other industry. Costs seem to go down.
(22:39):
It seems like more technology is introduced to the healthcare sector.
Our costs seem to go up and up and up.
Is AI over hyped in terms of medical expenses? Is
it over hyped in terms of research and discovery? Is
it under hyped as it relates to imaging benefits and
just sort of supercapacity to address chronic disease and solve
(23:02):
for some of life's great evils and cancers.
Speaker 2 (23:05):
I think it's going to be magnificent ultimately what AI
can do for healthcare. It's going to need guardrails, but
I think even those are, you know, very trainable. I mean,
there's great companies, one of them out to California called
Open Evidence, where you're already starting to see like for me,
I'll give you an example. A guy comes into the
(23:27):
office with back pain and leg pain and he's got
a herniated disk and their lumbar spine in the lower back.
Do they get an operation? Do they not get an operation?
I could ask ten different spine surgeons and maybe get
eleven different answers. AI could look at nine billion pieces
of data within a fraction of seconds that here are
(23:47):
fifty thousand other people who are just like the person
you're describing, and here are their various outcomes based on
evaluating their medical records and doing this all in a
de identified way. My resident's already walking around talking to
their phones as they're walking into a patient room to
figure out the best approach to to, you know whatever
whatever al's they're they're patients, you know, so it's it's
(24:09):
already changing. I think, I said on the Subcommittee for
AI for the National Academy of Medicine, and I think
one of the things that really struck me is we
were creating these these guardrails, was this idea that we
still have to think of AI from a trust but
verify sort of model. It's it's wildly effective at finding
(24:31):
breast cancers, for example, on mammograms, but sometimes it airs
wildly as well. And you know, these hallucinations as people
call them. I think they're already starting to get better
about that. I think it's gonna you know, we we've
been talking about big data, you know, for decades now.
AI is actually going to be able to make sense
of that big data and I think make it valuable
(24:53):
for patients. I'll tell you a quick anecdote. You know,
if you've been to the hospital lately or a clinic,
and you got a letter from you know, sort of
summarizing your care. It probably was generated by an AI platform.
That's interesting. And most of and when they when they
blinded these letters and they compared them to actual letters
written by doctors or nurses and then gave them to
(25:14):
random people, what they found was the AI letters were
often referred to as more human the human letters, which I.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Thought was that just is that the state of doctors,
is that the quality of you know.
Speaker 2 (25:26):
I think if you if you said to me, hey,
you know, my daughter's going to get married, you know,
in July, you know, and I'm really excited about that,
but you're here for your herniated disk, I may have
deprioritized that information, whereas an AI platform may have listened
to that and said, hey, Governor, I hope the wedding
went well with your daughter. And you know, just these
human touches. You had these moments where humans were looking
(25:48):
at these AI letters and they were pausing at the
moment that they read these human touches, and it was
almost like humans learning from machines how to be more human.
I think. So I'm bullish on AI. I think, and
you know, I think one thing about New technologies. Is
that there's always a disparity in terms of haves and
(26:09):
have nots when they first come out. Before mimmography, black
women and white women had similar rates of breast cancer.
After mimmography, breast cancer rates went down overall, but much
more so for white women than Black women. We see
those disparities with AI already, so we have to address disparities,
make sure this is very available and accessible to people.
(26:30):
But I think it's gonna it's gonna change healthcare. We're
gonna come up with new treatments and the right clinical
decision making much more quickly as a result of AI.
Speaker 1 (26:38):
In thirty years, you're still doing brain surgeries or as
a robot doing them?
Speaker 2 (26:43):
No, I'm still doing I'm still doing them. You'd be proud,
you know. I say this as a as a brain
surgeon who always carries around brain with me. I got
it right here. Yeah, I don't know that a robot
is yet able to fully grapple with three and a
half pounds of the most enigmatic tissue in the known universe.
(27:03):
I still think humans have to do that. Eventually, we may,
we may get there, but right now I just think
the you know, the dexterity and sort of the types
of operations that we do. But look in cardiac surgery
and prostate cancer surgery, you have Da Vinci, you have
robots that that stuff. For a while, we'll get there.
I'll be retired, I think by that point, hopefully. I
(27:24):
don't know.
Speaker 1 (27:24):
If you keep if you keep to your wellness program,
you're going to be fine. Go hardly, hardly. I'm gonna
watch ka. I already have my instructions on on my
meat consumption in the s acknowledge. I'll acknowledge them.
Speaker 2 (27:39):
Will be in the wine business, and that drinks so
much wine?
Speaker 1 (27:41):
No, I mean that's an issue. I mean it's an
objective issue. But I shouldn't be I can't be promoting well,
maybe I should be promoting my businesses. Apparently that's not
an issue anymore.
Speaker 2 (27:51):
Hey, can I ask you what's going on with you?
Real quick? Like, what's what's what's up? After you know? Sacramento?
Speaker 1 (27:56):
Well, it's it's sure as hell. I ain't going to
be medical school. I have no capacity there. But it's
it's to be determined, all of it to be determined
the time of profound uncertainty. And I'm just trying to.
You know, I'm trying not only to not get fined today,
but not get arrested tomorrow in the next few months.
It's crazy what's going on in this country. But I
(28:18):
will say, though on a serious note, just you know,
it's also remarkable how just trying to just absorb what's
happening with healthcare policy from the MEATA, we didn't even
get into medicaid cuts. We didn't even get to the
broader issues associated with the quote unquote reorg at HHS
and all the cuts to you know, just people out
(28:38):
there promoting vaccines, HIV issues and treatments. I mean, this
is a lot going on, and it's hard to absorb
just one hundred plus days in.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
I know, and as a reporter, I mean just every
day there's something new and it changes. It's so ephemeral,
like you get all ready to report on it. An
hour later it's it's it's different. But you know, in
the good fight, you know, I think certainly as reporters
were information matters, good information matters. Fewer people are consuming it,
you know, we we're well aware of that, right. Yeah,
it doesn't mean me stop trying, you know, keep that.
Speaker 1 (29:12):
Well, Well, I love what I mean to your point.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
I mean, I made the point earlier.
Speaker 1 (29:15):
But your podcast is fabulous and it's great to see you,
you know, out there doing especially with the just those
sort of short clips where you're answering those tough questions,
but doing with the kind of nuance I thought, and
I mean that sincerely, your response on the floor ide.
Speaker 2 (29:29):
Is just something we don't hear.
Speaker 1 (29:31):
And it's hard to have a segment that is that
COMPREHENDI because it just provides a different level of appreciation
for perspective on this. It's it's not just as simple
as yes and.
Speaker 2 (29:40):
Noah, it's not. And you know, I'm a dad, you know,
I mean, first and foremost in a husband, but a dad,
you know who I think like I do put myself
in the position of those people who are the honest skeptics.
I'm an honest skeptic. You know, most scientists are on
a skeptics I think, and I think that I think
(30:01):
that that helps you know, I would I do that
for my kid? Would I do that for my mom?
I think it makes it there you go.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
No, it's in by the way, we had the exactly.
I remember that conversation you mentioned with your wife do
we do all of the shots at once.
Speaker 2 (30:12):
Or do you you fish?
Speaker 1 (30:13):
I quite literally had that conversation with four kids four
different times.
Speaker 2 (30:18):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (30:18):
We concluded all four times, let's just get it done.
But but but that it's a legitimate sensitivity. I wouldn't
call it quote unquote hesitancy in this sort of weaponized sense,
but just human And you have to acknowledge that that perspective.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
I don't mock those people at all. I mean, well,
there are people who mock them. I that's not gonna work.
I mean maybe that's the number one thing about misinformation.
The mocking doesn't That doesn't work. It just it just
creates tribes and politicizes it even further. So try not
to do that.
Speaker 1 (30:50):
God Bless, I couldn't agree more. Hey, I really appreciate
you taking the time. This was fabulous. Thanks for all
you do and keep doing what you're doing. You're your
your are a bright light in this darkness. Uh, And
I appreciate you taking the time.
Speaker 2 (31:07):
He's a lot coming from you, Governor. Thank you
Host
Gavin Newsom
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