May 6, 2026 ⢠23 mins
This summer, the former TODAY Show medical correspondent will ascend Mount Kilimanjaro at 90 years old.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Doctor.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Aren't you lean? Good morning? How are you?
Speaker 3 (00:04):
I am doing well, sir? How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I am doing fantastically.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
Well, excellent, excellent.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
So let me let me ask you this, right off
the bat, Right off the bat, what the what the
hell are you doing?
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Sir? I'm gonna climb kill him and Jarl again. This
will be my fourth trip up and probably my last,
because if I want to climb again, I'm gonna find
another mountain.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
So but now, also correct me if I'm wrong.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
When you when you, when you climb, like you said,
this will be your This will be your fourth time climbing.
When you it's correct, when you, when you summit it,
when you make it to the top, will you be
and I don't get mad, will you be the oldest
person to ever summit kill him in Jarrow?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
As best we can tell, that is true. The record
is right now. There's no you know, official world record.
Most people think of the Guiness World Records, which is
really an unofficial commercial enterprise, and the oldest person who's
ever done it there is eighty nine years and thirty
(01:13):
seven days. So when I get to the top, I'm
going to claim the world record. And I've already filed
a registered in application with Guinness to try and get
their record.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Too, and you'll be ninety when you sum it.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Correct.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
We are planning it so that I will actually sum
it on my ninetieth birthday, and my guide and my
tour company have promised to bake a cake for me
at eighteen thousand feece. That's awesome. Well, by the way,
I know they can bake because I summited on my
(01:50):
eighty second birthday and they showed up with a cake
icing it said Happy Birthday Art on it. This is
really fun. It's it's cold, it's really cold, and I
don't like the cold, but the idea of having a
birthday cake at nineteen three and forty one feet really
(02:12):
appeals to me.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Hey, so, so, doctor Art, So you've done this, Like
you said, this will be your this will be your
fourth time going right is and you're gonna be You'll
be the you'll be the oldest person ever in the
world too.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Well, that sounds bad.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
You'll be the oldest person to have ever summitted Killiman Jarrow.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
So it's it means one of two. It means one
of two things.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Number one, either you are in really good shape and
really motivated, or Mount Kilimanjarrow is really easy.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Well, it's actually both. Easy is not the best word mount.
I tell people I'm climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, and it's not
really a climb. There is no technical climbing, no ropes.
I've done a mountain in South America on a glacier
with ropes and crampons. But this is a long, slow,
(03:05):
uphill trek. My trek will be about forty five miles
because we're picking a slightly different route this time. It
has a slower incline. You know, I just don't want
to I don't want to work that hard, and it's
(03:27):
a quieter route. There are fewer travelers on it because
of the length, and I get to stop anywhere I
want on There are several routes on Killman Jarl, and
on some of them you can only stay overnight in
their little campsite villages. But on this route you get tired,
you just put your tent up and lie down. That's
(03:53):
kind of a feeling to me. The worry I have,
my guide, I said, I don't like the cold, and
the worry I have is that we'll get up too
early and I'll have to just sit at eighteen thousand people.
I do not want to summit before my birthday.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
So doctor, you lean that begs the obvious question why, like,
why are we doing this again?
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Well, I'll tell you why. Most people are concerned about
their number one. I want to be at my best.
Right I don't know what my best is. I know
that at eighty two my best was Mount Kelimanjaro. At
eighty three, it was a mountain in South America called
Code Epoxy. But I haven't climbed in a few years,
(04:38):
and I just want to know if I can do it.
That's one reason I want to push my boundaries. For me,
aging is all about realizing your potential. And you don't
really know what your potential is unless you kind of
push it out there near the limits, not past the limits.
(04:58):
And there's another reason why most people are worried about
their lifespan longevity. You know how many years am I
going to live? Many people, I think it's more important
to worry about your health span. How many of those
years are you going to spend in good health? And
I want to be in perfect health until the day
(05:19):
I die. When I die, I want my friends to
say what in the world did he die of He
looked great yesterday. But for me, this is about a
new concept that I just learned about a year or
two ago called peak span, and that ak span, well,
(05:40):
that's living until the end at your peak. I want
to be the best I can be until the day
I keel over. And I find it kind of interesting
that the peak scan fits so nicely with a mountain peak.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Right, sure, yeah, that works out nice.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Hey, but don't you don't you say, doctor Euleen, that
for a lot of people as as they as they
age and listen, you're gonna be ninety years old. A
lot of people as they age, and it's not just them,
but it's also family members and friends, they start they
start looking at them being the older person and try
(06:26):
to start evaluating what functions they don't have or what
functions they shouldn't be operating or using, as opposed to
looking at him and going no, like you said, he's
in great shape, he can.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
Do this, he should be able to do this. His
purpose is to do that.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
So it's almost like everybody starts throwing up roadblocks before
they need to because and it's out of love, it's
at a concern, but maybe it happens too early and
it prevents you from being in your peak shape.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Well, I think we should start by talking about the
stereotypes about aging. We've developed this stereotypical view of of
aging as a period of decline, and some people do decline.
One of the reasons we see people declining is because
(07:19):
we are living so much longer. We're living long enough
to get some of the diseases that just don't occur
until old age, and so that's good news. But I
think decline for most of us is not about aging.
It's about neglect, right, It's about poor planning. It's about
(07:41):
an unwillingness to put in the investment. So I am committed,
and I have been committed for several decades to the
notion of planning and doing the work. In fact, I
am in better shape today than I was twenty or
thirty years ago. Yesterday, as part of my conditioning for
(08:04):
the trip, yesterday, I walked forty seven flights of stairs.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Shut up, are you serious?
Speaker 1 (08:12):
I was trying to fill in the blank, and I
honestly thought you were gonna say I walked forty seven steps,
and I was like, all right, we're getting there.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
We're getting thereout forty seven flights of stairs, and a
year ago I could only walk ten. So this work
during the past year has shown me what my real
boundaries are. And some of this is planning. You know,
you can't climb Killman Jarrow if you don't plan ahead.
(08:42):
And frankly, the planning should start in the thirties and forties.
This is not just my advice, is not just for
older people. It's about planning your life. But I've already
bought my seasoned ski pass for next year. I am
planning to ski next season. By the way, my sixty
(09:03):
year old kids are not happy about it.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
You know what, I'm glad you said mad though, no, no, no,
But I'm glad you said that. Like does your family,
I mean, listen, everybody knows you're famous, everybody knows who
you are.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
But to your family, you're just dad, Yeah, your dad,
your grandpa or whatever.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Like does your family ever to ever grab you and
go hey, listen, you lean probably stop driving? Like do
you have those normal fights that normal families do.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Well, we don't fight about it. And one of the
things in our family is that they now take for
granted that I can do some of this stuff that
I can do more than other people, and I tell
them no, no, anyone can do this. Well not I
have a very one. Most people can do this if
(09:51):
they're willing to put in the work and start early.
For me, this is all about legacy. So my children
and grandchildren, I'm leaving them a legacy of possibility. I
climbed Codo Poxi down in South America, a glacier to
eighteen thousand feet with a grandson. I climbed six years
(10:14):
ago Kilimanjaro with a different grandson. I've been to Antarctica
with a granddaughter. So for me, this is about teaching
my grandchildren what's possible. And so my kids think, well,
you know, dad's going to see. And by the way,
the reason they're worried about my skiing is not because
(10:39):
I fall I'm fallen in five years. It's because a
friend of mine, who was eighty four years old and
standing still on the ski slope got hit by an
out of control eight year old who was flying down
the hill. Hit him from behind, put him in the hospital. So,
you know, they don't talk to me about skiing slow.
(11:00):
They talked to me about looking behind you.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Hey, So let me ask you this. How did you
team up? How did you team up with care Scout?
Speaker 2 (11:11):
Well, I've my wife and I have been policy holders
for their sister company. We own long term care insurance policies.
We took them out by the way, twenty two years
ago when I was a young buck, you know, I
was sixty seven years old, and people said, what are
you taking long term care policies out for? I said, well,
(11:33):
I don't want the last thing I leave my wife
to be a three hundred thousand dollars bill for long
term care. Now, the other thing I gotta tell you
is I don't ever want to pay me back. All right,
My long term care policy reminds me that if I'm
not careful, if I don't take care of myself, if
(11:54):
I don't climb the stairs, I might need long term care.
So I hope, I'm hoping I don't ever get a
penny back. I want to stay in good health. I'm
hoping my wife never needs it. But it is about planning,
and by the way, planning shouldn't wait until your eighties.
(12:17):
It should started earlier. With respect to your health. It
should start in the forties. And personally, I look back,
I wonder why didn't I take out long term care earlier?
And the answer is quite simple. I didn't know about it.
Nobody told me about care scout is perfectly. I went
to them because they're my insurance company, and I said,
(12:40):
why don't you sponsor my climb and they said, sure,
we'll sponsor your client, but on one condition, and it's
that they said, you got to help us spread the
truth about aging. They are really committed to this idea
of health, keeping everybody healthy. Possibly you know, it's good
(13:01):
business by the way, right if they can keep all
their policy holders healthy, they wouldn't have to pay some claims,
so it's but it's the right thing to do. And
I said, well, hey, I'm retired. I'm retired at the
age of sixty one. I've been retired twenty seven years.
And they said, well, unretire you want us to spunk.
(13:24):
You want us to spunks? Are you? You got to
go back to doing the work he used to do
on television tell him people how to live healthy. So
I said, sure, hey, can I ask you?
Speaker 1 (13:35):
It's can I ask you a tru or false question?
Like you mentioned being on TV and telling people how
to live healthy? And people know you from the Today
Today for decades. Is it true that you got the
job You were living in Los Angeles and you did
an interview or you sent a letter to like some
reporter at a TV station it said, hey, stop doing
(13:58):
like soft, easy crap pieces and do something legit that
helps people.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
And you ended up.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Doing an interview with that reporter, which wasn't for NBC,
but NBC.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Saw the reaction and they were like, oh, dude, come
work with us.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Yeah. I started. It was it was a breast Actually,
I did an interview on a breast cancer program. It
was eleven seconds long. That's how long I was on
the air, and the station manager who went on to
become the president of ABC called me and said, I'd
like to talk to you. I went in and he
said what what what would you do if I said
(14:41):
you could have five days on the air three minutes
a day in our newscast. I said, I'd do breast cancer.
I'd cover that subject. He said, no, no, no, we've
already done that. I said, no, you didn't do it right.
He said, what didn't we do right? I said, you
didn't teach women how to do breast self exam. If
you want to present prevent cancer. If you want to
(15:03):
detect it early, you got to do brest self exam.
He said, well, how would you do that? He said, well,
I you know, I had a woman do best self exam.
I'm television. He said, we can't do that. I said, well,
then you ought to call someone else. You don't need me.
And he said, well, wait, wait, wait a minute, how
are we going to get a woman to show her
(15:24):
breast on television? I said, call my wife, She'll call
her friend Carol. You'll call her friend Carol Hark, and
Carol would say, I'd love to show my breath on television.
That's exactly what happened, and we found eleven early breast
(15:46):
cancers that week.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Now that that may be one of the most important
things I've ever done. So but I offered. I wrote
a brochure or for the series, and they all week
long they said basically what they said is do not
watch Channel seven next week h if you don't want
(16:12):
to see a naked breast on television. All week long,
he promoted the naked breast. By the way, if you're
gonna watch the series, you might want to send us
a self address stamped envelope and you'll get doctor Arch brochure. Well,
he he called me in the first day of the
(16:36):
series as they're two three hours early, and he took
me back through a door open and there was this giant
closet filled with one hundred thousand envelopes requesting the brochure.
That's amazing, amazing, it was incredible. Nothing like that had
ever happened. But he was mad, he said. He said
(16:59):
to me, what do you expect me to do with
all that nail? I said, I'd answer it, But let
me tell you how smart this guy was. I'd do
my spot on the air for three minutes, and then
he would switch the camera over to another studio where
(17:20):
twenty people were opening envelopes and stuffing brochures in them,
all right, and mailing them back out, and he would say,
if you want doctor Arts brochure, you know we're still
We've got more. And he ended up getting another twenty
thousand requests for that.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
Sure's I think that.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
Oh, it was fantastic. This guy was a genius. But
but when we got done, we you know, we didn't
have the readings yet. It took three weeks to get
the readings. We didn't know that we were going to
discover eleven breast cancers. And he looked at me and
he said, I'm not in the brochure business. I'm in
the television business. And I got a phone call a
(18:02):
few days later from the news director at ABC at
NBC KNBC in LA and he said, would you come
over and visit with me? Sure? And he said I
loved what you did on KBC. If I put you
on there, what would you do? And he said, you
can't do breast cancer because they've already done it. I said, well,
(18:25):
I'd do a weight loss series. I got patients. They
don't worry about their rest, they worry about their weight.
How would you do it? I said, well, I'd find
an overweight couple, let's call him Fat Albert and Fat Annie,
and I would put them on a program, a common
sense healthy weight loss program, and I would offer a
(18:48):
brochure and I'd come up with a point system. And
I sort of made this up as it went along.
He said, he said I can't do that. I said,
what can't you do? He said, well, I I can't
put you on for four weeks. We don't do four
week series. We promote a week at a time. And
I said, well, then you should call someone else. He said, well, well, wait,
(19:10):
wait a minute, he said, the brochures are a problem.
I know you got one hundred thousand requests at ABC.
I said, well, then call someone else. You don't want
to do a brochure, that's fine, I'm not your guy.
He said, okay, I'll do the brochure. And to make
a long story short, we did this for four weeks.
(19:31):
The guy on our program lost fourteen pounds. I started
him a little early. We put him on the pro
because we need a videotape. We started him three four
weeks earlier. His wife lost ten pounds. They raved about
the program. We got one hundred thousand requests for brochures.
The ratings went up thirty percent. We discovered three weeks later,
(19:53):
and he said, I want you on my air regularly.
After a year, I got a call from the Today
Show and they said, you know, we've been looking at
some of your tapes. How would you like to be
on the Today Show? And I said, what's that? I'm serious.
I was a surgeon. I was in the operating room
(20:14):
at seven o'clock in the morning, and I didn't know
what the Today Show was so they said, well, watch
it for a day or two. And I watched it
and I said, wow that you know, I asked the
cats me. Yeah, I was sure, I'd like to be
on and that started a twenty one year Career's amazing.
You know, here's here I am back again. Yeah, here
(20:35):
I am talking to you now.
Speaker 3 (20:37):
Yeah, it's a.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Little bit of a well some would call it a
step down, doctor, but I appreciate the thought. Hey, real quick,
and then I know I got to let you jump.
What would I be shocked? Like?
Speaker 3 (20:47):
What is like?
Speaker 1 (20:48):
I imagine just because the way you talk about planning
and starting so young, would I be shocked to find out?
Has there ever been a period in your life where
you would have said, oh, you know what?
Speaker 3 (20:59):
That was the un healthy period for me?
Speaker 2 (21:03):
Yes, I smoked for twenty years. Can you believe that
from the age of thirteen to the age of thirty three.
At the age of forty, I weighed two hundred one
pounds up, You're sad, Albert. I was that Albert, and
I had to lose weight for the serious by the way,
(21:25):
had to be a model for man. And now I
weigh one sixty and I'm climbing forty seven flights of stairs. Amazing,
and this is fun, it's work. Let's be honest about this.
If you're not willing to do the work, you can't
do what I'm doing. If you're not willing to advest
(21:45):
I ask people. I got some fairly wealthy friends. I
asked him, how much would you pay for an extra
year of life? Oh? Man, I'd pay a million bucks. Well, okay,
how much would you pay to stay healthy until you do?
You know, the day you die? I pay them million
bucks for that too. I said, well, why aren't you
(22:06):
willing to pay thirty minutes a day to enjoy the
kind of health I have? And you know, they him
and they haw, and it's like, all right, well show
me how to do it. And half of them, actually
half of them will join in and the other half.
We're only human, right, yeah, right, exactly, we're We're all human.
(22:27):
And so they they keep doing what they're doing, and
they cannot enjoy the life I have. I'll be ninety
in a few weeks, and my life expectancy, because I
lived to this age, is now ninety four. I plan
to live to one hundred and eight.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
By the way, I bet I got money on you
to one hundred and ten. You'll just keep on going.
I feel that way.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
This is not the last time we will be together
doing interviews, all right, perfect.
Speaker 3 (22:57):
I will hold you to that, Doctor Ewlen.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Thank everybody care scout for us, best to luck with
the climb on Kilimanjaro. And yes, you and I will
definitely talk again in the future.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Here Ron, it's been fun being with you. Thanks so
much for having me.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
Hey appreciate it. Thank you, doctor
Doctor.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Aren't you lean? Good morning? How are you?
Speaker 3 (00:04):
I am doing well, sir? How are you?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I am doing fantastically.
Speaker 3 (00:10):
Well, excellent, excellent.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
So let me let me ask you this, right off
the bat, Right off the bat, what the what the
hell are you doing?
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Sir? I'm gonna climb kill him and Jarl again. This
will be my fourth trip up and probably my last,
because if I want to climb again, I'm gonna find
another mountain.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
So but now, also correct me if I'm wrong.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
When you when you, when you climb, like you said,
this will be your This will be your fourth time climbing.
When you it's correct, when you, when you summit it,
when you make it to the top, will you be
and I don't get mad, will you be the oldest
person to ever summit kill him in Jarrow?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
As best we can tell, that is true. The record
is right now. There's no you know, official world record.
Most people think of the Guiness World Records, which is
really an unofficial commercial enterprise, and the oldest person who's
ever done it there is eighty nine years and thirty
(01:13):
seven days. So when I get to the top, I'm
going to claim the world record. And I've already filed
a registered in application with Guinness to try and get
their record.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Too, and you'll be ninety when you sum it.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Correct.
Speaker 2 (01:29):
We are planning it so that I will actually sum
it on my ninetieth birthday, and my guide and my
tour company have promised to bake a cake for me
at eighteen thousand feece. That's awesome. Well, by the way,
I know they can bake because I summited on my
(01:50):
eighty second birthday and they showed up with a cake
icing it said Happy Birthday Art on it. This is
really fun. It's it's cold, it's really cold, and I
don't like the cold, but the idea of having a
birthday cake at nineteen three and forty one feet really
(02:12):
appeals to me.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
Hey, so, so, doctor Art, So you've done this, Like
you said, this will be your this will be your
fourth time going right is and you're gonna be You'll
be the you'll be the oldest person ever in the
world too.
Speaker 3 (02:25):
Well, that sounds bad.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
You'll be the oldest person to have ever summitted Killiman Jarrow.
Speaker 3 (02:30):
So it's it means one of two. It means one
of two things.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Number one, either you are in really good shape and
really motivated, or Mount Kilimanjarrow is really easy.
Speaker 2 (02:42):
Well, it's actually both. Easy is not the best word mount.
I tell people I'm climbing Mount Kilimanjaro, and it's not
really a climb. There is no technical climbing, no ropes.
I've done a mountain in South America on a glacier
with ropes and crampons. But this is a long, slow,
(03:05):
uphill trek. My trek will be about forty five miles
because we're picking a slightly different route this time. It
has a slower incline. You know, I just don't want
to I don't want to work that hard, and it's
(03:27):
a quieter route. There are fewer travelers on it because
of the length, and I get to stop anywhere I
want on There are several routes on Killman Jarl, and
on some of them you can only stay overnight in
their little campsite villages. But on this route you get tired,
you just put your tent up and lie down. That's
(03:53):
kind of a feeling to me. The worry I have,
my guide, I said, I don't like the cold, and
the worry I have is that we'll get up too
early and I'll have to just sit at eighteen thousand people.
I do not want to summit before my birthday.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
So doctor, you lean that begs the obvious question why, like,
why are we doing this again?
Speaker 2 (04:15):
Well, I'll tell you why. Most people are concerned about
their number one. I want to be at my best.
Right I don't know what my best is. I know
that at eighty two my best was Mount Kelimanjaro. At
eighty three, it was a mountain in South America called
Code Epoxy. But I haven't climbed in a few years,
(04:38):
and I just want to know if I can do it.
That's one reason I want to push my boundaries. For me,
aging is all about realizing your potential. And you don't
really know what your potential is unless you kind of
push it out there near the limits, not past the limits.
(04:58):
And there's another reason why most people are worried about
their lifespan longevity. You know how many years am I
going to live? Many people, I think it's more important
to worry about your health span. How many of those
years are you going to spend in good health? And
I want to be in perfect health until the day
(05:19):
I die. When I die, I want my friends to
say what in the world did he die of He
looked great yesterday. But for me, this is about a
new concept that I just learned about a year or
two ago called peak span, and that ak span, well,
(05:40):
that's living until the end at your peak. I want
to be the best I can be until the day
I keel over. And I find it kind of interesting
that the peak scan fits so nicely with a mountain peak.
Speaker 3 (05:59):
Right, sure, yeah, that works out nice.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Hey, but don't you don't you say, doctor Euleen, that
for a lot of people as as they as they
age and listen, you're gonna be ninety years old. A
lot of people as they age, and it's not just them,
but it's also family members and friends, they start they
start looking at them being the older person and try
(06:26):
to start evaluating what functions they don't have or what
functions they shouldn't be operating or using, as opposed to
looking at him and going no, like you said, he's
in great shape, he can.
Speaker 3 (06:40):
Do this, he should be able to do this. His
purpose is to do that.
Speaker 1 (06:44):
So it's almost like everybody starts throwing up roadblocks before
they need to because and it's out of love, it's
at a concern, but maybe it happens too early and
it prevents you from being in your peak shape.
Speaker 2 (06:58):
Well, I think we should start by talking about the
stereotypes about aging. We've developed this stereotypical view of of
aging as a period of decline, and some people do decline.
One of the reasons we see people declining is because
(07:19):
we are living so much longer. We're living long enough
to get some of the diseases that just don't occur
until old age, and so that's good news. But I
think decline for most of us is not about aging.
It's about neglect, right, It's about poor planning. It's about
(07:41):
an unwillingness to put in the investment. So I am committed,
and I have been committed for several decades to the
notion of planning and doing the work. In fact, I
am in better shape today than I was twenty or
thirty years ago. Yesterday, as part of my conditioning for
(08:04):
the trip, yesterday, I walked forty seven flights of stairs.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Shut up, are you serious?
Speaker 1 (08:12):
I was trying to fill in the blank, and I
honestly thought you were gonna say I walked forty seven steps,
and I was like, all right, we're getting there.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
We're getting thereout forty seven flights of stairs, and a
year ago I could only walk ten. So this work
during the past year has shown me what my real
boundaries are. And some of this is planning. You know,
you can't climb Killman Jarrow if you don't plan ahead.
(08:42):
And frankly, the planning should start in the thirties and forties.
This is not just my advice, is not just for
older people. It's about planning your life. But I've already
bought my seasoned ski pass for next year. I am
planning to ski next season. By the way, my sixty
(09:03):
year old kids are not happy about it.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
You know what, I'm glad you said mad though, no, no, no,
But I'm glad you said that. Like does your family,
I mean, listen, everybody knows you're famous, everybody knows who
you are.
Speaker 3 (09:15):
But to your family, you're just dad, Yeah, your dad,
your grandpa or whatever.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Like does your family ever to ever grab you and
go hey, listen, you lean probably stop driving? Like do
you have those normal fights that normal families do.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
Well, we don't fight about it. And one of the
things in our family is that they now take for
granted that I can do some of this stuff that
I can do more than other people, and I tell
them no, no, anyone can do this. Well not I
have a very one. Most people can do this if
(09:51):
they're willing to put in the work and start early.
For me, this is all about legacy. So my children
and grandchildren, I'm leaving them a legacy of possibility. I
climbed Codo Poxi down in South America, a glacier to
eighteen thousand feet with a grandson. I climbed six years
(10:14):
ago Kilimanjaro with a different grandson. I've been to Antarctica
with a granddaughter. So for me, this is about teaching
my grandchildren what's possible. And so my kids think, well,
you know, dad's going to see. And by the way,
the reason they're worried about my skiing is not because
(10:39):
I fall I'm fallen in five years. It's because a
friend of mine, who was eighty four years old and
standing still on the ski slope got hit by an
out of control eight year old who was flying down
the hill. Hit him from behind, put him in the hospital. So,
you know, they don't talk to me about skiing slow.
(11:00):
They talked to me about looking behind you.
Speaker 1 (11:05):
Hey, So let me ask you this. How did you
team up? How did you team up with care Scout?
Speaker 2 (11:11):
Well, I've my wife and I have been policy holders
for their sister company. We own long term care insurance policies.
We took them out by the way, twenty two years
ago when I was a young buck, you know, I
was sixty seven years old, and people said, what are
you taking long term care policies out for? I said, well,
(11:33):
I don't want the last thing I leave my wife
to be a three hundred thousand dollars bill for long
term care. Now, the other thing I gotta tell you
is I don't ever want to pay me back. All right,
My long term care policy reminds me that if I'm
not careful, if I don't take care of myself, if
(11:54):
I don't climb the stairs, I might need long term care.
So I hope, I'm hoping I don't ever get a
penny back. I want to stay in good health. I'm
hoping my wife never needs it. But it is about planning,
and by the way, planning shouldn't wait until your eighties.
(12:17):
It should started earlier. With respect to your health. It
should start in the forties. And personally, I look back,
I wonder why didn't I take out long term care earlier?
And the answer is quite simple. I didn't know about it.
Nobody told me about care scout is perfectly. I went
to them because they're my insurance company, and I said,
(12:40):
why don't you sponsor my climb and they said, sure,
we'll sponsor your client, but on one condition, and it's
that they said, you got to help us spread the
truth about aging. They are really committed to this idea
of health, keeping everybody healthy. Possibly you know, it's good
(13:01):
business by the way, right if they can keep all
their policy holders healthy, they wouldn't have to pay some claims,
so it's but it's the right thing to do. And
I said, well, hey, I'm retired. I'm retired at the
age of sixty one. I've been retired twenty seven years.
And they said, well, unretire you want us to spunk.
(13:24):
You want us to spunks? Are you? You got to
go back to doing the work he used to do
on television tell him people how to live healthy. So
I said, sure, hey, can I ask you?
Speaker 1 (13:35):
It's can I ask you a tru or false question?
Like you mentioned being on TV and telling people how
to live healthy? And people know you from the Today
Today for decades. Is it true that you got the
job You were living in Los Angeles and you did
an interview or you sent a letter to like some
reporter at a TV station it said, hey, stop doing
(13:58):
like soft, easy crap pieces and do something legit that
helps people.
Speaker 3 (14:05):
And you ended up.
Speaker 1 (14:06):
Doing an interview with that reporter, which wasn't for NBC,
but NBC.
Speaker 3 (14:13):
Saw the reaction and they were like, oh, dude, come
work with us.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Yeah. I started. It was it was a breast Actually,
I did an interview on a breast cancer program. It
was eleven seconds long. That's how long I was on
the air, and the station manager who went on to
become the president of ABC called me and said, I'd
like to talk to you. I went in and he
said what what what would you do if I said
(14:41):
you could have five days on the air three minutes
a day in our newscast. I said, I'd do breast cancer.
I'd cover that subject. He said, no, no, no, we've
already done that. I said, no, you didn't do it right.
He said, what didn't we do right? I said, you
didn't teach women how to do breast self exam. If
you want to present prevent cancer. If you want to
(15:03):
detect it early, you got to do brest self exam.
He said, well, how would you do that? He said, well,
I you know, I had a woman do best self exam.
I'm television. He said, we can't do that. I said, well,
then you ought to call someone else. You don't need me.
And he said, well, wait, wait, wait a minute, how
are we going to get a woman to show her
(15:24):
breast on television? I said, call my wife, She'll call
her friend Carol. You'll call her friend Carol Hark, and
Carol would say, I'd love to show my breath on television.
That's exactly what happened, and we found eleven early breast
(15:46):
cancers that week.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
Now that that may be one of the most important
things I've ever done. So but I offered. I wrote
a brochure or for the series, and they all week
long they said basically what they said is do not
watch Channel seven next week h if you don't want
(16:12):
to see a naked breast on television. All week long,
he promoted the naked breast. By the way, if you're
gonna watch the series, you might want to send us
a self address stamped envelope and you'll get doctor Arch brochure. Well,
he he called me in the first day of the
(16:36):
series as they're two three hours early, and he took
me back through a door open and there was this giant
closet filled with one hundred thousand envelopes requesting the brochure.
That's amazing, amazing, it was incredible. Nothing like that had
ever happened. But he was mad, he said. He said
(16:59):
to me, what do you expect me to do with
all that nail? I said, I'd answer it, But let
me tell you how smart this guy was. I'd do
my spot on the air for three minutes, and then
he would switch the camera over to another studio where
(17:20):
twenty people were opening envelopes and stuffing brochures in them,
all right, and mailing them back out, and he would say,
if you want doctor Arts brochure, you know we're still
We've got more. And he ended up getting another twenty
thousand requests for that.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
Sure's I think that.
Speaker 2 (17:40):
Oh, it was fantastic. This guy was a genius. But
but when we got done, we you know, we didn't
have the readings yet. It took three weeks to get
the readings. We didn't know that we were going to
discover eleven breast cancers. And he looked at me and
he said, I'm not in the brochure business. I'm in
the television business. And I got a phone call a
(18:02):
few days later from the news director at ABC at
NBC KNBC in LA and he said, would you come
over and visit with me? Sure? And he said I
loved what you did on KBC. If I put you
on there, what would you do? And he said, you
can't do breast cancer because they've already done it. I said, well,
(18:25):
I'd do a weight loss series. I got patients. They
don't worry about their rest, they worry about their weight.
How would you do it? I said, well, I'd find
an overweight couple, let's call him Fat Albert and Fat Annie,
and I would put them on a program, a common
sense healthy weight loss program, and I would offer a
(18:48):
brochure and I'd come up with a point system. And
I sort of made this up as it went along.
He said, he said I can't do that. I said,
what can't you do? He said, well, I I can't
put you on for four weeks. We don't do four
week series. We promote a week at a time. And
I said, well, then you should call someone else. He said, well, well, wait,
(19:10):
wait a minute, he said, the brochures are a problem.
I know you got one hundred thousand requests at ABC.
I said, well, then call someone else. You don't want
to do a brochure, that's fine, I'm not your guy.
He said, okay, I'll do the brochure. And to make
a long story short, we did this for four weeks.
(19:31):
The guy on our program lost fourteen pounds. I started
him a little early. We put him on the pro
because we need a videotape. We started him three four
weeks earlier. His wife lost ten pounds. They raved about
the program. We got one hundred thousand requests for brochures.
The ratings went up thirty percent. We discovered three weeks later,
(19:53):
and he said, I want you on my air regularly.
After a year, I got a call from the Today
Show and they said, you know, we've been looking at
some of your tapes. How would you like to be
on the Today Show? And I said, what's that? I'm serious.
I was a surgeon. I was in the operating room
(20:14):
at seven o'clock in the morning, and I didn't know
what the Today Show was so they said, well, watch
it for a day or two. And I watched it
and I said, wow that you know, I asked the
cats me. Yeah, I was sure, I'd like to be
on and that started a twenty one year Career's amazing.
You know, here's here I am back again. Yeah, here
(20:35):
I am talking to you now.
Speaker 3 (20:37):
Yeah, it's a.
Speaker 1 (20:37):
Little bit of a well some would call it a
step down, doctor, but I appreciate the thought. Hey, real quick,
and then I know I got to let you jump.
What would I be shocked? Like?
Speaker 3 (20:47):
What is like?
Speaker 1 (20:48):
I imagine just because the way you talk about planning
and starting so young, would I be shocked to find out?
Has there ever been a period in your life where
you would have said, oh, you know what?
Speaker 3 (20:59):
That was the un healthy period for me?
Speaker 2 (21:03):
Yes, I smoked for twenty years. Can you believe that
from the age of thirteen to the age of thirty three.
At the age of forty, I weighed two hundred one
pounds up, You're sad, Albert. I was that Albert, and
I had to lose weight for the serious by the way,
(21:25):
had to be a model for man. And now I
weigh one sixty and I'm climbing forty seven flights of stairs. Amazing,
and this is fun, it's work. Let's be honest about this.
If you're not willing to do the work, you can't
do what I'm doing. If you're not willing to advest
(21:45):
I ask people. I got some fairly wealthy friends. I
asked him, how much would you pay for an extra
year of life? Oh? Man, I'd pay a million bucks. Well, okay,
how much would you pay to stay healthy until you do?
You know, the day you die? I pay them million
bucks for that too. I said, well, why aren't you
(22:06):
willing to pay thirty minutes a day to enjoy the
kind of health I have? And you know, they him
and they haw, and it's like, all right, well show
me how to do it. And half of them, actually
half of them will join in and the other half.
We're only human, right, yeah, right, exactly, we're We're all human.
(22:27):
And so they they keep doing what they're doing, and
they cannot enjoy the life I have. I'll be ninety
in a few weeks, and my life expectancy, because I
lived to this age, is now ninety four. I plan
to live to one hundred and eight.
Speaker 3 (22:45):
By the way, I bet I got money on you
to one hundred and ten. You'll just keep on going.
I feel that way.
Speaker 2 (22:52):
This is not the last time we will be together
doing interviews, all right, perfect.
Speaker 3 (22:57):
I will hold you to that, Doctor Ewlen.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Thank everybody care scout for us, best to luck with
the climb on Kilimanjaro. And yes, you and I will
definitely talk again in the future.
Speaker 2 (23:08):
Here Ron, it's been fun being with you. Thanks so
much for having me.
Speaker 3 (23:12):
Hey appreciate it. Thank you, doctor
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