Behind the Bastards - Part Two: The Grifters Behind The Fake Autism 'Cure' Industry

Episode Date: April 3, 2025

Robert concludes the story of the Fake Autism Cure Industrial Complex and tells Mangesh about a doctor who tried to get rich selling spoiled blood to deranged parents.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hi everybody, it's James here. If you don't listen to it, it could happen here. You might not recognize me. My name is James Stout and I am the guy who pops onto this feed every few months to tell you something very sad and then ask for your money. And that's why I'm here today. A terrible earthquake struck Myanmar today, the day I'm recording this, which is Friday the 28th of March. It was 7.7 on the Richter scale. We know of more than 100 deaths, but it's likely the death toll is much, much, much higher. Lots of the telegraph and internet infrastructure has been taken out by the earthquake and the Hunter restricts internet and social media access. So we don't

really know the full extent of the death, but we can imagine it will be very high as one of the areas most affected was Mandalay, which is the second largest city in Myanmar. I've spoken to half a dozen sources in Myanmar today, people who Robert and I have interviewed before. They're all okay, but they all shared how terrible things were. They said things were as bad as they were at the time of Cyclone Nargis, which was a terrible disaster in 2008. If you would like to support the people of Burma who are currently fighting against a tyrannical dictatorship as well as dealing with the consequences of this natural disaster, there are a couple of ways you can do so.

I was actually already running a fundraiser on my Patreon for Mobie PDF. They are a casualty evacuation team in Southern Shand State, right at the fiercest part of the fighting right now. They don't fight, what they do is they go and they evacuate people who have been injured and they provide medical services to internally displaced people. They've been doing this since 2021. They're incredibly brave people and they've saved more than 300 lives. You can read more about them by going to my Patreon post which also includes all the links for donation. The website for that is tinyurl.com slash help hyphen Myanmar. That's tinyurl.com slash h-e-l-p hyphen m-y-a-n-m-a-r. If you'd like to donate somewhere else, an organization that you can donate to is the

Free Burma Rangers. Free Burma Rangers dot org. They're a fantastic NGO. They've been doing a lot of medical work in the liberated zones of Myanmar for a very long time. They've also worked in Rojava and lots of other places around the world where people need help. I spoke today from FPR today, he's well, and he told me that they're already starting

to respond to the disaster. So to donate to them, freebermarangers.org. Thanks very much. We appreciate your support. Welcome back to Behind the Bastards, a podcast where, you know, Mengesh, our great guest for today. Do you know that you ever heard that that that that quote, cometh the time cometh the man? I haven't.

Okay. Well, it's a quote people say and and I'm saying it now because I've decided I had a dream last night. I've decided you and you when I was not excuse me, Sophie. Let's cut that out. No, cometh the time, cometh the man. And I had a vision last night while I was dreaming. Yeah, I was gonna say,

you're really not helping this theory. No, no, I had a vision while I was dreaming about how to save America. And so I've decided I'm running in 2028 and I'm running on a platform of, look, one of the big problems the liberals and the progressives have, they all think if you make education better, you know, if you get enough dunks on people in public debates or whatever, you can stop parents and the like from like putting poison into their kids to try to treat ill understoodunderstood conditions, right?

And you can't, you can't stop people from wanting something to do. So let's give them something to do that's basically harmless. And that's why as a presidential candidate, my entire platform is going to be legalized and subsidized using federal money, a $7 bar of Xanax the size of a Snickers bar.

You just get them over the counter, any grocery store, any pharmacy, just a Snickers bar of pure Xanax. You can lick it like a horse, you can do whatever you want with it, $7 flat. That's how we're gonna fix things in this country. Look, every problem, the $7 Xanax Snickers bar solved, right?

You got a guy walks into a fucking public building wanting to do a mass shooting, reaches for his gun, finds a $7 Snickers bar as Xanax, bites it, forgets why he's there, problem solved. You know, everything could be this way. I'm so glad you're coming with the solution. Yeah, this is how we save America. I'm convinced glad you're coming with the solution. Yeah, this is this is how we save America. I'm convinced everyone vote Evans 2028 for your seven dollars stickers.

Bar of Xanax. I mean, we went to both the R.N.C. and D.N.C. and, you know, at least somebody's got a big idea. Yeah. Yeah. Again, we won't have any more elections. There are going to be like three votes that make it in every election. And none of them will have a legit like a readable name It's just gonna be scribbles on the piece of paper So let's get back into this

Have you ever wondered if your pet is lying to you? Why is my cat not here? And I go in and she's eating my lunch. Or if hypnotism is real? You will use this suggestion in order to enhance your cognitive control. But what's inside a black hole? Black holes could be a consequence of the way that we understand the universe. Well, we have answers for you in the new iHeart original podcast, Science Stuff. Join me or Hitcham, as we answer questions

about animals, space, our brains, and our bodies. So give yourself permission to be a science geek and listen to Science Stuff on the iHeart video app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up, y'all? I'm AJ Andrews, pro softball player, sports analyst, and the first woman to win a Rawlings Gold Glove. On my new podcast, Dropping Diamonds, we dive headfirst into the world of

softball by sharing powerful stories, insights, and conversations that inspire and empower. It's time to drop bombs and diamonds. Dropping Diamonds with AJ Andrews is an iHeart women's sports production and partnership with athletes and limited softball league and deep blue sports and entertainment. Listen to Dropping Diamonds with AJ Andrews on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast,

or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports Network. Hey, all you women's hoops fans, and folks who just don't know yet that they're women's hoops fans. We've got a big week over at Good Game with Sarah Spain as we near the end of one of the most exciting

women's college basketball seasons ever. The most parody we've seen in years with games coming down to the wire and everyone wondering which team will be crowned national champions this weekend in Tampa. Listen to Good Game with Sarah Spain on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

Imagine you're scrolling through TikTok. You come across a video of a teenage girl and then a photo of the person suspected of killing her. It was shocking. It was very shocking. Like that could have been my daughter. Like you never know. I'm Jen Swan.

I'm the host of a new podcast called My Friend Daisy. It's the story of how and why a group of teenagers turned to social media to help track down their friend's killer. Listen to My Friend Daisy on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. The Autism Research Institute and our buddy Dr. Rimland rode in to defend doctors Usman and Carey after Tariq's death, writing in a defend doctors Usman and Kerry after Tariq's death, writing in a post on the Institute's website that Tariq had died not because of chelation therapy, but because of an error that had seen him dosed with a look-alike drug, disodium

EDTA, instead of calcium disodium EDTA. Now first off, I don't think the argument, didn't kill him with bad medicine We killed him because we cruelly administered a deadly dose of the wrong drug makes things better That's that's like no no no, I didn't give him fentanyl I just shot him up with way too much heroin I'm like, yeah, I don't really see how that helps. This is also untrue. Tariq was administered with the normal kind of EDTA used in chelation therapy, which is the only kind the clinic had stocked. In subsequent publications, Dr. Rimland bragged that chelation therapy had consistently good results as rated by paramedics who were surveyed by ARI.

In fact, it was the number one pick out of 88 approved interventions. What? A subsequent, yes. They love this because it's clearly is serious medicine, right? It doesn't help. It makes things worse generally, but it has a massive visible effect. I think that's honestly the whole reason why, right? A subsequent statement put out by Dan claimed that chelation was one of the most beneficial treatments for autism and related disorders. Now, aluminum, lead and mercury aren't the only metals that got blamed. I found a Chicago Tribune piece that gives the story of a boy named Jordan

King who was chelated for high levels of mercury and tin. This is weird. There's a quote in there from like an expert on tin poisoning who's like, Is tin poisoning really a thing? It is for like industrial workers who are like welding tin for a living, you know? But not little kids. There's no way to get enough exposure to tin, really. Is your kid welding a shitload of tin? Like,

then we have other issues. Autism's not the problem. You're letting your five-year-old weld. What are you doing? Take that torch away from them. Now, the actual explanation for why this kid- Although if they're kid productive like, you know sure why not why not? Have a hobby there at least touching if they can't touch grass they might as well Now again, they do they do a test which shows high levels of mercury and tin in this kid's blood

But that's not the whole story you You read that and you're like, oh, well, maybe there was something going on. Why would they have elevated levels? Well, the explanation for why and for why all of the kids that get tested in order to justify this therapy have elevated levels of different heavy metals is because of the very, the distinctly a scientific kind of lab test that they give these kids, right? You would think if you're like, this kid probably has high levels of heavy metals, we might want to administer chelation therapy.

You're not a doctor, Mangesh. What would you do first? What would you do first if you thought they might have high levels of heavy metals? Get a blood test. Right. Very basic science, right? Okay, you think this is true, let's test? Right. Very basic science. Have you guys seen them?

I don't know. Okay, you think this is true, let's test their blood. No, no, no. No, no, no. I'm so afraid. The way you give these blood tests I'm so afraid.

I'm so afraid. in this kind of therapy is first you chelate the child. You shoot them up with this thing that strips heavy metals out of their blood and makes them pee it out, right? And then you test them. Right? So you give them a drug that provokes them to excrete heavy metals and then test them and then you know what? You're gonna find some heavy metals.

Because you gave them the drug that makes them excrete them. And here's the thing, there's no accept, because this isn't the way science, where you don't do this otherwise, there's no accepted understanding for what normal results on a test given after chelation would be. So there's no actual medical case

for like drugging people and then testing them like this. So the lab just shows back charts that shows scary spikes of different metals and the clinician says, look, kids got it, you know, we need to keep doing this. Now, doctor, in case you don't believe me and you shouldn't, not a doctor,

Dr. Carl Baum, director of the Center for Children's Environmental Toxicology at the Yale New Haven Children's Hospital, calls this quote exactly the wrong way to do it. Wow. Now Dr. Usman did ultimately face mild consequences. In 2009 the Chicago Tribune featured her in their dubious medicine investigation which helped push for a probe by the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation. They alleged that she had provided

medically unwarranted treatment that may potentially result in permanent disabling injuries to two boys. From the Tribune. In reaching a consent order with Ouzman, medical regulators alleged that Ouzman failed to disclose to her patients her financial interests in the company supplying the hyperbaric oxygen chambers and in the compounding pharmacy that filled prescriptions for her patients. The state said that she also failed to obtain informed consent for the chelation therapy

and did not keep adequate medical records for her patients. Ousmane, who practices out of the True Health Medical Center in Naperville, neither admitted nor denied the state's allegations in signing the consent order. She agreed to pay a $10,000 fine. Great. $10,000 fine. Great. $10,000. I love that this is the punishment. I know, I know.

It's crazy. Now, the other boy that she's accused of harming in this case was a Chicago child, the son of James Komen. We don't get this kid's name because they're a kid. He was engaged in a custody battle with his ex-wife over their kid who was a child with autism. Now, the kid's mom is a believer of these biomedical interventions for their son's autism. James is not.

James recognizes this is pretty dangerous and he gets trapped in this nightmare of trying to advocate for his son against the wishes of the boy's mother. Here's how a different article by the Tribune, titled Autism's Risky Experiments, describes his regimen of treatment. James Coman's son has an unusual skill. The seven-year-old, his father says, can swallow six pills at once. Diagnosed with autism as a toddler, the Chicago boy had been placed on an intense regimen of supplements and medications aimed at treating the disorder. Besides taking many pills, the boy was injected with vitamin B12 and received an intravenous

infusions of a drug used to leach mercury and other metals from the body. He took mega doses of vitamin C, a hormone, and a drug that suppresses testosterone." They're just doing everything to this kid. Again, none of these treatments. He can swallow seven pills at a time is all- He's able to take so many pills. That's not an America's Got Talent. Yeah.

Now, the common boy also suffered extreme negative side effects from chelation, although thankfully not fatal ones. This provoked his father to sue, and his mother responded by complaining that any interruption of his complex, nonsense therapeutic routine would have a disastrous impact on the boy, setting him back, you know? That Tribune article, written in 2009, summed up the scope of the biomedical movement at the time. Studies have shown that up to three quarters of families with children with autism try

alternative treatments, which insurance does not usually cover. Doctors, many linked to the influential group, defeat autism now! Promote the therapies online and books in it conferences. Intensive regimens are so common that one doctor recently joked at an autism one conference in Chicago, you know you have a child with autism if your child takes more pills than your grandmother. He's joking about all the drugs you're giving kids. I love that like, you know, you're a redneck if, like is the format for this, it's awful. Sure man, that makes you sound good.

Sounds like you're a doctor. Great. It also made a point of discussing how the social media era had provided oxygen to the hyperbaric chamber fire that is the biomedical movement. Quote, parents trade stories and advice about chelation on large internet groups. One Yahoo group has more than 8,000 members.

The treatment takes many forms, including creams for the skin, capsules, suppositories, and intravenous infusions of powerful medicines usually reserved for people with severe metal poisoning. The hype was so big around this stuff in 2006, that the National Institute of Mental Health announced a randomized control trial of chelation as an autism treatment. So an actual legitimate medical body says, let's do a trial. So many people are saying this helps their kids,

let's look into it, right? And ultimately they canceled that trial in 2008, because they can't find any evidence that there's benefit to it. And there's a lot of evidence that even trying this will put kids at risk, right? Significant risk because chelation is not good for you if you don't need it.

So like, it's actually unethical for us to study this because there's zero evidence that's helped anybody and we know it hurts people. So we just can't do this to kids. Now, they've done some studies on lab rats that have showed that drugging lab rats needlessly with chelation therapy causes cognitive problems, right? So they're like, we just really can't justify doing this.

And this is good logic for ethical scientists. But the crazed parents and con artists doctors of the biomedical movement take this as evidence that big pharma has killed another attempt to uncover the truth, right? That's why they don't care about hurting kids. They just want to keep selling us expensive medicine that actually isn't as expensive as the fake medicine.

That's so awful. You see similar stories wherever you look at these nonsense treatments for autism. In 2007, the Cochrane collaboration, an independent evaluator of medical research, reviewed the efficacy of casein and gluten-free diets as treatments for autism, which had become another bugbear for biomedicine. The idea that some of these biomedical people have is that gluten and casein interferes with kids' brain receptors. And advocates would cite studies which prove that proper diet could eliminate the symptoms of autism. But, per

Scientific American, Cochrane identified two very small clinical trials, one with 20 participants and one with 15. The first study found some reduction in autism symptoms. The second found none. A new randomized controlled trial of 14 children reported this past May by Susan Hyman, an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and A new randomized controlled trial of 14 children reported this past May by Susan Hyman, an associate professor of pediatrics at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry, found no changes in attention, sleep, stool patterns, or characteristic autistic behavior. Slowly, the evidence is starting to accumulate that diet is not the panacea people are hoping for, says Susan E. Levy, a pediatrician at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia who

has evaluated the evidence with Hyman. Of course, logic and evidence never drives the reactions you want to see in cases like this, right? Fitzpatrick's book includes a quote from an anti-Mercury campaign in the US, Generation Rescue. This is a, what's her name? The Oprah ladies, Jenny McCarthy's organization. And this statement was made initially

in response to Tariq Ndama's death. You might want to recall here that Tariq was diagnosed with like high aluminum levels, not mercury, but whatever. Quote, we are not desperate parents willing to try anything. We are educated, caring parents who have done thousands of hours of research and administered dozens of medical tests on our own children under the care of knowledgeable physicians. Wow. Great.

Wasn't Jenny McCarthy's kid also like, she said he was autistic and then he wasn't autistic? And then she said she scared him. She says she scared him. Yeah. Oh my God. I hope that kid is okay. I don't know. But now this kind of talk, it's like, well, we've actually, we're the experts.

We've done so much to understand this. It's very common among the loudest mouthpieces of the movement, which includes Jenny McCarthy. We've discussed before her appearances on the Oprah Winfrey Show, which played a massive role in igniting the anti-vax movement in the US. McCarthy, whose son Evan was diagnosed with autism, describes herself as having a PhD in Google.

She does not. But she did have a role to play in the death of that five-year-old who burnt alive in a hyperbaric chamber. In 2016, Jenny pivoted from her successful anti-vax campaign and started advocating hyperbaric oxygen therapy as a treatment for ASD. The scientific argument she used was that people with ASD have, and this is autism spectrum disorder, right? The scientific argument she used was that people with ASD have inflammation in their

brains, which is true. One thing you can see is that there's a level of inflammation in the brains of people with autism. Inflammation in the brains of people with autism. We don't know why. We don't know how this relates to the... We just know it's there, right? So there's a lot of debate about this,

but it is something you see. And it is true that hyperbaric therapy has decreased other kinds of inflammation, but not in the brain. Yeah. Like stuff doesn't always, it's not all the same, right? Even the microbiome being different of autistic kids and diet not being able to affect it, right? You know? Even the microbiome being different of autistic kids and diet not being able to affect it, right? Like, this is hard.

Yeah, and so it's this thing where, like, you are taking two unrelated facts and using them to put kids in these death tubes. Now, actual analysis of the evidence, because there have been studies on this, shows that the only basis for hyperbaric therapy as a treatment for autism was one flawed study that showed a benefit. Per PubMed, quote, HbO2, that's the name for hyperbaric therapy, should not be recommended

for ASD treatment until more conclusive, favorable results and long-term outcomes are demonstrated from well-designed, controlled trials. A write-up from this time by the American Council on Science and Health states, despite all of this caution and doubt, McCarthy believes that she knows better. Her organization, Generation Rescue, is holding the third annual Autism Education Summit this weekend in Addison, Texas, just north of Dallas to promote HBO2 therapy for ASD. This conference included an expert panel of chiropractors and osteopaths, as well as, along with those august medical experts, a YouTuber named Lily who made a video about

hyperbaric treatment helped her little sister. McCarthy was joined on the panel by Del Bigtree, producer of the movie Vaxxed, and one of the ladies from The Real Housewives of New Jersey. Truly a symposium of the greatest minds in medicine. Awesome. Another conference expert was Dr. Anju Usman whose husband sells hyperbaric chambers. Oh my God.

Ha ha ha ha ha. I was not expecting that twist. Oh yeah baby. Now this is all made especially infuriating because four years before this conference in 2012, a four-year-old boy and his 62-year-old grandmother died after the hyperbaric chamber the boy was in caught fire at the Ocean Hyperbaric Center in Florida. Francesco had cerebral palsy, which hyperbaric therapy does not treat. And he had traveled to South Florida from Italy, where the treatment is illegal with his grandmother.

And he caught on fire as he tried to save them. They both die nightmarish deaths. Four years before this conference, Regina McCarthy saying everybody should do this for their kids. Um, now none of these deaths, none of these injuries, none of the illnesses caused by all this bullshit treatment means anything to most of these people. Their only interest is their children. And one of the issues here is that because of the way autism works for most people who

have autism, you see around the time the symptoms become evident, it seems like they're regressing, right? They stop making eye contact, they stop engaging as much. And this can be very dramatic and very shocking to parents, right? But most people with autism, their symptoms then improve over time because they grow up and they get used to dealing with and engaging in the world, right? That's just life, you know? This is going to be the case with a majority of people who get diagnosed with autism.

You will see the symptoms get alleviated. So even if you're just dosing them with every random drug you can get your hands on, they will likely show improvement in some ways just as they grow up and people convince themselves, I saved my kid. At least they're better because of all of this shit I did. When like, you could have just loved them. That would help, you know, have maybe gotten some treatment with the GI issues or whatever, but like you could have just loved them. You know, didn't have to do all this other shit. But it's just like, you know, life,

people find ways to interact and deal with the world like David Lynch, you know? This is again, because people with autism are people. But yeah, as a result of this fact, many of these parents will go to their graves securing the belief that they stood up for their kid and helped save them, even if all they did was make the world more comfortable

for the kind of con men who encouraged children to avoid getting vaccinated for measles. And speaking of con, nope, speaking of ads, here they are. Have you ever wondered if your pet is lying to you? Why is my cat not here? And I go in and she's eating my lunch. Or if hypnotism is real? You will use this suggestion in order to enhance your cognitive control.

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Hey there, Ed Helms here, host of Snafu, your favorite podcast about history's greatest screw-ups. It's the 1920s, Prohibition is in full swing, and a lot of people are mysteriously dying? Assistant Attorney General Mabel Walker Willebrand is becoming increasingly desperate in forcing Prohibition. She was a lone warrior. I mean, how could Mabel not be feeling the pressure? Her bosses are drunks, her agents are incompetent, even Congress is full of hypocrites. So if Mabel is going to succeed in laying down the law, she needs to make the consequences for drinking hurt a lot more. Which she does, arguably a little too well.

Find out more on season three, episode four of Snafu Formula Six. Listen and subscribe on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. I always had to be so good no one could ignore me. Carve my path with data and drive. But some people only see who I am on paper. The paper ceiling. The limitations from degree screens to stereotypes that are holding back over 70 million stars. Workers skilled through alternative routes rather than a bachelor's degree. It's time for skills to speak for themselves.

Find resources for breaking through barriers at tearthepapersealing.org brought to you by Opportunity at Work and the Ad Council. Hey, y'all, it's your girl, Cheeky's and I'm back with a brand new season of your favorite podcast, Cheeky's and Chill. I'll be sharing even more personal stories with you guys. And I know a lot of people are going to attack me. Why are you going to go visit your dad? Your mom wouldn't be OK with it. I'm going to tell you guys right now, I know my mother and I know a lot of people are gonna attack me. Why are you gonna go visit your dad? Your mom wouldn't be okay with it.

I'm gonna tell you guys right now, I know my mother. And I know my mom had a very forgiving heart. That is my story on plastic surgery. This is my truth. I think the last time I cried like that was when I lost my mom. Like that, like yelling. I was like, no.

I was like, oh, and I thought, what did I do wrong? And as always, you'll get my exclusive take on topics like love, personal growth, health, family ties, and more. And don't forget, I'll also be dishing out my best advice to you on episodes of Dear Cheekies. So my fiance and I have been together for 10 years and the first two years of being together. I find out he is cheating on me,

not only with women, but also with men. What should I do? Okay, where do I start? That's not love. He doesn't love you enough, because if he loved you, he'd be faithful. It's going to be an exciting year, and I hope that you can join me.

Listen to Cheekies and Chill, season four, as part of the My Kultura podcast network available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Oh, we're back. Good stuff. Good stuff. Good stuff. So every now and then, when you read about the biomedical community, you do hear about

the rare wins, right? These cases where a parent gets pulled into this, they treat their kid with nonsense for a while and they realize, I fucked up and they pull back and they take accountability and those are good stories. There's a great article in the Atlantic about autism's fringe therapies and it gives a story of Emma Zurcher and her family. Emma was born in 2002 when she started to show signs of autism at like age two and a half right around the time Tariq would have died, right? Her mother, Ariane, later described the realization of her daughter's diagnosis as being like, quote, descending into hell.

I was desperate to save my daughter. We went to everybody. We tried everything. Per the Atlantic, quote, she and her husband took Emma to neurologists, gastroenterologists, behavioral, speech and occupational therapists, nutritionists, naturopaths, a shaman and a homeopath, a craniosacral therapist and a quigong master. A developmental pediatrician who didn't take insurance charged at least $200 per visit and had a months-long waiting list recommended they call a psychic in

Europe. The psychic ironically refused payment because she didn't pick up a signal from them. When the psychics are more honest than the doctors, holy fuck. That is an unbelievable list. The psychics are like, no, I don't want to rob you. Holy fuck. They tried dozens of treatments that claim to have recovered children with autism, including numerous vitamin supplements, topic allotments, restrictive diets, chelation, hyperbaric oxygen therapy, brain scans, a so-called detoxification system, and stem cell therapy. In other words, she went through all the con therapies we covered in these episodes and a bunch more. She describes her mind state after each failure as, I thought I didn't do it right.

Let me do it again. And this is the consequence of this. It's not unreasonable to say to like, well, if your kid has a condition or an illness, part of treating it properly is the parent needs to be an advocate for their kid and involved in the treatment. Not an unreasonable statement. But there's this attitude that that means that that the parent is responsible for figuring it out. And like, well, but you're like a fucking accountant or something. You don't know how to, you're not a medical expert. You don't know what you're doing.

Like you know you shouldn't be diagnosing your kid here. Also, you can see how you slip from one to the next to the next because you're increasingly desperate, but once you're dealing with a shaman and it feels like someone in your life would tell you. You're calling a shaman? A psychic? I don't know if the shaman knows how to cure autism.

The ultimate result of all these specialty diets was that Emma shed body weight at a dangerous pace, losing 15% of her weight in six weeks. Now, Emma's mom had by this point come to believe that her daughter had something that is another common line in biomedical hooey that GI problems like leaky gut might help cause symptoms of autism. It doesn't. None of her attempts to fix Emma's microbiome worked. Ariane kept going, quote, I thought any treatment was better than doing nothing at all. It's this, I can't think

of anything else to do better. Press the gas, you know? Yeah. Yeah. That's just not, it's not smart. Sometimes heartbreaking. I have a friend who's an ER news. She says, sometimes the best thing to do with the site of a disaster is like smoke a cigarette and just kind of think things out for a second before you get in there, right? And that sounds horrifying to a lot of people, but this is a person who deals with emergencies every day. Sometimes your best bet is like, give it a sec. Take a look.

Take a look. Think it through. Everyone in the autism community is telling you that like there's a ticking clock, right? Like you're trying to race and beat the clock. This is also, it's another thing. It's a thing that gets people killed in war zones. I've seen it, this desire, this feeling a need to do something when again, the people

who are the real veterans, the people, number one, they also do react when they need to, but they also don't react all the time when they don't need to. They tend to keep to watch it, to think, you know? Cause otherwise you die horribly. Anyway, her kid loses a disastrous amount of weight and none of these attempts to fix Emma work at all. This is the state of mind, this idea, I've got to do something.

That's most of what these parents find themselves in. And the market for quack cures has only grown. I stated in 2009, about 75% of parents of children with autism reported using alternate medicine. Today it's about 88%, nearly all of them. If you have the money, there are a truly dizzying number of options available. Like SPECT, a $3,500 treatment that scans a child's brain to diagnose them and derive targeted treatments for their individual autism.

This is in spite of the fact that brain scans like SPECT can't reveal autism. They don't. You don't see it that way. And of course they can't like figure out this specific treatment is how to help your kid, right? But parents love that shit. Like, oh, I'm going gonna get the exact kind of therapy for my individual kid.

No, that's just, you're not doing it this way, sorry. Maybe the therapy your kid needs is for you to just like them. Well, also, once your kid has autism and then you get a scan, you can point to anything and say like, this is the cause of it, right? Sure, look at this thing. I don't know what it is, but it says autism, you know?

100%. Probably the most costly of these new interventions is stem cell therapy. And this might actually be, there might be treatment derived from this in the future. It's very far from clear at this point, right? At the moment, it is not approved as a treatment in the US. There are several trials gathering data

on whether it's safe or effective. But again, the parents who think their kids have this ticking clock before their life is ruined don't want to wait. And as the Atlantic reports, quote, several foreign clinics offer it for around $10,000. Sarah Collins credits the adult stem cell injections her two children received in Panama City, Panama with the recovery of her older son and improvement in her younger son, both of whom were diagnosed with autism. Her experience led her to co-found the Stem Cell Therapy for Autism Facebook group. She says one reason parents might not want to take part in clinical trials in the US is that their child might wind up in the placebo arm of the trial.

They won't mess with that. They'll go right to Panama instead. Again, you get both the psychology of like, well, I don't want my kid to be, I want them to get the medicine now. But it's like, ultimately, your desire to do something now is making your kid and everyone else you love everywhere in the world less safe. Because good medicine relies on good double blind studies with placebos. That's how you do medical studies. And by delaying this, number one,

you are slowing down the process by which science will get done. But also by going to Panama to get whatever the fuck shot into your kid, well, say that clinic doesn't have good standards. Say your kid gets hurt. And maybe it's not even because of actual stem cell parapheries,

because something else fucked up happened, but there's this horrible public death or illness associated with it, and that shuts down research into a thing that may one day lead to treatments that help people, right, that alleviate some symptom or something. You are doing nothing but harm by doing this out of this desire that like,

well, but I gotta focus on my kid. And it's like, no, it's this fucking no, no, no. Emma's mom eventually made the right decision after about seven years of trying this carousel of treatments to reach out to an adult with autism and talk to them about her kid. This adult was Julia Bascom, who has a blog called Just

Stimming. This talking to Julia keyed her in on the fact that, well, maybe autism doesn't mean my kid has no life. Maybe they could be happy as a person with autism and I should focus on that because it's just the way they are. Emma's mom wrote, quote, my entire focus changed. Instead of fighting against Emma's neurology and trying to cure this heinous disorder, I started finding ways to help her flourish. And that's it really. Right? Yeah. Like that's the ball game. I mean, just a, just robbing yourself of like the joy of being able to enjoy your kid and see them, you know, is, is, is stunning because you're so worried. Yeah.

I mean, it is tragic. The amount of the wasted years. You're so obsessed doing this that you're not actually having a relationship with your kid as your kid. You're having a relationship with your kid as a sick thing you need to fix. Yeah, as a guinea pig, essentially. It's sad. Yeah.

Now, in this case, one of the first things she does when she has this shift in mindset, she realizes like Emma's not great at talking. This is a big problem for her that like her kid can't really talk and like communicate verbally. And so instead of trying shooting her up with more drugs and shit, she tries a different kind of intervention. She gives her kid a keyboard setup so Emma can type out her thoughts. And suddenly Emma starts communicating very clearly with people and the rest of the world.

She gets on track to get her high school diploma. The fact that she now they figured out how she individually needs to communicate gives her a chance to advocate for herself and to live a life. While Zurcher told the Atlantic that she now views the money she wasted on quack treatments as insane, and Emma herself insists that only occupational therapy provided her with any benefit and occupational therapy is a real thing that can help. She also insists she's not angry at her mom. Quote, you thought my autism was hurting me and that you needed to remove it, but you

did not understand that it is a neurological difference. Fear caused you to behave with desperation. What an incredibly mature way to respond. Right. Jesus. Yeah. And that would be a beautiful note to end on, Mangesh. But this is a different show.

This is behind the bastards. So we're not going to end on that uplifting note. Instead, I'm gonna tell you a whole nother story about one of these quack bastards. One of the worst of these sons of bitches. An asshole named James Jeffrey Bradstreet. Three names, real serial killer shit for James Jeffrey Bradstreet.

Yeah, this episode and part one, just the names. The names. Just the names. Always the worst. Born in July, 1954 in Florida, Brad Street was at one point a Christian preacher who got a medical degree from the University of Florida. We're doing great.

Knocking it out of the park so far. His post-graduate research was in aerospace medicine and his actual career was as a family doctor. But in 1997, after he'd been practicing for a little over a decade, his son was diagnosed with autism. As Fitzpatrick writes, Jeff Bradstreet abandoned his career as a family doctor to become a radio talk show host. Great, great start, great start.

He immediately met up with the biomedical activists and founded the International Child Development Resource Center in Florida, or the ICDRC. In 2001, he appointed Andrew Wakefield to be head of research there. Brad Street was a big believer in merging his evangelical Christian faith with his treatments for autism, and so he created the Good News Doctor Foundation. Now again, Brad Street's training was two years of residency in obstetrics and some added training in aerospace medicine. He was not board certified in any specialty, yet he advertised himself as a biomedical expert in autism treatment who specialized in correcting biochemical imbalances as well as detoxification.

Again, this is a guy who's like qualified to help your kid with the flu, you know, right? Not to like downplay family medicine, but this is not a guy who's qualified to cure, but among other things, nobody is. It's not a thing. That's not a thing that happens. In the book, Deadly Choices, Paul Offit describes Brad Street's clinical approach this way.

Brad Street had promoted several cures for autism, including secretin, chelation, immunoglobulin, administered by mouth and by vein, and prednisone, a potent steroid that suppresses the immune system. He also prescribed dietary supplements he sold in his office. As one expert put it, the nutritional supplements prescribed by Dr. Bradstreet were also sold by Dr. Bradstreet. Sure. That's fine.

And this is, we're like the late nineties, right? This is when this is happening. This is like the late nineties. This guy would be on TikTok. Oh my God. He might've been actually. You know what, Sophie, good news. We're gonna talk about what this guy winds up doing in the present era.

It's actually the best part of the story. So in 1999, Brad Street began treating Colton Snyder, ultimately examining him more than 160 times and ordering a number of invasive lab tests that were not approved by the FDA. examining him more than 160 times, and ordering a number of invasive lab tests that were not approved by the FDA. Among these were multiple spinal taps. If you've had a spinal tap,

that's not a thing you fuck around with. They're just stabbing this kid in the spine with needles. See if that makes it better. 160 times feels very, very thorough. Feels like a lot of visits. Feels like a lot of visits. Feels like a lot of visits. They also insert a fiber optic scope into Colton's stomach and colon. As Offit writes, all these tests and procedures were expensive, potentially dangerous, and

according to the opinions of expert witnesses, of no value to the child. Wow. Now Brad Street's, this is not said directly, but his parents have money. This is not sheep. That's why Brad Street's doing this. His medical documentation of Snyder ultimately runs to some 650 pages. He diagnoses the boy over the years with autism,

yeast overgrowth, a fungal infection, unspecified encephalopathy, unspecified eudicaria, and a shitload of other things. And it's so many different things that it is clear that what's going on here is Brad Street has, this is like a Munchausen's by doctor syndrome, right? And he's not doing it because he's deluded, he's doing it because he is a mercenary

with the goal of keeping Colton's parents paying for very expensive tests and treatments for forever, right? None of Colton's mercury tests were ever high, but still Brad Street, who believed mercury contributed to autism, prescribed numerous rounds of chelation therapy. A write up in Quack Watch summarizes, Broad Street conceded that Colton did not respond well to chelation. The medical records, including reports from Mrs. Snyder, reflected that Colton did poorly

after every round of chelation therapy. The more disturbing question is why chelation was performed at all in view of the normal levels of mercury found in the hair, blood, and urine, its apparent lack of efficacy in treating Colton's symptoms, and the adverse side effects it apparently caused." That's another thing you encounter where these parents and these practitioners will convince the parents, oh yeah, if they're responding negatively, that's the toxins leaving. Of course it's ugly, you know? Yeah, yeah.

That's bad. It's just so hard to listen to. I mean, like- It's awful. It's real fucked up. These people should all have gone to prison. They should all still go to prison. Yeah, yeah. But you know who shouldn't go to prison?

Our sponsors. Is that what we're doing? I'm saying they shouldn't, Sophie. What do you want from me? Have you ever wondered if your pet is lying to you? Why is my cat not here and I go in and she's eating my lunch? Or if hypnotism is real? You will use this suggestion in order to enhance your cognitive control. What's inside a black hole? Black holes could be a consequence of the way that we understand the universe. Well, we have answers for you in the new iHeart original podcast, Science Stuff. Join me, Jorge Cham, as we tackle questions you've always wanted to know the answer to

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And don't forget, I'll also be dishing out my best advice to you on episodes of Dear Cheekies. So my fiance and I have been together for 10 years. In the first two years of being together, I find out he is cheating on me, not only with women, but also with men. What should I do? Okay, where do I start? That's not love. He doesn't love you enough, because if he loved you, he'd be faithful. It's going to be an exciting year, and I hope that you can join me. Listen to Cheekies and Chill, season four,

as part of the My Kultura podcast network, available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We're back. So in one conference in the early aughts after Brad Street had become a Dan-affiliated doctor, he referred to parents who didn't blame their kids' condition on vaccines or subject them to dangerous biomedical experimentations as A-pids or autism parents in denial, right?

If you just accept your kid and try to help them live their best life, you're in denial. You should be poisoning them. Fitzpatrick notes that other experts in the field speak in similar ways. Quote, Jenny McCarthy is dismissive of woe is me moms, though she is not above moaning about how shitty her own life is and reminding her readers that celebrities suffer like everyone else.

Still, she finds it difficult to accept that other parents don't simply believe in alternative treatments. Was it, she asks herself, that they didn't want to hope or that they enjoyed the victim role? I don't know, maybe they're just trying to do what's best for their kids. Yeah. Yeah.

When the Chicago Tribune interviewed Brad Street about his use of IV immunoglobulin or IVIG as an autism treatment, he told them, every kid with autism should have a trial of IVIG if money was not an option and if IVIG was abundant. Brad Street also became a vocal advocate for hyperbaric oxygen therapy, although he did later publish research arguing it was ineffective, perhaps because it wasn't a big moneymaker for his clinic. In 2008, more than 5,000 families enmeshed in the biomedical movement launched a lawsuit seeking compensation for vaccine-related harm in the US court of federal claims.

Bradstreet was one of their major witnesses. He provided expert testimony, which ultimately failed because the special masters, which is the title and name for the people who are evaluating this claim, look into Bradstreet in part to determine if there's credible evidence to support the idea that vaccines cause autism, they conclude it doesn't, they reject the case. And one major reason is the case of Colton Snyder, which they examine at length and hold up as like, this is an example of how the malpractice is coming from inside the house. It's guys like Bradstreet, right?

Yeah. Still, by 2009, Bradstreet had been in practice so long that he claimed his institute has records on more than 4,000 patients. He got a California medical license in May of that year and established a branch of the ICDRC. Two years later, he got a Georgia State medical license and opened a clinic in Beaufort. Because staying competitive in the industry of fake autism treatments required constant innovation, Bradstreet became an advocate for a new autism cure

late in his career, GCMAF. This stands for Globulin Component Macrophage Activating Factor. And this is a thing, it's a protein and healthy blood that you can remove and concentrate and use it to treat certain kinds of illnesses. Some kind of people are sick in a way that injecting them with this concentrated factor can help them, right? It's a real thing for stuff. Not for this, but for stuff. In August of 2012, he gave a presentation in England in which he described injecting 40 patients with autism with this shit, declaring, I shouldn't call it shit. Well, the stuff he is selling is shit. There's a legitimate version of this. That's not what he's selling. Declaring, quote, it's extremely potent in terms of its ability to work for children, he announced.

Many from this experiment have gone into basically lose the label of autism. They don't have autistic distinctions anymore after sometimes as little as 20 weeks of therapy. Now, this just isn't the way this works. It's not really how anything works. But Bradstreet tended to show up in the kind of crowds where he wouldn't be questioned. He claimed that doctors in Japan and Italy were working on the same therapy.

And he also cited a guy named David Noakes, the head of an immuno biotech, which manufactures GCMAF. And he, in fact, he shouts this guy out and then offers attendees to the speech a 25% discount on GCMAF. Sounds like medicine to me, bro. I love it when my doctor gives me a fucking coupon for blood factor. Great.

Well, it's coming from him, honestly, because he's a radio host. Sure. Yeah, of course. It does come in. Right, right. Absolutely. Per a Washington Post piece by Michael Miller, quote, what he did not disclose, however, was that much of the research he cited had already been discredited and retracted.

The journal considering Bradstreet's paper was the scientific equivalent of self-publishing and Bradstreet had close ties to Noakes and ImmunoBioTech. During the same UK trip, Bradstreet and Noakes made what was essentially a promotional video for ImmunoBioTech and its brand of GCMAF called First Immune. I'm here with Dr. Jeffrey Bradstreet from the USA, the autism expert in the first immune GCMAF laboratories, Nook said on camera. Dr. Bradstreet has been using our GCMAF for 18 months and we'd like to thank you for, I think you've treated 900 children now? Not just children, Bradstreet boasted. So the spectrum of my patients with autism ranges

from somewhere around 18 months to goodness, somewhere around close to 40. So we've treated many adults with autism as well as chronic fatigue patients, cancer patients. So we found application for a fairly broad number of disorders for the product. The two trading compliments for four minutes straight. Just gassing each other up for four minutes.

Again, it sounds like medicine. Now, the transcripts for this are just impossibly fucking cringy with Noakes saying, we've never met a doctor with such an understanding at the microbiological level of how autism and cancer and other diseases work. And again, autism and cancer, other diseases work and again autism and cancer Not really related not like not at all like other diseases again

Not that I'm not saying autism is a disease, but like that's the way this guy's talking. It's like no This is this isn't medicine. I know Doctors are never like yeah, we figure like this thing helps with the flu and I don't know, probably lung cancer. Fuck it. Like. And gout. It's like, yeah, gout, share, fuck it. And one of the things like Bradstreet goes back to after Noakes gasses him up, he's like,

this is the most sterile lab I've ever seen. The best equipment, the best people. This is the perfect like environment for doing good medical science. Bradstreet then pivoted to make the pitch that the greatest thing about GCMAF was that you could use it without the presence of a doctor. In other words, regular parents could just buy the stuff

and shoot their children up with it. Quote, it's accessible to anybody around the world. Through your internet sites, you've made it available very broadly We've used it in South Africa, China, India, Eastern Europe, South America and all over that's been a wonderful experience to see parents have access to a therapy and like So there's this um, this cut this drug that's a cousin of benzos That was like Soviet Union Xanax that they gave to their astronauts that is like unregulated in the US you can order it by the kilogram

yeah okay but what if we just did that for children's medicine you know oh man it is so funny yeah I just don't understand like how like it's so shameless like going from children to like people with autism to like everyone with cancer to like unbelievable. And again, the people selling Soviet Xanax to strangers on the internet fundamentally an honest business. People who buy that shit know what they're getting, you know? So this that like, and you can give it to your kids, DIY was the ultimate pitch to the parents in the biomedical treatment community and the ultimate evolution of the founding principles that parents should be actively engaged, not just in caring for their child, but in diagnosing and treating them.

Meanwhile, there was no real evidence that GCMAF benefited children with ASD as Baylor Skill School of Tropical Medicine Dean Peter Hotez told The Post. And by the way, Dr. Peter Hotez also is the parent of a child with autism. An initial safety test of GCMAF injections had not even been completed. It was still trying to recruit participants. So like the actual doctors are being like, we don't even know if this is safe. We haven't been able to get enough people to volunteer to prove that this isn't dangerous, not even to show that it works.

And they're just selling this over the fucking internet. Even so, Brad Street bragged about dosing more than 2000 children and claimed 85% of them improved and 15% had their autism eradicated. The initial hype was massive, but the actual comments from parents who used the treatment were standard. Some claimed small positive, while others claimed hard-to-rate changes like, well, he's talking more. Many, though, recorded disappointment. Quote, we have recruited 20 shots of GCMAF so far. I am still waiting for the wow that everyone talks about, one person wrote. Even worse, they described side

effects including crying and pains in his chest and stomach for at least the first three. We are doing GCMAF injections. I have not seen any gains at all, another person wrote. I have seen worse behaviors and tantrums. So after spending $1,300 for no gains and living in hell, I'm done with this. Wow. I can't imagine ordering something online and being like, yeah, I should

shoot my kid with it. I'm just shooting this into my child with a needle. Twenty times. It's unbelievable. I don't know. Maybe that's child abuse. I'm sorry. I know you quote unquote love your kid, but that sounds like child abuse to me.

Completely. Yeah. I like, obviously little kids don't understand. Sometimes you have to, if they're sick, you have to give them medicine that they don't like, that may have negative side effects, because that's just necessary sometimes, right? I get it, but to do that for no reason, none at all.

Also, I'm sure some of this was causing some sort of delirium, and the kids were talking Maybe! As a result of that I think it's not doing nothing because by the way mango we're about to talk about where this blood came from Oh god Because I know I know I know the first thing I thought was like wow

Jesus Christ I didn't think that's where this was going This is not just fucked up because they're like shooting kids full of blood that doesn't do anything or maybe it hurts them. But also like blood is rare. There's not enough of any of these blood factors. People need this and you're not getting this stuff to people who need it. The good news is that's not an issue here. It's...

I'm afraid. So nervous. I've spent a lot of these episodes talking about what a bad idea it is to make parents without medical training part of the diagnostic and treatment process in this way. But the Brandstreet story does have a positive ending due to a mom of two sons with autism named Fiona O'Leary. She came upon his scam and she gets angry, right?

She is not one of these moms who buys into the bullshit. She's like, oh, this is fucking dangerous. Fuck this guy. She looks into his business and the web of shady undisclosed financial interests he had with ImmunoBioTech. She files complaints with regulators. I think this is over in the UK. I believe she lives, I don't know if she's in the UK proper or Northern Ireland given

the name Fiona O'Leary. This leads to the UK's equivalent of the FDA does an investigation that culminates in a raid on a first immune GCMAF production facility near Cambridge. This is the lab where he filmed that video, where Brad Street films the video with Noakes, where they gasp each other up. Which I heard was pristine. You heard that, yeah. So while Brad Street had praised the lab's sterility, UK regulators described it as making GCMAF out of, quote, blood plasma labeled not to be administered to humans or used in any drug products.

Oh my God. They're getting this out of the shit blood. Does that make it better? Cause at least regular, like people who need blood aren't losing, I don't know, I don't know. I don't know what we say here. So. Sad. I don't know. I don't know what we say here So sad Eventually she succeeds. It's so fucked up, right? Oh my god

Where was this blood coming from? She succeeds eventually in getting us regulars to look into Brad Street Which brought the feds to his door in Buford on June 18th, 2015. Had he been indicted properly, Bradstreet might have faced 20 years in prison, according to the suspected charges on the search warrant. Rather than endure that, Bradstreet fled town the next day, driving to North Carolina. As he checked into his hotel, Swiss papers reported a story from Switzerland that a first immune clinic in that country

run by Noakes had been shut down after five patients being treated with GCMAF had died. Some had paid almost as much as 6,000 euros a week for treatment. And to be clear, we don't know that the GCMAF killed those people. These were terminal patients, right? But this was billed as helping terminal conditions and it didn't, right? So there's a big raid on his partner, Nokes. That and the raid on his own facility in Buford probably contributed to Jeffrey's decision to take his own life on June 19th.

His body was found by a fisherman that afternoon floating like a river and the gun he used was found nearby in the water. This immediately became a conspiracy for biomedical advocates, including the CEO of ImmunoBioTech, who insisted that Jeffrey was murdered by pharmaceutical companies for stating that the MMR vaccine causes autism and hurting their profits with his GCMFA therapy. And unfortunately, what happens here is kind of the best case scenario in this world. One major agent of harm faces a teeny bit of justice and then makes a choice to take himself out of the picture, right? To this day though, Bradstreet remains a focus of vaccine conspiracists.

And I found this in a Reddit post on the R Conspiracy Commons board from 2022. And it's like a picture of this guy in a suit. This is Jeffrey Bradstreet. He found the cure for autism using oxygen chamber therapy, chelation, and protein shots for T cells. After having cured thousands, he was shot in the back twice at his mansion and the FBI for autism using oxygen chamber therapy, chelation, and protein shots for T cells. After having cured thousands, he was shot in the back twice at his mansion and the FBI raided and destroyed his cure center the day after.

Now, none of that's accurate. They raided his center the day before. He's not at his mansion. He tries to check into a hotel and can't check in and then he goes to the river. This is just all wrong. But it's also such a hydra, right like it feels like you cut off the head and Like all these others emerge. It's awful. Yep anyway That's our story for the week

Great stuff it's super uplifting Happy trails, everybody. Mango, you got any plugs to plug? Yeah, definitely. I did a show called Skyline Drive, which is about a skeptical look at astrology. It's really good. I would love for people to check it out if they have the time. But honestly, Robert, Sophie, this is so fun. I know I was just shocked and saying,

oh my God, more than I probably should have. But it was both horrifying and, I don't know, really enlightening. Yep. Well, glad to be horrifying and enlightening. Horrifying, enlightening. And now I need that Snickers bar of Xanax. That's right, that's right. Yeah, now again, this is the solution to all of our problems is the $7 Snickers bar of Xanax. The salt flick. Yeah, again, vote Evans.

Snickers bar of Xanax in every pocket. And honestly, none of us is gonna know what happens next, but that's kind of the benefit and look are some people gonna die absolutely and we're gonna knock down the Washington Monument and replace it with a monument that's just a Problem solved. Behind the Bastards is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more from Cool Zone Media, visit our website, coolzonemedia.com, or check us out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Behind the Bastards is now available on YouTube.

New episodes every Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to our channel, youtube.com slash at Behind the Bastards. Have you ever wondered if your pet is lying to you? Why is my cat not here? And I go in and she's eating my lunch. Or if hypnotism is real? You will use a suggestion in order to enhance

your cognitive control. But what's inside a black hole? Black holes could be a consequence of the way that we understand the universe. Well, we have answers for you in the new iHeart original podcast, Science Stuff. Join me, or Hicham, as we answer questions about animals, space, our brains, and our bodies. So give yourself permission to be a science geek and listen to science stuff on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. What's up y'all?

I'm AJ Andrews, pro softball player, sports analyst, and the first woman to win a Rawlings gold glove. On my new podcast, Dropping Diamonds, we dive headfirst into the world of softball by sharing powerful stories, insights, and conversations that inspire and empower. It's time to drop bombs and diamonds. Dropping Diamonds with AJ Andrews is an iHeart Women's Sports production

in partnership with Athletes Unlimited Softball League and Deep Blue Sports and Entertainment. Listen to Dropping Diamonds with AJ Andrews on the iHeart radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Brought to you by Novartis, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports Network. Hey, all you women's hoops fans, and folks who just don't know yet that they're women's

hoops fans. We've got a big week over at Good Game with Sarah Spain as we near the end of one of the most exciting women's college basketball seasons ever. The most parody we've seen in years, with games coming down to the wire and everyone wondering which team will be crowned national champions this weekend in Tampa. Listen to Good Game with Sarah Spayne on the iHeart radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Imagine you're scrolling through TikTok. You come across a video of a teenage girl and then a photo of the person suspected of killing her. It was shocking. It was very shocking. Like that could have been my daughter.

Like you never know. I'm Jen Swan. I'm the host of a new podcast called My Friend Daisy. It's the story of how and why a group of teenagers turn to social media to help track down their friend's killer. Listen to My Friend Daisy on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.