Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher - Ep 106 | Name That Storm, How To Kiss a Cow?, & Superbugs Are HERE! | Guest: Dr. Matt McCarthy

Episode Date: May 21, 2019

Did you know that we have names for storms til 2020... Then we find out that we have a new internet challenge and we end with Dr. Matt talking about superbugs! OUCH! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Yesterday, the National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center, the SPC, issued a high risk for a day one outlook. I mean, between the Texas Panhandle and central Oklahoma, a 45% probability of EF2 or EF5 tornadoes to occur within 25 miles of a point. That's the first time, the first time. And much of that is going to go into a today, which is a Tuesday also, which is a West Texas, western and central Oklahoma, including Oklahoma City. And it continues on throughout the country. Prepare for big storms coming. Now, I don't know if you remembered, but yesterday marked the sixth anniversary of the EF5 tornado that hit more Oklahoma.

in 2013. Fortunately, there were no tornadoes yesterday impacting the more Oklahoma area, but more dangerous storms I've been predicted through Columbia and Springfield, Missouri, Little Rock, Arkansas, St. Louis, Missouri, Springfield, Illinois, and then the path, this continues to move across the country. And then a second round of storms. Central Kansas, Nebraska. I mean, and Nebraska,

there's a lot of Nebraska still underwater. Still underwater, it's amazing. So damaging winds, large hail, flooding downpours will be primary threats with today's storms. I mean, we already have, it was reported, that we had 14 tornadoes hit yesterday. And, you know, more than 2 million people are in harm's way.

So, I mean, if you look at that entire area that they're talking about, you know, unless you're just considering the entire country, more than 50 million are at risk from the high winds, large hail, flash flooding. You know what today is? Today is a good day to sit back and relax and just listen to your favorite podcast, chewing the fat. favorite podcast but it has to be one podcasts that you subscribe to and check the fat with me and I'm sure that's all it has to be

just subscribing right you do not want to hear this in your neighborhood man you do not want to hear this now that's supposed to be for tornadoes but we found out

that they also shoot it off at other times um No? I just want that for tornadoes. When I hear that, I want to be scared just for tornadoes. That's it.

I'm okay with the testing once a month like that. I think it's the first, right? The first Wednesday of each month is the testing one. I mean, I've posted one time that we were right underneath it when the testing started. I was scared the crap out of you. My daughter and I were right underneath that bad boy when it started on the test. Wednesday, man. Those things are,

I don't know if you're aware of this, but they're pretty loud. And when you're right there, whoof. It went off last night. No, it did not. This morning last night? Yeah,

no, it did not. Maybe on your computer. That's the one you're playing. I mean, we don't live that far apart. Here in Texas, and I certainly didn't hear it. It woke me up. In fact, when I woke up this morning,

I realized it wasn't raining at my house and I race to get here so I could beat the storm and I beat it. Just as I pulled in it was just starting as it arrived here. Yeah, I had to go outside and go get the turtle to bring it inside just in case. Just in case.

The turtle goes flying. Just in case, like the turtle is like low to the ground in a little, don't you have like a little outside cage or whatever? Yeah. And do you think that the tornado? It's going to take it away. If there's a tornado, we'll pick up the turtle.

Yes. Are you guys okay? You have the turtle okay? Yeah, yeah. He's slept in the little container inside. Yeah, I mean, that's good. You brought him in. He's safe.

Did you all huddled in a corner in your little tornado room? I mean, that thing goes off. The tornado is eminent, man. That's what I thought. I mean, a tornado has been warned. Yeah, that is there is a tornado been seen. It's spotted. Get the cover.

It's not the first time I hear it go off. during a windstorm like that. Yeah, see, you got better check to see if they're just setting it off for the high winds or whatever. It could be that. Because I say, see, that's again, we need to go to the city council meetings and vote note to that. Yeah. No. Oh, it's really windy.

Send those things off. No! We know it's really windy, douche. That is true. Yes, it was very windy. It's fine. We live in, this is the wind tunnel where we live here in Texas. Oh, yeah.

I follow Chicago. No, that's the wind. windy city. But this actually, I mean, between the panhandle of Texas and where we're at northern Texas and southern Oklahoma? The one like is 12 hours away? Isn't panhandle you have to have water surrounding you? Where's the water?

The panhandle of Texas. All right. We're in northern Texas. West of us is the panhandle of Texas. If you look at the state, if you look at geography on the state, no, there doesn't need to be a water. It's just the way the state is. I'm going to bring in a map

I'm going to bring in a map I have several maps that aren't hanging on the walls because I love giant maps of the world of the United States I'm going to bring I'm going to give you one and I want it hung up in your home

and I want you to look at that thing every day I have one in the kitchen I saw it I'm going to give you a real map a map that you can hang up and look at every day so you see it

the one that have in the kitchen right under it's like silver I mean it's like gold plated no you've got that's a little boozy thing I'm talking about something you're going to look at something that's going to it's going to do you some learning okay because you and the whole

thing here is agonizing plus i want to apologize i've got to apologize be careful i've got to apologize um we did the dmv i got news today that's very disheartening okay so we did the dmv show and we had the dmv stories and i've talked about uh my you know trials and tribulations at the DMV before. I found out today that they haven't admitted that it's because of me, but it's because of me. They are now. I told you how to jump ahead in line when you go to the DMV.

Get your ticket number, right? And whatever, you wait until that last second, you know, like, I told you, get your ticket number, whatever it is. And if you're waiting, if your ticket number is 65 and 34 is on the counter, you got a ways to wait, right? So you're waiting. So when you see the ladies or the guys that are working around the counter go 35 and they do it like three times. 35 and between the second and third time is when they're looking to switch. Nobody's coming up. So you got to get it just right. Just before they switch to 35 you can stand up and go 35. Oh, that's me? Oh. And you just go up. Right? You go up

and take care of business and you're out. Well now, I'm told. that they are checking ticket numbers. Now, I don't know what they do if they catch you. I'm going to have to find out. I don't know what their rule is. So if you're not opposed to getting shot at the DMV, I'm 35.

Oh, your ticket says 64. I'm sorry. Next, don't worry about the dead bodies. Other people lying out the wrong. number. Don't worry about that. Just step over them. They'll be fine. Janet will be here in a little bit. Who told you to check?

So I talked to someone who went there and was ready to do the Jeff Fisher jump the line. And they were checking. They were checking the numbers. People were going up and showing them the number. They had to show them the number and check.

Because I did it and it worked. The first time, when I went to the big mega, you know, center. It worked. They were like on number 102 and I was like 3178. Yeah, I'm not wait. I mean, I just, you wait for that third time. That's 104, 104, 104, just before that third time, because they're getting ready to

change it, man. Because when they say 104, they're 105. I mean, it's quick. So you got to catch them just between, just before they switched into that third one, 104. It was very nervous. I was shaking. I was so nervous. Oh, that's me.

Oh, 104. Yeah, that's me. and you go up and I still think you might be able to get away with it if you do it right. You pull it off. You got a confidence. Confidence and you got the ticket in your hand like this. You go 104. Oh, that's me.

Yeah, that's me. What am I thinking? Right. And as you're walking up, you're just, I tell you, man. Also, I need to see the ticket. I don't know. I don't know which one. Are you going to go through?

Yeah, pick it up and I need to see it. I don't know which one it is. Just come on. Let's say, I got to get my driver's license. I mean, the only ticket I can find is three, two. 105 So we have our first We started off with storms

Across the country We also have our first Subtropical storm A named sub-tropical storm They're getting quick to name them, man Andrea Before becomes the first name storm of 2019 June 1st, don't forget

Just a few days away As we roll it up the calendar days It's a few days away June 1st First day of hurricane season 2019. You know what I just realized too? Just as a side note. This coming up weekend, if you're listening to this podcast before the 25th of May 2019,

I mean, it's a three-day weekend coming up. That's Memorial Day weekend, Saturday, Sunday, Monday. Amazing. I mean, I'm going to try to be here on Monday for Memorial Day putting a podcast together. but if I don't make it, you know, it's a holiday. So I don't know what to tell you. I don't know what to tell you. But I can't believe it's almost hurricane season again.

So I was looking at the, I thought, well, I didn't even hear the new names that we have to look forward to this year. So, Andrea. You don't hear that for hurricanes. Well, you do for tornadoes. But if you're in the middle of a hurricane. Tornadoes are, they come with. Yeah. A hurricane is a giant tornado with little tornado.

was inside of it and it's just like, you know, we're not blowing anything now, okay? Which is a line that you hear a lot during hurricane. Anyway, that's a different story. So you got Andrea. You're going to get that joke later and you're going to laugh. Seriously, you are. We got Barry,

Chantel, Dorian, Aaron, Fernand, Gabriel, Hamas. Umberto, Imelda. Umberto.

That's what I said. Umberto. Umberto. He's not Italian. No, it's Umberto. That's what it is. That's what it is. You okay in there?

I look up with, I mean, I said, umberto and you jumped like it was a, it was a shock. Emelda. Jerry. You got a Jerry hurricane Jerry. Emerita. That's what I said. Imelda. Imelda.

Stop with the Italian. They're not Italian. Jerry. Karen. Lorenzo. Melissa. Nestor. Nestor.

That's what I said. Nestor. Olga. Oof. You don't want to know any part of Olga, the Hurricane Olga, man. That's going to be nasty. Pablo. I don't get a.

Pablo, Pablo, Pablo. From you? You get nothing for that? Pablo. Rebecca. No, you're not saying that right. What is it? It's a K in there, so how do you say the K?

Rebecca. No, Rebecca's with a C. What is this? Rebecca, R-A-H. That's not Rebecca. Rebecca. That's how it's supposed to be. Sebastian.

That's not Sebastian either. Sebastian, it is too. Sebastian. T-I-A-N. T-I-E-N. That's why I said, Sebastian. That's how I pronounced it. Maybe you ought to listen.

I didn't say Sebastian. I said Sebastian. Sebastian. Sebastian. Tanya. Tanya. Van. Van.

Van. Hurricane Van. Are you kidding me? Who's writing these names? Are you any of these? Vendervold or something? Thank you. Wendy.

And the W. Wendy. Wendy. And then, of course, it just goes back to the first again. Let's roll over. There's more than those storms. So there's your 2019 hurricane names. I don't know which one is going to be worse.

I think, oh, yeah, Olga. If we get to Olga, man, that's going to be ugly. The hurricane, of course. Rebecca with a K. That's going to be the ugly one. Rebecca? Hurricane Rebecca with a K. That's possible.

But Van, Hurricane Van. Are you kidding me? Is it handing out candies too? It's a storm people. Van is here. All right. So apparently I find out that we have names for the hurricanes up through 2022. A couple years ahead.

I mean. You didn't find out. I told you. Yeah, that's what I said. Apparently their name through 2020. too. I found this out. I don't want you to take credit on this. This is my research. Whoa. Gee, thanks. Appreciate it.

Did you know that they're like alphabetical order? They're like A, B, C, B, C, B, to W. That's what they do. That's how they name it. Well, yeah, I knew that's how they name it. But I didn't know they were like over the alphabetical order and that's okay, here comes a storm. We're going to name it. I don't know. We have a list. Pick a name. I thought it was like that. I didn't know. They already have the names in alphabetical. What do you think? We got a storm going to.

Bill, what do we name it? No, they... No, I know they already had the names, but I don't know they go by order of the alphabet. Right. I thought they just, here's a bunch of names. Just pick one? Pick one, yes.

Yeah, no. It hasn't been that way. Of course, you would have found that out in your research that you did, you know, so much in-depth research on the hurricane names and everything. 2020 looks good on names. You got Arthur, Bertha, Christobal. Cristobol?

Cristobol. Cristobol. That's what it is. It's Crystal ball. No. Cristobol. Okay. Eduardo.

That's how you spell Eduardo. Edward. No. And Fay, is that like gay? No. Fay and Van. Last year Van was the tough one. Faye's here this year.

Gonzalo, Hannah, I see. And that's not on Isis. Azeas. Joseon, Cio, Laura, Marco. Nana. Those are sad. Nana. Nana.

Omar. Paulette Renee Come on Sally This is some weak Teddy Yes it is

Yes it is Vicky Wilfred Wilfred That's a dog That's the old man from Sun City Florida And he got Claudette On 2021

I don't like that one Anna Ida Ida Oda O'Dette Odette Rose

Wanda Oh, they were into 2022, Earl Gaston Gaston I know Gaston Gaston Gaston

Hermony, really? Hermine Hermine Hermine Yeah, that's what it is Yeah Hermine Hermine

That's right She's me She belongs to me Hermine Sherry, Tobias and Virgin They got a virgin in there. No, it's not what it is. Then what is it? That's Virginia. Virginia? Virginia.

Okay. I'll give you because B-I-R-G-I-N-I-E. Yeah, that's virgin. But you would have known how to pronounce all these names with your deep research and the hurricane names. All right, so Mr. Research on the internet. Mr. Oh, it's my research, my story. Nobody else would ever get

to the hurricanes up for three years. So are you aware of the latest viral internet challenge? It's very interesting. I'm doing my research on the storm.

And there's, the reason why they start naming storm is because to make people aware of them and how dangerous they can be. Well, how can I be scared of,

you know, Wanda or Nigel when they're like have Woosey names. Because it's not about the names being wussy or non-names. It's just naming the storm so you can identify them and react

to the name of the storm. Some storms have, some names have been banned from being storm names anymore because they were so horrific when they went through. But you'll find that out in deeper research. So are you aware of the latest

viral challenge on the internet? No, no, I'm too to reading because you know there's no names that starts with a Z, Y, and X because it's too difficult to find names that starts with those letters for storms.

That is very interesting. Do you go to any more of the National Hurricane Center's info updates about hurricanes? No, Wikipedia page. That's it for the Wikipedia page. But that's not the smart, though. Okay, I'm sorry, I'll bite.

What is this? this new trend of... Oh, no, I want you to continue with your hurricane research. What day did I say was the first day of hurricane season again? June 1st. Very good. What's the last day? August something.

What's the last day? August something. You keep telling yourself that. Kissing cows. Ooh. Kissing cows. Dude, I have like a couple, like 15 cows. The viral challenge right now people kissing cows.

I think that would be. I want to see some. In fact, I didn't even go to look it up yet. just was checking us out to see the new challenge. Now they're saying, be careful. What's going to be fun about this challenge of people kissing cows is that they're saying, hey, be careful because the cows can attack you. So that's what I want to see.

That's what I want. What is, no, I want the cows to. I want you to sneak. Cows does not attack you. Oh, how. You sneak up on. Please tell me how a cow will attack you. Oh, my gosh.

You sneak up on them all of a sudden. And they do. You start lit. You start lit and you try to kiss it and then head butts you, a cow butts you? You're done. You're done. As a 21-year-old female trying to get up and kiss a cow in your challenge for your Instagram account, you're done. You get head butted by a cow butted?

So I want the new chewing the fat kissing cow challenge. And I specifically. want the ones where the cow attacks you after being startled. But you have to make sure because it's with or without tongues. So which one are we doing? There's cows without tongues?

No, you kiss it with? Really? Really? You kissed the cow. Yeah, but are you doing with tongue or without tongue? I'm doing with tongue. If I'm going to go for, I might as well go for it.

Right. Right. If you're going to get head-butted by a cow, you might as well get head-butted with the tongue in. So what is this the hashtag? Hashtag kissing cows, baby. It's actually, I think it's the Cuss Challenge or something like that, right? The Cuckuss Challenge. Yeah, yeah, yeah, which is. That's too close.

In America, that's too close. In America, that's too close. Yeah, because it started in Europe. Yeah, started in Europe. So they think it's funny with the Ku-Kluss. challenge with the K-U-H-K-U-S-S challenge. But that's too close. It's too close for it here in America.

So we've just got to call it the, you know, I don't know, kiss the cow challenge. Tongue the cow? Ooh, that's not good either. No, don't do that one. I'm watching some videos. I don't think this girl is doing it right because all she's doing, she's straddling the cow. No, you don't straddle. That's what I'm saying.

She's straddling the cow. And she is going to town. crashing her neck. She did not kiss the cow at all. I want the cow to... Whoa, this guy brought flowers in a ring. You know what? I don't, I don't like, you're going to get mad cow disease.

We're going to start spreading disease. Ooh, that guy just got a huge tongue from a cow. Cow tongues are nasty. You ever eat them? You know, there's a story out that talks about how a jury has awarded 3.3 million dollars to five African-American strippers after a federal judge found the women worked under worse conditions than their white colleagues. I find that.

I mean, that's just amazing that this would happen in today's world. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued the club Danny's years ago. Jackson Club Limited when black women could work. Find them $25 if they didn't show up for a shift. Said white strippers had flexible schedules at the club. We're not subjected to the fines. Also said Danny's manager used racial slurs against a black dancer. Danny's owners forced black women to work at another Jackson club they own called black diamonds,

where conditions and security were worse and dancers were paid less. The case shows that the EEOC will sue any employer operating. type of business who violates federal anti-discrimination laws. I mean, I'm glad. And of course they're going to, you know, they're going to say, no, we're going to appeal and we're really disappointed with the verdict. But I, you know, they deserve it if they were treated like that. I mean, I don't necessarily want Danny's to close down because it's, you know, providing

a service, of course. but you know they should be i can't believe that they're treating people like that in today's world it's pretty bad pretty bad all right so we all know the benefits of drinking coffee and i i do kind of miss drinking coffee i haven't i haven't i haven't smoked and i haven't drank coffee in over five months now my life almost six months oh long six months long six months but i didn't want to start drinking coffee again because i love drinking coffee and no one told me i couldn't drink coffee anymore, but I didn't want to start drinking coffee again because that reminded me too much of smoking. So I didn't want to drink coffee and then think I needed a cigarette to

drink coffee with them because I, you know, still not smoke. It would be bad for you. Don't smoke. So I haven't. But, and I do miss it from time to time, but we all know, you know, that coffee is enjoyable. And even the coffee that you get that isn't really coffee, that's just sugar and flavor, you know, like, you know, the, you know, the, you know, the French vanilla cappuccinos that you get at gas stations, those aren't coffee. Those are just powdered sugar, man, that taste good with hot water. It tastes real good with hot water, which I'm, you know, I'm okay with. But, you know, coffee is great.

Just, man, a nice, fresh, good black cup of coffee. So good. with a nice fresh cigarette. But so I just look out at Fox News and they're showing this robotic coffee maker in San Francisco. And so I look it up, but they've had this in San Francisco for quite a while.

And he's just, they're just honing it down now. So it's making like 120 cups an hour of these lattes. And they're all happy that, you know, they get in line for the robot. And the guy developed it originally because he got tired of waiting in line

for coffee to be made. But San Francisco is doing great. You know, I was looking another story about San Francisco. It is now the highest salaries in the world, San Francisco. San Francisco has the highest salaries in the world with residents bringing in an average of $6,526 a month. That doesn't sound that much. Six grand a month? The city also has the highest disposable income.

after rent, $4,710 a month. Really weird. It doesn't, I mean, if you're making, I mean, if you're living paycheck to paycheck in San Francisco, because it's an expensive city to live in. I mean, it's one of the top, it's one of the top 10 cities, most expensive cities to live in the U.S.

San Francisco is like number two. The most expensive city to live in America. So it's no wonder that their salaries are so high. But they're saying here that if you could live paycheck to paycheck and earn 300,000 a year in San Francisco. But if you're earning 300,000 a year, that's $25,000 a month. That's not $6,000 a month. $25,000 a month, you should be able to live on $25,000 a month. Unless you're, you know, Jeff Bezos, then you can't live on $25,000 a month.

But like I said, San Francisco is the second. And number two of the most expensive city in the United States of America. You look at some of these cities, pretty amazing. I don't even know why you'd want to live there. Number 14 is Boston. I mean Boston, Cambridge. Seattle is tied. Seattle is tied with Boston at 14th.

Both sides of the country. San Diego, Los Angeles, Oxnard, Thousand Oaks. number 10 Washington, Arlington, most expensive. I wonder why it's more expensive there. Why could it be more expensive there? Oh, that's right. That's where our government is. Fairfield, California, New York, New York, Newark, New Jersey, Pennsylvania,

all that whole little window there. The tri-state area. Pretty expensive. There's some nice places in Pennsylvania, though, that you can live and still work in New York, which I did, and not be out of this war. World, Santa Rosa, California, Napa, California, Honolulu, Hawaii, Santa Cruz, Watsonville, California. I told you number two was San Francisco, Oakland. And number one, most expensive city in America, San Jose, Sunnyvale, Santa Clara, California.

Wow. That's a lot of Californians, man. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine. I mean, nine out of 14 of the most expensive places to live in the United States of America is California. Might tell you, give you an idea, maybe the state you don't want to live in. What state wouldn't you want to live in? Let me guess. Let me guess.

Oh, I know. California. All right, let's go to the break room. I need a drink of Coca-Cola zero sugar. We'll head to the break room. Remind you to subscribe to chewing the fat with yours truly, Jeff Fisher. Thank you so much for coming along for the ride every day. But it'd be, you know, just subscribe.

That's all you did. Just subscribe. So you're alerted. You know when the show comes every day. We downloaded or uploaded at 530 Central, 630 Eastern, Monday through Friday. You're good to go. And you'll get the alert. When it's uploaded every day, you're going to get the alert.

When it's uploaded every day, you're going to get the alert. It's going to sound like that. If it's delayed like that, you've got some sort of problem with your internet or your Wi-Fi access on your device. And what we cover this couple episodes ago on how to fix that. Yeah.

So if it takes that long to get the alert, you've got an issue that you need to get resolved. But subscribe to Chewing the Fat with Jeff Fisher. All right, I need a drink. As long as we're here, we might as well talk about Mark Levins' new book, Unfreedom of the Press.

Yeah. Unfreedom of the Press. You remember the press, right? A standardless profession that has squandered the faith and trust of the American public. Yeah, yeah, yeah, those guys. Yeah. Well, his new book, out today, it's out wherever you get your books from on any platform,

Amazon or Marklevin.com, wherever you order your books from, Unfreedom of the Press, get it now. Of course, you know, Mark isn't going to mince any words. He's going to take direct aim at the partisan party press, which you know as well as I do, and as well as Mark does for sure, they have gone completely off the rails. if you care about the existence of a free republic, like every American citizen should, read the book on Freedom of the Press.

You can read some excerpts on Amazon right now, but it is out and you need to get it. Mark Levin, a new book. And you know what? This book was number one before it was even available. It was already number one. It's already causing a stir. CNN's Brian Stelter took a jab at Mark Levin

before he'd even read it, and Levin struck back hard. and you can read that on the Blaze. So the Blaze television host, Mark Levin, and also the Fox television host, Mark Levin. You know Mark Levin. I mean, radio, TV, Blaze Television, just a reason to subscribe to the Blaze TV, by the way.

His new book, Unfreedom of the Press. Get it right now. I mean, go, you want to go get it right now. Unfreedom of the Press by Mark Levin. As long as I'm here, I might as well get another drink. So we're in the break room and I see Dr. Matt McCarthy in the break room here on Chewing the Fat. And I know that he's got a brand new book out called Superbugs. Superbugs.

Now, are you talking about the bugs that are working out and taking steroids and racing each other? Or are you talking about the bugs that are going to kill us all? Well, first of all, thanks for having me. Absolutely. about such an uplifting topic here. What I'm talking about here, superbugs, really any of the pathogens in our environment, fungus, bacteria, parasites, anything that has become resistant to the normal treatments, the things that we once were able to use to treat and cure people, that these pathogens have figured out

how to get around them. And so now it's just one of the most pressing issues in medicine, and I decided to write a book about it. So I noticed, I found it fascinating that the superbugs were really, I mean, they were, they were around, but they were really kind of non-existent overall until the 1960s. That's not too far. That's not too long ago. You read the book. I did read some. I did read some of the book. I have another couple questions that I'm going to ask you that caught me off guard in the book as well. Yes. I'll tell you. So what happens. happened was we stumbled on the first antibiotic in the 1940s, and we started using these things

like crazy all through the 50s, and then the bacteria figured out ways to get around the drugs. So they developed these things called e-flux pumps, which are like microscopic vacuum cleaners that can suck up any drug we give them and spit it out. And all of these interesting enzymes that can chew up all of our drugs. And that started in the 1960s, and the problem has only gotten worse over the last generation. And I'll tell you, the bigger problem is that Big Pharma no longer wants to invest in new treatments because they don't think they make enough money off of these things. Well, isn't that, and I'll jump ahead. I can go back. I still have a couple of questions for you, but as long as you jumped into Big Pharma, I mean, isn't that they

funded your work, right? I mean, so they're not completely out of it. Yeah, no. Well, you know, if you give them the right incentives, they'll fund just about anything. And what's so interesting here is that these pharmaceutical companies are saying, we're simply not going to invest in new antibiotics unless you give us some incentives. And these things are called push incentives and pull incentives. And a push incentive is to say to a company, hey, you know that that billion dollar drug that you have will give you a tax break on your profits if you promise to invest some of those profits into new antibiotics. And that's kind of a tough thing to swallow for some of us, giving a tax break to a billion-dollar company isn't exactly what everyone wants to do.

But we reach the point where we have to come to the negotiating table. And I'll tell you, the other thing is called a pull incentive. And that's to say, if you invest in a new drug to Big Pharma, if you create a new drug, we'll give you market exclusivity instead of five years, we'll give you 25 years, we'll give you 30 years so that no generics can compete with you. And what's so interesting is that these are going to be some of the major political issues people are talking about in 2020 and beyond because antibiotics are a market failure and they require many people believe the government to intervene so that we can have more of these drugs. And nobody's really talking about what's going to be the right proposal to get this right so that we don't bail out big pharma and give them tax breaks and only to see them use the money in ways we don't like. Well, but when you say ways we don't like, I mean, aren't they, I mean, I'm torn between that because I know Big Pharma is on the chopping block of we're supposed to hate them all because they're so evil and, you know, they were, they were selling opioids across the counter and we're not supposed to like them anymore.

But it's a private company and they should be able to do what they want with their money. I'll tell you, I don't, I don't see them as evil. You know, they funded my study. They're discovering. They're, they, I, the first part of my book, what I make very clear is that we need big pharma, because they have affected many, many of the crucial aspects of drug development. And we do not want the federal government to be our pharmacy. Amen. We, we need private corporations.

But what I'm getting at is really, what are the incentives that we can use? And what I, I really was amused when I saw that one pharmaceutical company started transferring. its patents to a Native American reservation because that reservation can do something called tribal sovereign immunity, which means that you can't challenge them. And so there's all kinds of corporate trickery going around. And I'll tell you, it's something where we... That's the American way, Doc. That's the American way, Doc.

Don't try to make that sound like that's a fishy thing. I'm starting it. That company's doing it. I take it back. I'm sorry, go ahead. I'm sorry, go ahead. But what's so interesting here is that we need to view Big Pharma as our partners. And the reason I wrote this book is that I had a patient ask me a few years ago, why is it so hard to make an antibiotic?

And it ended up spiraling into this big, you know, colossal story. Or what I found was that in my own medical practice that the infections that I had once treated with oral antibiotics, I had to move on to intravenous antibiotics. and then those intravenous treatments stopped working. And so we're looking for all kinds of new drugs anywhere we can find them. And what I found in my own reporting is that many of the best and most promising new antibiotics were finding beneath our feet in the soil. And that's going to be an area who are trying to discover more. Well, I mean, that's great.

But also it appeared to me that you were really kind of finding that new antibiotics where you were going backwards and finding that, you know, civilizations were already ahead of us on that, right? You were using their old stuff. It was incredible. I said, you know, they may not have even realized it, but, you know, we exhumed mummies from Africa, and we find that they have tetracycline, one of our earliest antibiotics, is inside the bones of mummies, and that people, whether they knew it or not, were consuming foods and plant life that had natural antibiotics in them. And, you know, life finds a way, and humans recognize this far before the discovery of penicillin, which is considered the first commercially available antibiotic.

We're talking to Dr. Matt McCarthy, author of Superbugs, the race to stop an epidemic, which is out today. You can get it wherever your favorite books are sold. Amazing that more than 20,000 people die every year in the U.S. because of antibiotic-resistant infections. that seems like an awful high number. And I'm not doubting your number, but I just find, oh, man, it's just, it's hard to wrap my head around that we're losing that many people to infections that we can't cure. Well, the projections, I'll throw out a number that's going to be even more absurd,

which is that the World Health Organization says that by 2050, that we're going to lose 10 million humans every single year to see. super bug infections. You believe them? And the reason for that, and do I believe, I think that's a bit of an overshoot. Okay. I appreciate that they're trying to draw attention to this, but the last thing I want to do is be a fearmonger here. I'm not trying to scare people. What I wanted to do was tell a story about a problem that we're facing. I wanted to give people a sense of how we got into this mess, but then far more importantly is how do we get out of it? And I think that, you know, giving companies free rein to try to develop these drugs and to give them the support and the incentives to want to make new antibiotics

is going to be crucial. And when I see patients, you know, I can tell you, I'm at the hospital right now and I took care of patients who have superbugs all the time. And this is not an issue that's going away. And in fact, we're going to only be hearing more about it, I think, in the years to come. Well, maybe you should get that hospital a little bit cleaner. Maybe we get a new cleaning crew. Okay, maybe the infections are coming from them.

well they don't want they certainly don't want me to say that that's coming from there no I know no don't do that don't do that out loud as a side note as I was looking through your book I noticed that it starts out with you talking about

in 2014 still having a pager is that actually true a pager in 2014 you know they got rid of them shortly after that I think we got a deal with the iPhone.

They gave us all iPhones. But one of the last relics of the old school medicine was carrying around the page around my hip. But I do not miss that at all. We carry a lot more around on our hip. Yeah, that's right now doctors communicate largely by text message. And I get 500 text messages a day. So I do miss the pager a little bit. Yeah, no kidding.

And everyone expects their return text immediately. be sure to get on that. All right, so your new book, Race to Stop an Epidemic, where are we at in the race? Where are we at the race? Well, it's going to be a marathon, and I think we're at mile two right now.

What we're trying to figure out is how fast, you know, I don't know if you ever ran a marathon. Oh, oh, Doc. You can't keep me away from marathons. I mean, I'm, oh, I am. I'll tell you, we're trying to figure out right now what our pace should be.

You know, are we going to jog, this marathon or are we going to sprint it? And I think that right now we're picking up a little bit of speed and people are starting to recognize that this is the issue. But really what I wanted to do with this book was to get people to understand the problem so that when you hear your congressman come out with a proposal to fix the antibiotic market, you can tell if this is a good idea or a bad idea. And I want people that, you know, have an informed conversation about this. So walk us, Take us through the book a little bit outside of, you're talking about several patients that you're taking care of. And are you, are we finding out exactly, you know, it's so scary, really.

I mean, honestly, it's so scary to think about being told that you have an infection that we're going to have a tough time to cure. Yeah, you know, that's one of the challenges of being in this line of work. I bet. infectious disease doctor is people aren't particularly happy when you walk in the room. Yeah, no, that means it means that you're, you know, you're the sign that something's not going right. Yeah. And what I talk about in the book are all of the unusual infections that I'm seeing and where

they're coming from, where we're, how we're trying to address them and cure them. And then I pull back and I start to look at the bigger issue of how did we get here. And one of the problems is, you know, I quote a number of. of famous scientists in the 60s and 70s who said, wow, we've basically cured infection in humans. We can move on to bigger issues. Right. And I think we are still all walking down that path, right? We're fine. And I think we, yeah, we took our eye off the ball a little bit. And while we were doing that and focused on other things, bacteria were mutating and evolving and coming up with these very intricate enzymes that can chop up any drug we give them. And as a

result, we've got, we're sort of playing catch-up now. And, you know, it is a, it's a very scary proposition, but I will say, you know, when I walk into the hospital every day, I'm confident that we're going to cure the patients. And when I go home at night, I'm not worried that I'm going to transmit something to, you know, somebody on the subway or to my kids. And it's something that we take very seriously and we have strict protocols in place to protect people and to get them better. I'm happy to hear that. I'm very happy to hear that. So, you know, the final part of the book, I'll just say is that one of my family members gets one of these infections. And I go from being the doctor who's treating them to being the very nervous family member who's, you know, praying

that things are going to go okay. Right. And what really helped was not an antibiotic that cured him but was actually a surgeon who could go in with a knife and just cut out the infection. And that was something that I hadn't even thought of while I was working on the book is the role of surgery in the treatment of the case. Right. That's fascinating. So, but you still, if you go in and, uh, you, it's very hard to get all of it, right? I mean, that's what we're trying to attack.

I mean, most of the stuff that we're, we're giving patients are, you know, almost like, for lack of a better drug, I'll just use chemotherapy as, you know, you use chemo, so you go in and it kills everything, right? I mean, you're just killing everything. And then you're trying to hope that you can grow back to good stuff before the bad stuff takes over again. Yeah, you nailed it. Well, with the infections, we cut it out, but we know we don't get all of it. So we still give antibiotics after we've done the surgery, trying to mop up the rest of the infection. And you know what? Sometimes it comes back, especially if patients have a weakened immune system. It's a terrifying proposition for people who become vulnerable because their immune

system that has been weakened from chemo. So let's talk about that a little bit. Is there other ways to strengthen that? Even prior to, you know, I mean, even just, you know, you and I talking, we know, we know now at this moment that we're talking, we are not sick. It might be on us, but we know we haven't been diagnosed. I mean, is there anything that we can do that we'll strengthen us and make us stronger before we know? There are a few things you can do. Some of them are not particularly fun, but things like getting eight hours of sleep a night, not drinking alcohol heavily, exercising, all of the things we know that we should

do are actually very good for our immune system. The other thing that I highly encourage people to do is to find out from your doctor how your immune system is doing. You know, there are patients walking around with weakened immune systems who don't recognize it. They never ask their doctor if the medications that they're on might have a side effect of doing that. And so if you know that you are of low risk, then you don't have to walk around being worried about these superbugs. If you're somebody who's high risk, you need to be on a bit more high alert. And what I mean by that is you don't necessarily want to go into a musty basement where there might

be mold in the corner, where you don't want to be going, putting yourself in these positions where you may be breathing in all kinds of dirty air. You might want to hose down that shopping cart. Exactly. So part of it is just having a simple conversation with your doctor of saying, hey, doc, how's my immune system? You got me on anything that might be thrown it out of whack? That would open up a conversation.

Yeah, that would probably help thousands of people, I bet. Yeah, yeah. Dr. Matt McCarthy, I know you're busy and I'll let you go. I appreciate you stopping by. The New Book Out Today, Superbugs, The Race to Stop an Epidemic. Also, the author of The Real Doctor, We'll see you shortly, which I may have to get. I think I like the title of that. Well, thanks for having me.

This was a lot of fun. I appreciate it, Doc. Take care yourself and thank you very much. And yes, continue the good fight. Thank you, sir. Appreciate it. Don't forget to follow me on social media. You can follow me on Twitter at Jeffrey JFR.

Facebook, Jeff Fisher Radio, Instagram, Jeff Fisher Radio. And you can stay in touch with that, or you can always email. me, Chewing the Fat at theblaze.com, Chewing the Fat at the Blaze.com. And, you know, subscribe to the podcast, Chewing the Fat, on whatever platform you get your podcast on. You know, my line is wherever free podcasts are sold. But whatever platform you use to download your podcast, use it, and subscribe to Chewing the Fat.

Don't forget about Jeopardy Champ, James Holzhauer. Have you seen this guy play at all yet? I caught one game with him, and he's pretty fascinating to watch him how much butt he kicked on that. And he's won a 23rd time. If you're listening to this live, you're listening to this on Tuesday, the 21st of May 2019. He won last night for the 23rd time. He's already up over a million dollars, $1.7 million. He won his 23rd consecutive game.

Amazing. Congratulations. is the fix-in? I don't know. But he trails only Ken Jennings on the Jeopardy top slot. Ken remains in the top for both lists.

74 victories and $2,520,700 in prize money. So our man, James is pretty cocky and thinking he's pretty good. But until he gets in front of Ken Jennings, Take it easy Because you ain't that good yet, bro