LadyGang - Dr. John Brownstein

Episode Date: June 9, 2020

Arguably the smartest guest ever to grace the LadyGang, Dr. John Brownstein is here to help us understand “the new normal” in how we can effectively and efficiently deal with the Coronavirus as we head into the summer. Learn some helpful do’s, don’ts, and how you can plan for major life events like weddings and babies. Thank you to our sponsors! Hammitt – Go to hammitt.com and chat with their team to mention you heard about them on LadyGang to get a special gift with your purchase!  FitBod app – Get one month for free when you sign up at fitbod.me/lady.   Nutrafol – Get 20% off at nutrafol.com using promo code LADY.  Caldrea – Get free shipping on orders of $50 or more when you shop online at caldrea.com.   Storyworth – Get $10 off your first purchase at storyworth.com/lady.   See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Welcome to the Lady Gang. That's amazing. Say that again. The Lady Gang. Things are about to change around here. Each week, we catch up with Hollywood's hottest girl posse, Kelty Knight, Becca Tobin, and Jack Vanek. Hello, hello, hello.

Welcome to the Lady Gang. I am Becca Tobin here with Jack Vanek and Kelty Knight. And we get last names. You get last names for the regular intros. quickies are quick so it's just one name thing oh yeah saving time oh shit it's so early you guys but we have a good reason to be up this early we have maybe the most impressive the guest of our lives for sure the most impressive yeah i was like i just barely graduated high school whatever yeah it was good and i feel hopeful so that you know that's yeah you guys will enjoy it

But before we get into that, it's time for Good Week. Yes, it is. Bad Week. Oh, no. Who wants to go first? I'll go. Okay. Okay.

So my Good Week is I have found some of the most incredible, incredible Black-owned businesses on Instagram. And I have been shopping my balls off. Did you get that big cardigan? I did get the big cardigan. Oh, my God. I almost got the big cardigan that you posted. It was so good.

it looks luxurious and amazing i'm excited did you get orange oh which one's the cardigan what brand is that um hanifa is the brand okay um their stuff is actually it looks it i mean it looks luxury as but it is pretty affordable so i'm really excited to get it i found teething rings i found heirloom dolls i found paint for your apartment there is absolutely everything and if anybody wants to check them out i have a highlight reel on my instagram so i have purchased like The many crop tops. Jack is in crop top heaven right now. Oh my gosh.

They're incredible. No, I'm so excited to get all my packages in the mail. And it's kind of exciting that you're going to have clothes that like people are not buying in mass on Revolve. Like you're going to be so special. Yeah. I'm very excited about it. Good for you, Jack.

So that's my good week. My bad week. It's a simple one. I know, and everybody knows how much I hate when people talk about dreams. However. Oh God. I have been having a recurring dream that I have cheated on Jared with Shawn Mendes and it's really, I mean, screwing up my psyche. Wow. Because now my attracted attraction to Shawn Mendes is just through the roof. Didn't know it could get any higher. And then also now when I think about Jared, I think about Shawn Mendes. So there's a connotation there that didn't exist before. link tell me this link yeah on on the scale of like our obsession last year to AJ to your

Shawn Mendes right now don't say our can you just specify you and Jack Jack and I's AJ like texting each other every night about his hip thrusts on YouTube like to now there's Shawn Mendes like where are we at I mean it's kind of like a different obsession because like AJ obsession was a little bit of like a nostalgia an older man and then like the Shawn Mendes one feels a little bit wrong when he's of age but like he's still 10 years younger i think barely i am um i'm incomparable sean just gets me with the vests yeah he kind of reminds me of our mutual ex-boyfriend i know he's like this generation then rose vest yeah um okay i'll go um so my good week is that, did I talk, tell me if I've talked about this before, because I'm so brain

dead for some reason. Have I talked about turning my bad day around and watching Ben Platt on Netflix? You did, but it was not on a TV thing. It wasn't on our podcast. Oh, okay. Okay. So I was just having one of those days, like as we all have had many, and I sat down on the couch middle of the day on a work day. And I was like, you know what I'm doing? I'm going to watch Ben Platt's special on Netflix. I cried. I laughed. I went through a whole range of emotions. And I just, it was the most cathartic thing. And I just, I was never a huge like Ben Platt stan. And for those of you who don't know who he is, shame on you, but he started on Broadway and has moved into like the popular pop culture zeitgeist because Ryan Murphy cast him in a bunch of his

shows and he's on The Politician. Anyways. Wow. Guys, do yourself a favor. Okay. That's it. What's the special? Is he singing? I don't know. Yeah. He's live at Radio City. He's live at Radio City. Does he talk? Does he tell stories or is he just singing? No, he tells great stories. And he talks about, there's this one song where he talks, he leads into it being like, when I fall in love, I like basically want to move in day two. like we can all relate to just wanting to move too fast and it's like I want to share your address I think is the name of the that's cute he's so cute he's so adorable I just like it was and he's so talented um so there's that and then my bad week is we've been getting so many really really

sweet messages on Instagram about people connecting with the book and having moments in the book of being able to relate or helping them through stuff and I haven't been able we it's been a lot of messages. It's hard to get through them. And then one really amazing message came through to me from a girl who lost her partner. He passed away and she was just saying that the spiritual therapy chapter that I have where I sort of touch on that experience for myself. And I wanted to pull it up to make it my good week. And I accidentally deleted it and I cannot remember for the life of me, her name. So if you're listening to this, I received that and it meant so much to me and I'm so sorry. I don't know how to recover DMs, which is why I know now

why people cheat on DM because you can't recover deleted messages. That's right. It's a good and a bad thing, but right now it's a bad thing. Right now it's a bad thing, but thank you so much. And yeah, it was amazing. I just love these messages. Kelty. It's been really cool. It's been so nice to like see everyone being like, I had a kilt down and I was like, me too. Okay. I have an amazing good week. And then I have maybe the worst bad week I've ever had in the history of lady gang. So I'm going to start with my good week. Um, so a lot of our lady gang group has had to cancel or postpone their weddings. And so, um, I saw on the Facebook group, this woman, a member named Jessica and Jessica was talking about, Hey, like I'm postponing my big wedding. Um, I'm just

going to have a simple ceremony in the backyard. Have you guys seen dresses? This is a reoccurring thing. We are on the hunt for a backyard dress for many of our lady gang brides. Um, and I went to her profile and I looked at her and I was like, okay, well you have boobs, but other than that, I think we might be somewhere in the same size. So I sent her a message and was like, Hey, I have this, my renewal dress that was like kind of spendy. Um, and it's just a simple, like little silk dress. And I was like, you're more than welcome to borrow it. I'll send it to you. I don't know if it's going to fit your boobs. Cause I have no boobs, but like, you're more than welcome to try. And she was like, Oh my God, this is amazing. That's like exactly what I wanted.

And I didn't want to spend money because I have like the next wedding, you know? So I, you know, I have stamps.com. I mean, I'm just saying sponsor. Like I easily printed out that little thing I posted in the mail to her she posted in the group it fit her perfectly you guys oh my gosh so beautiful on her and I just sent her a dm and I was like hey these are the Spanx that work with the dress and she was like I'm getting married July 17th I wanted you to know I'll send you a picture so we're so happy for Jessica I'm hoping that July 17th goes great for you and you feel and look gorgeous that's so awesome but then we started this idea that we could do the sisterhood of the traveling dress because everyone loves this dress it's like that

simple like nothing silk like you know whatever it's kind of a shape that looks good on people and so then other people were like can I borrow the dress for August so that's amazing I might just start like you need you know what you need to do you should get a tag sewn into it and people can kind of like add their name back in that would be cute right really it is a really good simple dress. And if you're, you know, even for me, I'm like, I kept my original wedding dress like in the box. I mean, Becca, I think you haven't even taken yours to a dry cleaners. It's so embarrassing. No, I haven't. Um, but I have like that, but this is like, this is different and this is something I feel cool about. So I think maybe we'll start that. I think it's really cool. All right, here

we go. Tradition. Bad week. Ready. So I'm on my period and I have, I've, uh, switched from a diva cup to this other kind of cup that was at Whole Foods. And the little taggy thing is much longer. And that's good for me. Cause you know, I have a deep vagina. So I have the cup in and I'm like, okay, great. You're great. Uh, so like 12 hours passes or whatever. And I go to take it out and it is like, it is a struggle. It takes me like half an hour. I'm on the toilet. I'm pretending I'm like pushing, like I'm pooping. I'm grabbing it with the left hand, trying to hold it with the right hand. Like the suction of this cup is so intense and then get it out. I'm like, okay, cool. And then I'm thinking to myself, wow, that was really hard to get out. You were like five

minutes away from having to go to the hospital to get that removed. You should probably not use this again. And then what did I do? I rinsed off and I put it right back inside my body. So then the next 12 hours goes through and I have the exact same problem. But this time I've with it. Like I am like literally like Edward Scissorhands-ing this thing up my vagina. I'm like grabbing it every way. I'm like doing yoga to like flip it. I've with it so much that now it's tilted and it's not like I can't even get the little thing to pull it out so I'm like all right you know what I'm gonna need tweezers so I'm in the bathroom with like my legs spread trying to like push it out you know like a baby and I'm trying to tweeze the little thing well the tweezers do not

have enough grip so I go downstairs to my tool shed and I got a plier oh my god I removed a essentially a diva cup with a pair of pliers and that is womanhood wow did you clean the pliers i just went for it i was like you guys i was like in a sweat i'm in a panic i'm like it is coronavirus people are really need help i can't go to the hospital and be like hey emergency room sorry people you know are having coronavirus or it's like i'm gonna have to you know help need help with my period. Like, no, you do remember that I went to the emergency room cause I got a tampon stuck my first period. So wouldn't be the first time. No, it's not the first time they see it, but there's far more important medical things happening right now. So anyway, you need to take

care of your shit. I plired it out. And then of course in true Kelty form, I'm like, throw this thing away. What did I do? I put it in the drawer for next period. Oh my God. Just stop. Just stop trying to do the do the cup i love the cup do you really yes well not that taking out of the cup but i like the cup part okay well sounds like a personal problem i'm very excited i hope that dr john doesn't listen to good week bad week because he'll be so embarrassed so bad he realizes who we are yeah he's like do you guys ever talk about fecal matter we're like yeah yeah you mean shitting your pants sure do got that dr john all right all right when we come back we're going to help you figure out what you should do this summer about corona

now back to the lady gang our guest today may be one of the most intelligent people we've ever had on lady gang and i say that because he's looking at a zoom right now of one college graduate and well one college dropout and one person who never even applied to college as a trained epidemiologist I practiced that 100 times last night. He's also known as a disease detective from Yale University. He's focused on infectious diseases like coronavirus, malaria, and HIV, while advising the World Health Organization, Homeland Security, and the White House. Now, I may only be the doctor of TikTok, but our guest today and I actually have six degrees of separation.

His sister is Jessica, who's now married Jessica Mulrooney. She's married to Ben Mulrooney. And I know Ben because he's a host on eTalk, and we spend a lot of time together at Press Junkets. But Ben is also the son of the former prime minister of Canada, Brian Mulroney, and I am Canadian. Boom. Didn't think you'd take science into that, did you? All right.

Well, when I'm back to John for a minute, when the heavy hitters of press, like the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal needs someone to weigh in, they go straight to him. Please welcome to the lady gang, a man that has somehow found the time to take a break from teaching at Harvard and practicing at the Children's Hospital of Boston to teach all of us more about Corona and why we haven't been together in months. Welcome to the lady gang, Dr. John Brownstein. Welcome. Thanks, guys. Hey, John. So first of all, I didn't even know this was a job until yesterday.

What do you do? Yeah. So the epidemiologist is now a job title that people know about. I spent the last 20 years doing something that people barely could even pronounce. But it was sort of this deviation from going the traditional medical school route where you could think about the health, instead of an individual and taking care of a person, you can think about the health of a whole population. And what can you do to understand risk? What can you do to prevent disease? What findings can you pull together that ultimately can change the course of health for everyone? So like, for instance, studying a vaccine, because a vaccine can save millions of lives, or understanding the efficacy of a treatment, or changing our lifestyles around

food and exercise. Those things are all, those findings that you see on the news are all done by epidemiologists. What did you want to be when you were growing up? Well, it was likely that just the traditional path of a doctor, then spent some time in Africa and recognize how there's this combination of the environment and animals and the intersection between like our world and our health. And I got really interested in infectious disease because recognize that like there are all these diseases in animal populations that could quickly jump from a host, an animal host, into a human population like we have with coronavirus, but like we have with Ebola and Zika and all these diseases. They're in animal populations and they jump into a human and then they spread.

And I got very interested in that and then recognized that was a whole field of epidemiology that you could get into and study these diseases. I guess my question is, you just brought up a good point. You study so many different diseases and it seems like the media, obviously Corona is what we're talking about, but Zika still exists, right? Because there was a whole time on Lady Gang when we were deciding if we were going to go on a trip and get pregnant and it was all Zika. And so these things don't ever go away really, right? We're constantly dealing with new, we have the current infectious diseases that we deal with. Clearly there are many, there are many in parts of the world that we don't experience directly as much, like malaria and dengue. HIV clearly is

still a threat. And yeah, so these things keep popping up and we'll deal with these kind of emerging diseases over time. Now, just coronavirus had one of the biggest impact that we've seen ever because of the way that it sort of moves through a population. We can talk about that. But yeah, this is just one of many things that we're concerned about. so one of the things that i read um when we all started sort of social distancing and staying home was hey if at the end of this we feel like we overreacted then we've done the right thing so i've been in my we've all been in our houses not seeing anyone um lady gang you know we canceled the tour like a lot of things um you know we we stayed home we whatever um and now

we're like, wait, the barbecue place around the corner is opening? Like, huh? It doesn't feel like we ever got to that place. Although, you know, so many people died. I saw the cover of the New York Times. I mean, this has been absolutely devastating. So what's your take on our reaction versus what we should have done, what we did do? Yeah. I mean, listen, it's very hard to look back and decide. There are many people that will feel that we overreacted. There are many people feel we didn't do enough soon enough you know we we exist somewhere in that in between my view is is I was you know it's pretty impressive to see the entire population for the most part understand these public health concepts and do things not for necessarily themselves but for others

the things like we did around social distancing and essentially slowing the spread of a virus to limit the impact on vulnerable populations I mean that's pretty amazing and I do think it had a real measurable impact. Now, you can debate, like, oh, did we shut things down, you know, not soon enough, or did we push mask wearing too late, but ultimately, I mean, I think the population did an amazing job. Now, government agencies maybe should have done more, but I think, I mean, it could have been way, way worse than what we're seeing today, and clearly, we still have, we're not out of the woods. I mean, we're likely going to have another big wave of this pandemic in the fall, and so we we can't sort of let our guard down, unfortunately. And I know how painful that is for people.

Yeah. I have a question. Like, do you, cause like most States are opening up, like restaurants are opening up in California. What is your thought on the timeline of that? Like, do you think it's too early for States to open up? Is it the right time? Because it's like, as a country, we flattened the curve, which was the point of the lockdown, but there's still a shit ton of cases popping up every single day. Yeah. It's, it's a weird balance. I mean, not every part of the country is the same. California has done a really good job and it makes sense to be slowly reopening. Some states were not out of the woods at all and quickly went to reopening and sort of completely let their guards down. You know, I think it's not, you can't sort of apply uniform policy across the country,

unfortunately. And people have different motivations. I mean, the economic motivation is clear. I mean, it's really incredibly painful to be on lockdown for so long. And so it's understandable that people are ready just to be done with it um but yeah i mean i think that these phased we see how cases you know are you know emerge right so things you know will quickly see it you know if some basic reopening like restaurants and and and sort of some relaxed social distancing cases will start slowly reopening and going back to this you know new normal i guess um what do you what's your take on the vaccine yeah uh well listen i mean vaccines take years and years to develop um and the reason is you have to do all the right testing

you have to understand efficacy we know how much pushback there is on vaccines generally right anti-vax movement out there people have a lot of distrust over pharma and the government so you can't get this wrong and given that and all the safety guards that need to be put in place it takes time and as much as you want to speed up the process you know so i think you can't count on a vaccine right now as a way to sort of get out of this and then there's reports that you know that corona is changing over time yeah that like as more people get it our bodies learn to fight it and it becomes less you know i'm listen i'm the one who didn't even apply for college so i don't really know how to say this, but do you know what I'm talking about?

Yeah. So listen, viruses mutate. They mutate obviously over time to escape the response of the host. It's a common concept. We have not seen any real evidence to say that it shifted. There's a lot of people that say it looks different here in the US than it did in China. It has different impacts across the world. It is changing over time. And that change allows us to actually look at the sort of clock of how it spread around the world. So those mutations are helpful to understand the virus, but at the same time, there's no evidence that it's mutated to be something totally different. And I think that, you know, so far there's no evidence that points to that. Ask us who are pregnant or planning on getting pregnant, if they should stop,

if they should wait to see what's going on in the world before, you know, moving forward with any of that. Obviously, if they're pregnant, it's too late. Right. So far, there's no evidence to suggest any real risk to pregnant women, to babies. And actually, all the evidence right now shows that kids do much better with infection than adults. There's different reasons for that. Some people think it's because their immune system isn't fully formed, so it's a little bit more flexible to a new virus. Some may say they get actually a lot of cold, so they have to generally build up immunity to this new virus. There's still research that's going on.

Now, you've probably heard in the news there's some small subset of kids that have had this complication of the immune reaction. That is sliver. That's 0.1% of 0.1% of kids who get it. So I think that generally, people shouldn't stop trying to get pregnant. We should worry about kids as important vectors of disease.

Like if kids are infected, they'll bring that home and infect their parents and grandparents, parents, and that's where the real risk is. So just like flu season, kids are an important part of how a virus spreads. We call them cesspools. They're little baby cesspools. Yes, exactly. That we love, and they're so cute. So cute. But yes, they are part of how the epidemic will spread, but less important as high risk of mortality. I have a question about that too. So my mom is a teacher at a school. She's 64 years old. And so there's a lot of, um, you know, talk going on

how to safely reopen schools. She teaches at a high school. And I mean, I never knew your mom was a teacher till right now. She's a job developer. She helps kids underprivileged kids get jobs anyways. But, um, so I'm kind of worried for that situation because you can barely trust adults to put on a mask and social distance. Uh, what are your thoughts about opening up schools and what that might look like safely. Right, we're in talks with our kids' schools about trying to advise like what to do. Do you start to like create smaller groups?

Do you eliminate recess? Do you eliminate water stations and all these things? How do you, it's hard. There's no doubt that being able to enforce these things. And as you mentioned, it's not necessarily about the risk to the kids themselves, but the staff, the teachers of those schools that are potentially in high risk categories,

age or underlying chronic conditions, they're the ones that we have to be really careful about and they're the ones that are at risk and so if you put high-risk people with people that are essentially cesspools that can lead to you know some some you know problem and that's what you know the big question is and that's why there's this risk of schools opening in the fall but then quickly shutting back down again right do you think with this second wave that that's what we'll see in your expertise do you think we'll all try to go back to normal and then we'll have a big breakout and have to be home again? It's hard to know for sure, but it's definitely a

reasonable chance that that's going to happen. Part of the other issue is that we're going to have a flu season on top of the coronavirus. So these things are going to be totally lined up at the same time. So you're going to have this sort of double whammy situation. So I think it's going to be hard pressed for schools to keep open if the cases are really skyrocketing, which unfortunately if you look at past pandemics the second wave can actually be worse than the first wave great thanks for coming on um bye i know i need you i need you to lie to me right now we're very delicate wonderful yeah as as the worst if it gets worse do you think worse means more it's more contagious or worse as in the symptoms for the person that gets it it's not

about worse symptoms it's not it's about the fact that there'll just be more transmission so we know that viruses do better uh in the winter uh potentially because people are closer are indoors more closely they also it's because of the dryness of the temperature it allows for more effective disease transmission so it's not actually it's going to be worse it's just more people might be infected and you might hear of this concept herd immunity yeah this is this idea that you need a certain amount of the population to have been infected or vaccinated for a virus to really peter out. We're not anywhere near that. Maybe in its most prevalent place, like New York City, you're at 20% of the population infected. Most other parts of the country are below 10%.

We don't know what percent is necessary. Is it 20? Is it 60% of the population? We're not quite sure. But given that so many more people need to be infected, we have a long way to go. And that's that's the issue. I have a question about that. So there's been so much conflicting evidence with asymptomatic people and how contagious they are or like if they have the antibodies, are they protected against catching the disease? I mean, I've seen, I go on the coronavirus subreddit every single morning and there's, it's everything just is everywhere. So in your opinion, are asymptomatic people contagious? Yeah. And I get that. So that's a huge question. I think part of the issue and what made this virus really tough to control is that so much of the transmission happens when

you're asymptomatic and that's how it easily spread around the world. So you get the virus, you're infectious, you can spread it to other people, but you don't know it. And that moment is what creates so much problem because you're roaming around. That's why mask wearing was so encouraged because you may not even know you're infected so put on a mask and protect others and protect you um so that's a big part of of the equation is this asymptomatic transmission and it could be you know upwards of you know 30 or more percent of people getting infected from asymptomatic people um and then this issue of immunity if you got infected once can you get infected a second time right now the data suggests that you get some level of immunity

now it there's different you know experiments that are going on to understand how long your immunity might last for this virus is it six months is it a year some more um that will also make it complicated because if you think about if you're immune for a bit and then you become sort of uh vulnerable again that makes this virus just even more capable of spreading efficiently and so this is another big area of research right because you know how like every year there's a new flu. Yeah. Like what if every year we get a new coronavirus? Well, actually we have already several coronaviruses. Like that's cold season, but it's coronaviruses. We have like at least a few that are circulating in the population. And yeah, like this issue that like they're

changing to a certain degree, but also populations become more susceptible over time. And so it's the same thing here. We're going to have this new virus and it'll likely be with us for a long time. And it's just a question of, you know, how, you know, how much immunity we can get from being infected or how well the vaccine does. Because with the flu vaccine, it's not a perfect vaccine, right? It only, you know, works, you know, some small percentage of time, you know, we're trying to hopefully do better with coronavirus. The last thing before we go into like some of our specifics are, you know, obviously you've seen and been around these protests around the country and people are wearing their masks, but what are the ramifications of going to protests and being

around these large groups of people at a time when we are, I guess we're still supposed to be social distancing? Right. I mean, clearly it's a complicated time, but you know, the way that we see it is that we have two public health crises that are essentially operating at the exact same time. You know, social injustice that exists, it needs to be dealt with and the protests are absolutely critical to that so there's real you know clearly there are researchers and thinking about the impact and what we'll see increase in cases but it it at the end of the day these are important events that need to take place and so we hope that you know people are and when you see the images many people are taking this the social distancing aspect incredibly seriously and so it's

just part of you know we're going to have to understand how these things are linked unfortunately you know these public health crises were actually already linked to begin with because we knew that coronavirus hits the African-American community much harder. And so, you know, there's all these health inequities that are already built into coronavirus. And we published a study a few weeks ago that showed the lack of equity in access to testing. So disadvantaged populations not having the same access to testing. So this was already baked in to the issues that people are protesting. So, you know, we just have to sort of support the people as they do what they need to do and how you know how we structurally change the system

um you know and that's you know unfortunately that we're you know we're dealing with these two issues simultaneously so if you want to protest you go you wear your mask you bring your hand sanitizer you shower when you get home wash your clothes etc well and i have a question about that too i guess i can kind of move into our specific questions so um there's a lot of research that it spreads less in outdoor settings than indoor settings so the protests even if there is like a lot of people in a smaller space it is outside so what is what are your thoughts like if you're going to have a social situation with somebody outside versus inside and the safety of that let me pause you for one second let's take a break and when we come back we're going

to get into this you're listening to the lady gang let's talk about social settings yeah so you know as we were talking about you know outdoor settings are less risky and so that's why for the protest that that's an advantage to reducing transmission because they've been outdoors similarly with a barbecue these are outdoor settings if you can you know do them in decently small groups uh that's probably better right if you can you know bring your own food maybe but you know at the end of the day like we're all we're all about trying to reduce risk and it should be under the backdrop of the numbers of cases that are going on in your state i mean if risk is super minimal at the state level then it should translate to risk low in your own personal

events um and so i think that's where we sort of have to sort of think about but generally an outdoor barbecue with, you know, a small group of friends should be low risk. A lot of people are looking at Airbnbs. They're just like, I got to get out of my house. I got to go somewhere this summer. What are your thoughts on renting an Airbnb? I think generally, okay. I mean, I think the risk of virus hanging out on services is very low and it's not sort of the main mode of transmission. So, I mean, I think that this idea of people being able to get away and changing their environments, I mean, it's so important. I mean, I clearly am in favor of it. And I think, again the risk in those types of situations is very low take me to the public bathroom

yeah well uh so here's the thing and you know uh we don't know the impact so clearly those are pro you know close quarters oftentimes but also we don't know about the risk of uh fecal transmission and i'm sure this is fecal transmission first time someone's saying that on your on your podcast absolutely no never we talk about our own fecal transmissions quite often okay great well then yeah i mean right in your we can say poop yeah you're right in you're right in our zone now i mean this is the zone we understand yeah yeah i'm in your sweet spot okay bodily functions uh so we have no idea like clearly um diarrhea is a main uh main symptom of coronavirus that we're finding that that could create some opportunities for transmission

especially you know if there are no lids on the toilets and anyway so we don't have to go too deep into that but um it's it's well jack jack read on reddit that when you flush the toilet it aerates the aerosolizes well my question about this is um because i am interested in public restrooms because obviously a public restroom that has a lot of toilets that's one problem because they probably don't have lids there's a shit ton of people in one bathroom but what about a public restroom that is just a single person you go in by yourself like the risks are obviously if you're touching stuff or i think just try to try to avoid you know making as much contact and try to you know hopefully there's some sensors there that prevent you from having to touch

uh various components of that bathroom i think generally again the risk would probably be low or low to moderate we have like eight million questions so i'm so sorry we're bombarding you But, um, so I had a question about, you know, a lot of people I'm from Atlanta and I think that down in Georgia, in certain areas, they've been relaxing a little bit sooner than others. And they're banking on the fact that if they're under 65, no preexisting conditions, you know, that everybody's going to be okay. But then there are the outliers and the stories that we've heard. And even the people that we know who are 34 year old men or 41 year old men who are, we

think know pre-existing conditions and are currently intubated. So what's the story there? Well, I think it's complicated. One in which, you know, it's, this is, you know, it more significantly impacts the elderly and those with chronic conditions. But at the same time, these things can just have impact more broadly. And so, you know, just like the flu, you know, people, you know, generally healthy, you know, part of the population will get hit and die. I mean, these things do happen. Also, it's also about a definition of what chronic conditions mean. I mean, obesity plays a role, blood pressure, all the heart conditions, things that may not be sort of the listed things that people are concerned about could play an important role.

And we know that obesity has a relationship potentially with long-term risk of coronavirus infection. And if I wanted to get on an airplane to see my family, what is your suggestion as far flying? And then how long do you kind of self-isolate before seeing people after that flight? Yeah. I mean, the recommendation right now is 14 days. I think that, you know, it's hard. We're not sure we have 14 days. Right. I think that's challenging. I mean, listen, at the end of the day, we're trying to reduce risk of transmission. I mean, you guys will be, you know, if you got infected, maybe you have been, you know, it's, it ultimately you'll be fine. We're it's trying to reduce the rate of spread in a population. It's not meant to make people

incredibly fearful of resuming activities. So plane, wear a mask, try to use hand sanitizer. I think, you know, you'll, you'll be fine at the end of the day. And same with Ubers. Exactly. I mean, exactly. Ubers feel gross. I'm going to be honest, John. I don't know about an Uber. I was going to go back to the plane. Like planes feel gross too. Is it, do the planes have recycled air? Like what is your risk actually being on a plane with people? Yeah. I mean, for sure. You're in close quarters. The airflow isn't the best. I mean, yes, there have been numbers of studies that have shown disease transmission that happen on planes. So yeah, I mean, it is definitely a risk. So if you're traveling to see someone that is in a high-risk

category, that could potentially pose a risk to them. Yeah. Well, John has to go back to other important things. But before you go, I do want to ask you one last question. We have so many uh, brides in the lady gang. And so many ladies had to cancel or postpone their weddings this summer. And it was, you know, obviously so heartbreaking for them. And a lot of people moved on to do, you know, small little backyard ceremonies, but people are kind of wondering, Hey, should I reschedule for fall? Or if I have a fall winter, something, should I push it again? You know, like it's very expensive to move a wedding. So we're using you as our wedding planner. Um, what would you recommend these, these couples do? It's funny. I've been talking

my sister a lot about this. Because she has her new wedding show. She has a show called I Do Redo and she does wedding redo. So I've been thinking like the number of redo's she's going to have to do for coronavirus is skyrocketing. Yeah, the show just got picked up for 900 seasons. Yeah, right. Exactly. There's unlimited examples. Listen, it's hard to know. You can't predict, but you know, we think there's going to likely be a wave in the fall. So I do think there's a somewhat risk for people that have them. You know, I guess I've been sort of suggesting to wait until 21 later in the year to be on the safer side. It's possible that it'll be totally fine, but weddings are expensive, as you said, to reschedule and plan. And yeah, it's a really

unfortunate stress. I feel horrible for the people going through this who may have moved it from a spring to a fall and now are struggling with that decision. But there's definitely a reasonable risk that there's going to be no ability to host big events. I mean, we know that major conferences that we go to are all like offered the rest of the year. I just think any mass gatherings or, you know, concerts and, you know, festivals, those are all sort of on hold right now. Yeah. I tried to make these girls tour in October and they were like, nope. They're like, that's not happening. They're like, let's not even get down this road. Let's just wait till spring. We're like, okay. But it was, it's hard, you know, and that's like kind of meaningless.

So, you know, I can't imagine if it's people's major life moments. It's, you know. All right. before you go is there one thing you want everyone to know that you feel like is not getting through in the media like every time you do an interview you're like i just wish people would well you know i just think that we just have to find a balance i know that there's this like push on the media to to always say you know create this like horrible concern and then there's you have these two sort of things like is it it's it's nothing or it's horrible but the reality is it's somewhere in between. And like, I know that it's a tough narrative to keep pushing because you're trying to get people to respect this idea of social distancing and mask wearing. So it's sometimes

easier to push the sort of more extreme view. But I think ultimately, again, this is all about, you know, if we can have sort of a level head around this and it's all about sort of protecting the vulnerable populations or doing your part, I think, you know, that's the right place to be. And so, you know, hopefully we haven't created this whole generation of hypochondriacs from this, But, you know, hopefully it's more people that are sort of empowered to understand sort of important public health issues going forward. What do our girls, oh, sorry, just one more thing. What do our girls tell their stupid relatives and friends that say wearing a mask is not, like they shouldn't wear a mask? Yeah, what's the deal with the masks?

The masks are, like, it's clear, like, we know that masks should, first of all, our healthcare providers should have access because that's where the greatest amount of transmission is. But then, you know, you're doing your part to slow the spread of a disease and limit the impact that ultimately would create spikes and then likely death. So you're doing your part to slow the spread. And there's great evidence to suggest that even a cloth mask will protect you from spreading a virus that you might be carrying to others. And I think it's like everyone's just doing their part. We love it. People can understand that. If you guys want to, if you've fallen in love with Dr. John, can I call you Dr. John?

Yeah, sure. Um, if you've fallen in love with Dr. John, the way that we have this morning, you guys can follow him on Twitter and Instagram, and he'll be keeping you updated on what to do going forward. Twitter is just John Brownstein and Instagram. I didn't want to get it wrong. Instagram is at Dr. John Brownstein. And, um, we're very excited that you took time out of being important to come educate

the lady gang about our weddings and other wonderful things. But, um, thanks so much. And this was, this was really helpful and we will wear our masks and social distance. All right. thank you john thank you so much great to talk to you absolutely bye thanks for listening and make sure to rate and review this podcast wherever you get your podcast we have new episodes of lady gang every tuesday and thursday follow us on social media at the lady gang uh follow us personally at kelty most importantly at becca and at jack vanek the lady gang network is produced by will sterling

steve delamater kirsten woodward and elizabeth baquet thanks for rating and reviewing wherever you get your podcasts and tune in for new episodes every single week.