Weird Medicine: The Podcast - 437 - Miss Gender and Medical Journalism

Episode Date: December 31, 2020

Watch as Dr Steve presumes and misgenders like a jerk while trying to make an important point. Watch Tacie and Dr Scott look on and laugh. The rest of the show is ok, though. Happy New Year! PLEASE VISIT: stuff.doctorsteve.com (for all your online shopping needs!) noom.doctorsteve.com (lose weight, gain you-know-what) Get Every Podcast on a Thumb Drive (all this can be yours!) wine.doctorsteve.com (get the best deal on wine…delivered to your home!) simplyherbals.net (for all your StressLess and FatigueReprieve needs!) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you just read the bio for Dr. Steve, host of weird medicine on Sirius XM103, and made popular by two really comedy shows, Opie and Anthony and Ron and Fez, you would have thought that this guy was a bit of, you know, a clown. Your show was better when he had medical questions. Hey! I've got diphtheria crushing my esophagus. I've got Ebola, I'm stripping from my nose. I've got the leprosy of the heartbound, exacerbating my impetable woes.

I want to take my brain now, blasts with the wave, an ultrasonic, ecographic, and a pulsating shave. I want a magic pill for my ailments, the health equivalent of citizen cane. And if I don't get it now in the tablet, I think I'm doomed, then I'll have to go insane. I want to requiem for my disease. So I'm aging Dr. Steve. It's weird medicine, the first and still only uncensored medical show in the history broadcast radio, now a podcast. I'm Dr. Steve with my little pal, Dr. Scott, the traditional Chinese medical practitioner who gives street crap with the alternative wet medicine assholes. Hello, Dr. Scott.

Hey, Dr. Steve. And we have my wife, Tacey, the professional WebEx attendee. Hello, Tacey. Hello. And we have our new executive producer. He goes by DJ Free. His also name is Sully. Hello, Sully.

Hello, everybody. How's it going? Well, I think we'll just call you Sully. How about that? I wouldn't want to. I like it. I do, too. Yeah.

This is a show for people who would never listen to a medical show on the radio or the Internet. If you have a question, you're embarrassed to take to your regular medical provider. If you can't find an answer anywhere else, give us a call at 347. 766-4-3-23. That's 347. Take it, Sully. Take what? Oh, my God. He always gets me with it. He was sleeping again.

If you're listening to us live, the number is 754-227, 3-2-7. 3647, that's 754. Bear Nip. Follow us on Twitter at Weird Medicine at D.R. Scott W.M. And visit our website at Dr. Steve.com for podcast, medical news and stuff you can buy. Or go to our merchandise store at CafePress.com slash Weird Medicine. Matter of fact, don't do that. Unless you want a Bristol stool scale mug, they're pretty cool.

You can rate your fecal matter while you're drinking coffee, I guess. It's never too early. We get 25 cents every time you buy. something so we don't care if you do it but it is funny yeah but it's never too early to start buying Christmas presents for next year that's right most importantly we are not your medical providers take everything here with a grain of salt don't act on anything you're on this show about talking over with your doctor nurse practitioner physician practical nurse physician assistant pharmacist chiropractor acupunctures yoga master

physical therapist clinical laboratory scientist registered dietitian or whatever all right very good don't forget to check out dr scott's website at simplyerbils.net Simplyerbils.net. You got a email from a guy who was very disappointed that he couldn't get the nasal spray on your websites, or do you have it back in stock now? Yes, everything has been rectified. He was a very kind man. Okay, that's cool.

Yeah, simplyerbils.comnet. Check out Dr. Scott's herbal malarkey over there. It's actually pretty good stuff. That guy was a big fan of yours. He liked stress relief and stress less and sleep more. Sinus, brain, the whole thing. Wait till I get my chocolates on Ford. What?

Special chocolates. What? No, I'm just kidding. Got my hopes up. Don't forget to check out wine.com. We've had a couple of people try that now, Tase. The wine club that we're in, which is naked wines, which is awesome. Awesome.

And you have direct influence on the wine. and you can talk to them and they'll interact with you and you can tell them what you like and what you don't like and I got I think 250 bucks worth of wine for 85 bucks the other day so it was a really good deal so I like it wine.com now there's a kind of a subscription aspect to it and that you pay for some of your wine up front so I give them 40 bucks a month but tasty drinks so much damn wine that I get it right back yeah it's not like Not in the new year. It just goes on and on.

You know, it's like every month, okay, can I have another 12? So, but we're going to lose weight together, Tacey and I are, with Noom. dot, dr.steve.com, N-O-O-M dot Dr.steve.com. You get two weeks free and you get your own counselor. You get a group counselor and a group and some other tools that interface with any of your smart tools. If you have them, I have the Withings scale, and it just reports directly to Noom and to my counselor. It's like, gosh, don't tell her that. Tell her I gained three pounds eating enchiladas last night that weren't on my law.

Oh, did you gain three pounds? Yes. So, but that's okay. I will take care of that tomorrow in the first thing in the morning. If you know what I'm made in the heart taste. Yep. But Noom. dot dr steve.com changed my life it really did and uh that's about it oh yeah tweaked

audio dot com offer code fluid 33% off the best earbuds on the market for for the price and the best customer service anywhere so oh and the most important well how can i forget stuff dot dr steve com stuff dot doctor steve dot com that's your portal to um amazon and you can scroll down see all the different products that we talk about on this show but it also when you you do scroll through there or click through there to go to Amazon. It helps us out. So thank you very much for that. All right, Tacey, what do you got for us today?

Okay, so I have one article about a nurse who's tested positive for COVID-19 despite getting the recent vaccine and how it's not unexpected that it can happen. Yeah, so, you know, when you look at journalism, the person who writes the article a lot of times is not the person who writes the headline. So the headline is, what does the headline say? Nurse tested positive for COVID-19 despite recent vaccine. And the scenario isn't unexpected. Oh, that's not the one I saw.

Here's how it could have happened. That's the headline. That's an awful long headline. I'm looking for a headline. Okay, so there's a headline and a subheadline. Right. So what people see, what people see when they, well, look, because the effing point is is that I saw this story

all over AP and Reuters Nurse gets COVID vaccine you know right soon after getting the shit. Let me start over because I'm already agitated

because medical journalism is one of my pet peeves and it said nurse gets COVID vaccine after getting no COVID-19 after getting the COVID vaccine right? And it's like Okay, and then you read it, and then the story actually tells you the real story. So go ahead and tell us that part.

Okay, so we know from the vaccine clinical trials that it's going to take about 10 to 14 days for you to start to develop protection, right? Right. Even after those 10 to 14 days, patients still need a second vaccine dose for full protection. And that's three weeks after the first one. Okay. So this patient tested positive six days later after working a shift in the COVID-19 unit. Right. But that's not when she got it.

She didn't get it at the shift. So this is the scenario. Well, now mine is not about a woman. Mine is about a male nurse. Okay. Right. So that was my fault for, so I'll give myself a lot of. Oh.

For presuming. Sorry, that was stupid. Oh, yeah. Oh, yes, it was. It was a little. So, don't let him off the hook, Tacey. Don't let him off the hook, Tacey. Because all nurses are women, ladies and gentlemen.

I get it. I know. That was, that was asinine. All doctors are men, too. Well, that is true. Nurse, COVID vaccine. Because I'm going to see if there's another one, because I could have sworn that gave a person's name and it was a woman. But anyway, I could be wrong.

Okay. Done. Yes. Never presume. just because it says nurse that it's a woman or, you know, a guy, anyway. So the scenario is exposed on Monday, and how long does it take to display symptoms, Dr. Scott? Seven to 14 days, exactly right. Week.

So, yeah, that's most people within seven days, but 97% of people, it will take. them up to 11 to 14 days to display symptoms. So you get he, they got exposed on Monday. They got the vaccine on, say, Tuesday, and then they got COVID-19 six days later. So that would be one. So they were probably exposed to it. It wasn't. Well, actually, it says six days later, after working a shift in the COVID-19 unit.

He felt bad. And then he went up and got tested. That's when he got tested. Well, how many days was it from when they got the vaccine? Six days. Okay, so they got exposed the day before. Yeah, or 10 days before. Or whatever.

And then got the vaccine, and that was already working on them. And then they tested positive for COVID-19 sometime after that. So this happens all the time with people who say, well, I got the flu from the flu shot. And those are people who, if you have, you know, how many, millions of people in this country get the flu shot every year? Let's say go ahead. You have an answer to that? Yeah. Okay. I'm all about answers today. No, I have a question. Didn't people used to get the flu from the flu vaccine? Like a long time ago when it first came out, wasn't there something where people could actually get it? Or is that just this myth that's been living?

It's a myth. Okay. Because I thought it used to be true, and now it's a myth. As far as I know, influenza vaccine was never marketed as a whole virus. Okay. So influenza vaccine is manufactured particles that stimulate the immune system to make a reaction against the influenza virus, but they were never viruses themselves. So one way to do it is to take DNA that code. for whatever viral protein you want to make and insert it into a bacterial colony and let those bacteria produce the protein for you. And then you've got to purify them and everything.

And that's your vaccine. So it was never actually a virus. But what has happened taste, and it happens a lot, is that people associate their getting an influenza with their vaccine. And here's what happens. Let's say you have 50 million people get influenza vaccine over a three-month or six months period let's say 60 million so it's 10 million a month okay and out of those 10 million a month so that would be how many a day so 10 divided by 30 oh crap here we go um don't ask her

she's echo what's 10 million divided by 30 10 million divided by 30 is approximately 333 133 333 okay so you have okay okay okay got it so you have 300 way you can now ask another question. Echo, stop. So you have 33,000 people getting vaccinated every day. Now, out of those, let's just say 1% of them we're going to get influenza on Wednesday. No, let's say, yeah, well, yeah, let's say 1% of those we're going to get influenza on Wednesday. Echo, what's 1% of 33,000?

1% of 333,000 is 3,330. Okay. So 3,330, we're going to get it on Wednesday. But they got vaccinated. And let's say 1% of those got, or 10% got it on the vaccine on Tuesday. Okay. So that'd be 3,000 people who are going to tell you, I got vaccinated on Tuesday and I got influenza on Wednesday. and there's no way in hell

that you will ever convince them that the vaccine didn't give it to them even though it's impossible. No. Right? Yes. So that's very similar to this story. This person got exposed to it. Then they got the vaccine.

Then they got it. And the sort of implication is here's one. ER nurse test positive for COVID-19 eight days after first dose of vaccine. It doesn't say any qualifying stuff. This is the headline. California nurse.

tests positive for coronavirus one week after receiving the vaccine, colon, report. Here's another one. Oh, here's from ABC News. Nurse tests positive for COVID-19 despite recent vaccine. So the implication is, well, the vaccine didn't work. Right? When you see the headline. It's infuriating.

That's what I'm trying to get at. When do you get your, Scott? Saturday. I get this Saturday. ass you get yours this saturday okay good yeah well who you get moderna or uh modern yeah if you see some extra syringes laying around why don't you just grab me grab me a couple yeah we can do it just two i just enough for me just two just just two for you yep yep i can do it kick a baby and it was a dude it's matthew w 45 year old nurse so boo on me for assuming

that was so stupid pretty lame oh i'm no better no better you know better what if there was a non-binary nurse wouldn't that be yeah that's why i said they after that oh just in case come on man come on man it's top of 2021 yeah okay we got to step up our game i love how you assholes pile of pile of kicking all he's down one thing in 17 years that i said wrong kicking well i'm trying to make a damn point about medical journalism i just i just made about how people assume shit. Yeah. Well, that's the thing, but you... That's on me.

And you made a good point, too. That's not medical journalism. That's sensationalism. They're just trying to get it. They're just trying to sell some papers or whatever. You know what I mean? Yeah. Yeah.

And then they say, okay, a nurse who got vaccinated tested positive for COVID, but that's not unexpected. That's the one taste he found. Okay. Then why is this news? Right. Why are we hearing about this? Well, a man got bit by a dog, but dogs like to do that.

Maybe it's been a slow urine for the news. A man got a speeding ticket, but he was going too fast. It deserved it, by God. A man got a sexually transmitted disease, but he's frequent prostitutes. from a from a from a it's not new from a from a from a penis pump he purchased at a yard sale that's a good alliteration there a penis pump he purchased in peoria from a personal friend that's some friend that's some friend buddy so anyway so that just irritates the shit out of me i will tell you this according to the to the to what i could find

45.3% of American adults last year got the flu shot. What? It says right here in 2019, 62% of children between six months and 17 years got a flu shot, and 45.3% of adults got flu vaccination. Okay, that's not enough, but that's higher and I would have thought. Yeah. So this warp speed vaccination is more like not, it's not happening. Because you're not getting it.

That's why, right? That's why you're saying that? No, because it's been all over the news yet again about how this warp speed has just been a total dismal failure. Really? Can we give her some convalescent therapy? Can somebody just get some vaccine? She's stressed out. She wants the vaccine.

I do want it. I don't see. We're a COVID hotbox at the moment. Some convalescent therapy. I'll give you mine. I don't see dismal failure in getting a vaccine to market in nine months. And the first day, they vaccinated 10 times more people than were in the phase three trial. I don't know.

The phase three trial was 20,000 people got the vaccine. I'm in that group. And they vaccinated like 275,000 people the first day. Let's see how many have been vaccinated. You can go to our world and data. How many people have, boy, this is great radio, vaccinated for COVID-19. all right that he makes it worse hey but you know i can't call it a failure because i mean i think there's always going to be some stumbling blocks but i think they've done a pretty

good job i don't see the failure i don't either that's my point dude i'm telling you i saw it on the news this morning i saw the internet but i think they've got it up pretty quick considering COVID-19 vaccination dose administered December 30th 4.9 so 5 million people in the world 2.13 million in the United States. So, you know, we got, that's a whole lot, a whole lot of millions left to go, but still, that's not bad. Not what the NBC said, that it's just not going as planned. Yeah, no, it's not going as planned because there have been some issues with the temperature stability of the Pfizer vaccine, but the Moderna vaccine doesn't have that problem. And what about this AstraZeneca vaccine?

I read that their efficacy was about 74%. It was until they changed it and said it was 90. I thought they did that with the other one. That's what AstraZeneca did. Oh, no, let's not make up. Allegedly. Okay, here's Oxford Zeneca COVID-19 vaccine efficacy from the Lancet. Okay, Lancet is a very prestigious British journal, medical journal.

And let's see what they're saying is. Interim efficacy results were available and are reported for two of the four ongoing trials. Okay, come on. Vaccine. Okay, here we go. This is where you're getting that number. Vaccine efficacy for the pre-specified primary analysis against the primary endpoint of COVID-19 occurring more than 14 days after the second dose was 70%. Surprisingly, let me see.

Yeah, but then I've seen as high as 90% somewhere else. Still, 70% ain't bad, considering that influenza vaccine, we will give it when it's only 12% effective. Because it still reduces deaths. But it's still, I say 12% is still a huge number across the spectrum. It's a huge number. Yeah. Yeah, this is this Lancet article, and I am just skimming it, and that's hard to do when you're trying to do radio show at the same time very poorly i might add from my part so tasty came up with a pretty

good question though she did it's a damn good question taste but yeah that's what that's what this lancet article says i'm smart i could be a nurse if i'm really tried i'm smart i'm smart but hang on except they'd call you tasty yeah hang on hang on but that's okay too He said that you would be in tough on the negotiations. Oh, wait. But if they could get a little help.

Oh, God. We should just start over. I'm your older brother, Mike, and I was stepped over. That's the way of Buck wanted it. It ain't the way I wanted it. I can handle things. I'm smart. Not like everybody says.

Not like everybody says. Okay. Sully's blown away. You're blown away by this, aren't you? Loving it. Well, this is our New Year's show. It's his job to fix it. No one's listening anyway, so it's...

Cut pace, baby, cut paste. Okay, anyway, all right. So anything else? No. Got anything. Thank you. It's very delightful. I'm glad you liked it.

Oh, I liked it. Hey, Dr. Steve, hope you're doing good. It's Stacy Delo, everyone. Hope Tacey's doing good. She is. Anyway, got a quick question. Not anyway about Tacey. I miss you, Tacey.

I miss you, too. And Scott. Amen. Well. Just stupid little question here. What are freckles? What causes freckles other than just being really cute on a girl? I've always wondered that.

Thank you. Bye. Okay. Tacey, you want to take this one? Are they all sun damage? Mine are caused by sun damage. I pay a lot of money to get them taken off. Yeah, no one has ever born with freckles.

But they're probably genetic. You know, they're clusters of cells that contain melanin. And so most people, when they hit the sun, they will tan all over. But some people tan in these little pools, and we call those freckles. And so they'll have some skin that has less melanin in it, and they'll burn, too. And some skin that has more, and so they'll be freckling. If you don't like your freckles, wear sunscreen. That's the big thing.

And it should be SPF 30 or higher. And put it on at least 15. minutes before going outdoors. I know we don't follow by that rule when we go to the beach taste, and that's probably part of the reason that we have skin issues sometimes. Shit, are you kidding me? I lather myself in it. Not 15 minutes before, though, right?

Oh, well, but then I go straight from the golf cart to the umbrella, and I don't leave unless I have to go to the bathroom. And where do you do that? In the ocean. Oh, my God. Oh, no. But I won't I will not pee in a lake

Because that's disgusting They have it Because that's fresh water They have that red tracer stuff Everybody knows you're doing this Oh in the ocean? Oh yeah They have red tracer

They can see where you've peaked I don't care Everybody knows what I'm going out there for I just wish sharks would bite people That piss in the ocean Because you see these people go out there And they're just standing there for a minute And then they come back in

They're not swimming You know what they're doing They're just out there pissing What is fun is my friends will go out And do it with me It's fun They take their drinks out out there and they're just emptying their awful bladders into the ocean.

And I can't do it. I tried because it's a lot easier. What? You can't be a lot. No, I cannot do it. I cannot do it. I have tried. My bladder would rather burst than piss in the ocean or in a pool or any, you know, if

I'm surrounded by water. Oh, my God. I can't believe that. Yeah. It's all about relaxing the sphincter. Can't do it. Can't do it. Let your testicles drop.

Now, I do have a. I have a cure or a treatment for shy bladder, and I tried that even. So shy bladder, for those of you out there that have difficulty, you know, voiding your bladder, and this goes for men, at a urinal when there's other people in there, and then you stand there and you're like, oh, my God, one thing to do is to take a full breath of air, fill up your lungs with air, and then let it out, and when it gets down, to about one-fifth of the amount of air left, stop. And that's it.

And then hold your breath, and you will automatically avoid your bladder. And you want to, it doesn't work the first time. Do it again. And this time, just imagine that there's a fluid level in your chest that's working down, working down, working down through your bladder out the end of your equipment. Well, I have to go pee now. I already did. Did you?

Excuse me. I must go to the bathroom. Pardon me. I've soiled by bridges. That's from my dirty rotten scoundrels. That was a great movie. So, but anyway, so yeah, that will work, but I've tried that in the ocean. Does not work for me.

It doesn't work for me. Do you think it's because there's instability in your foot, and the waves keep hitting you? That could be part of it. The focus is just too much. Temperature differential? Shrinkage. Shrinkage. Now the shrinkage.

I don't think that's it, but that could be. But no, I just, I'm not. I think what it was is, I was one of the time. of those pool brats when I was a kid my mom took me to the pool when I was little and they would just stick you on the end of the diving board and you'd be going no no and shivering and standing there and they would take a pole and just push you in and then they'd shove a pole in for you to grab to get out of there because you were drowning and I think maybe that had and it was like if you piss in this pool they're going to know we're going to know there's a year they're already yelling at me

and pushing me in and stuff. I would never pee in a pool. Yeah. What's the screaming downstairs in our house? Does anybody else? I don't know. Do you want to go investigate? I don't see anything down there.

It looks good. I mean, you're welcome to go investigate if you think you need to. Don't we have two adult children that could? This is the New Year's show, by the way. So that's why. No, this is just how it is. This is pretty much our day-to-day. I can just quit.

People don't like it. It's our day-to-day. So, all right, let's use, let's do another phone call here and see. Oh, we forgot the disclaimer too. If you just read the bio. There you go. Well, let's try that again. Number one thing.

Don't take advice from some asshole on the radio. Thank you, Ronnie P. All right. Hey, Dr. Steve. It's Mike from New York. Hey, Mike. I'm just wondering about these vaccines for the COVID-19. Is there any benefit to getting both Pfizer and Modena vaccines? or would that just be overkill, like the same one twice?

I think they're both a little different, so it makes sense to think that having both vaccines might be better than... Well, you know, when I get my flu shot, if my kids get the flu missed, now that is a live vaccine. And yes, you do get influenza from that, but it's very mild case, usually asymptomatic. because that's a live vaccine. Tacey, that might have been what you were thinking of. But I'll get a double dose, right? Because I get the shot and that, and maybe it offers some protection. The year that I did that, I got influenza, but I was only sick for about a day.

So go see what that is. What in the hell? It sounds like it's coming through the speakers. It does, doesn't it? Yeah, because Ralphie's right there. Yeah, just make your rounds. Yeah, make your rounds, Jesus. We'll send Sally after you.

I got you. You're quicker than we are. You got your gun? Sally's young and quick. So now I've already forgotten what the hell we were talking about. Oh, we were talking about a double dose of the flu vaccine. Okay, so I am not aware that the two vaccines make different antibodies. Now, they might.

It's unlikely that their genetic sequences exist. exactly the same. Right. But they are, they, but it may be because they are coding for the same protein, which is the spike protein on the coronavirus that attaches to the ACE2 receptor in the body. So, but there may be an extra amino acid here or there straggling. Who knows if that makes any difference. So what we would want to know is do these two things somehow create different antibodies and having different antibodies, does that make a difference as far as protectionist concern?

Someone will eventually do that study, but we have zero data on any cross-reactivity between these two vaccines right now. It's way too early to tell. Yeah, I think for now, if you can get one. Just get the one. Get one and let everybody spread wealth, and then if there's enough. Somebody asked me that today. They said, which vaccine would you get? And I said, I would get the one that I can get.

The one they offer you. Yep, yeah, I agree. That's a good question, though. That's a damn good question, man. That's one that we'll have to follow over time. Hey, Dr. Steve, this is Mike from Buffalo. I'm just calling to ask you about vitamins and doubling down with trying to prevent coronavirus. So I've been reading, you know, take your vitamin Ds, obviously take your vitamin Cs and all that stuff.

But let's say you take a multivitamin that has 125% vitamin D. in it and 125% vitamin C in it, you know, all the other all the other good qualities of a multivitamin. Do I also need to take a separate vitamin D pill and or a

separate vitamin C pill or and on top of all that drink juices or I need oranges and like basically get like 600% of vitamin C in a day or take a zinc pill. What is

Basically, I'm asking, what is the... I know what you're asking. Max... What, go ahead. Maximum amount of benefit you get from the maximum amount of vitamins. Yeah, the thing is, nobody knows the answer to that. Most vitamins in our body in multivitamins are water-soluble, and so when your body doesn't need those, they just pee them out.

So people will have bright green urine, and it's usually riboflavin, I think, that they're, that they're peeing out. So now the four fat-soluble vitamins are A, D, and K, so those can accumulate. And so vitamin D is one of those. It can accumulate. So if you take too much vitamin D, you can get a thing called hypervitaminosis D. And that's from people who are megadosing vitamin D, and they don't need to. And it can cause things like fatigue, loss of appetite, weight,

loss and those kinds of things can cause problems with kidney stones as well. And it's so you don't want a megadose any of these fat, soluble vitamins. Remember, A, D, and K. I just remember it ADAC. And, but here's the deal with vitamin D in COVID. There was a study, they did about 500 people. They looked at people who had vitamin D deficiency were more likely to test positive for the virus than people who had normal.

levels of vitamin D. That doesn't mean that if you take vitamin D, you're going to prevent it. It could be a marker for susceptibility, not the cause. See, the only way that taking vitamin D would help is if the low vitamin D is somehow the cause of you being more susceptible to this virus. We've had this discussion before. On the other hand, I don't have a problem with you taking it. There's no downside to taking just a vitamin D supplement, particularly if you've had your

vitamin D levels check. So he's saying, well, how much is too much? How much do you need? It depends. If you have normal vitamin D levels, then taking vitamin D probably isn't going to do very much, but you could take 400 IU to 1,000 IU and it's not going to hurt you. Maybe it'll help. Maybe it's not going to hurt.

If you have low vitamin D, they're going to need to dose you up until you don't have low vitamin D anymore. And we still don't even know if that does anything because, you know, low vitamin D levels are associated with heart disease. cancer, some other stuff like that, there's still no evidence that that dosing with vitamin D prevents those things.

We just know that low vitamin D levels are a risk factor. So we will know someday if dosing with vitamin D prevents disease. It certainly prevents rickets. If you don't want ricketts, take vitamin D. We know that. Vitamin D deficiency is common

in the United States, particularly among Hispanic and black folks. And they've, those groups have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. So, you know, it's interesting. So I have no problem with anybody taking a vitamin D supplement. Just don't, oh, megadose it unless you're told to by, you know, an endocrinologist that says you need to do this because your levels are so low you have to. All right.

So we just don't know the answer yet. but no downside might help so I'm okay with it okay okay hey this is Matthew Greer my dad is a DPC and looks vertical they have shown no cases

of the flu this year I was curious if we are just ignored the flu cases this year or if this is the COVID-19 is just a amp-up flu just a quick question on that well no it's not an amped up flu they're different viruses

influenza is a distinct virus from from SARS cov2 which causes COVID-19 that's in a different class those are coronavirus influenza viruses or influenza viruses and they're structured differently but it is interesting percentage of visits to a health care provider for influenza like illness because we don't test everybody we just say is their illness like influenza is 1.5% this week, similar to week 50, so that'd be last week. This is below the national baseline of 2.6%. So they're saying that the surveillance may be impacted by COVID-19 pandemic and should be interpreted by caution. Maybe people aren't going and aren't presenting themselves, or they're assuming they have influenza.

Now, when somebody comes in our hospital now, we do this. COVID pack and it has influenza A and B in it because they test them for COVID-19, influenza A and B and something else and a respiratory sensicial virus.

And I haven't seen a single influenza case this year. So why is that? I think social distancing, mask wearing and all that stuff. Then why is COVID so hot? Because it's a novel virus and it's more

transmissible, I'm assuming. That would be my only guess. Okay. And COVID isn't that high. Remember, uh, we've still haven't quite hit 6% of the populace has had it that we know of. It's terrible here though. Yeah, it's terrible, but it's still 94% of people haven't, haven't had it, you know, the vast majority. And again, if I gave you those odds, Sully, if I gave you the odds where you take all your life savings and you're going to bet it on black at the, at the roulette wheel, and you're, if you win, you'll double. and your chances of losing or there's only 6%.

Hell, you do it, you know? That's a pretty damn good bet. That you have a 94% chance of winning. So let's go to COVID. Dotlabs.com and let's just see what the world has for us as far as United States cases. Total cases in the United States, 19 million, 19.5 million. So let's see.

Echo, what percentage is 19.5 million of 33 million? 19,500,000 is 5.856% of 33 million. Okay, so we haven't quite hit 6% yet. So 94 plus percent of people have not had a case of this disease. That doesn't mean they weren't infected. You know, there could be people with asymptomatic infections that we can't count those unless we just tested everybody. All right.

So, yeah, it's been interesting. I didn't see a single case of gastroenteritis this summer either. Did you hear of anybody that had a puke bug this summer taste? No, I did not. Yeah, unless it was COVID-related. I think I said last week that Colorado was reporting 97. Right now, they're 97% down in influenza. Is that right?

Yeah, yeah, in hospitalization. Yeah, 97% down from last year at this time. Very interesting, but I think that's what it is. I think it's social distancing. And, you know, we make it through this, I think going down the road, maybe that will help us moving forward with the flu and people appreciating the fact that it is we can mediate the spread of the flu and many other things by just doing a couple simple things.

Yeah, see, okay, here we go. The R-sub-0 for influenza H-191 is 1.4. It's 2.4 for this, and the new strain is four. Which is here now. If everybody remember, right, they found a case in Colorado, right? For those who don't remember, the R-sub-zero is the number of people that one person will infect if they are in a population that is vulnerable to being infected. That's not a real world.

This is an imaginary scenario, but it gives you a gauge of relative. transmissibility. So for influenza, it's saying 1.4 to 1.6. SARS-COV-2 strain 1 through 10 or whatever. It was 2.4. The new strain is 4. Measles, 12. Okay?

So, and that impacts how many people have to be vaccinated or immune before you can reach herd immunity. And that's why measles, it's so easy. for it to flare back up when people stop vaccinating their kids. Okay, doke. Sounds good. I didn't know that about influenza. I suspected it, but I didn't know it now. I know.

I learned something today. All right. Hey, Dr. Steve, this is Sean from Nashville. Hey, Sean. You were talking about Transient Global Annesia on one of the past podcast. I just wanted to talk a little bit about it. Dad had it several years ago.

Let's talk about it just for a second, get everybody up to speed on transient global amnesia. My experience with it came when I used to be the doctor for a marathon bike race in Vermont. And it was very hilly, and it was a long race, and people were really maximally exerting themselves. A lot of people were doing it that didn't have any business doing. it. And in my little emergency room, I would have at least one a year a person come in saying, I don't know my name. I can't remember my name. I know where I am. I know what I was doing, but I can't remember my name. I don't remember where I live. And we would lay them down, give them some IV fluids, and then all of a sudden it would come back. And that was the classic

sort of transient global amnesia, sudden temporary episode of memory loss that isn't a attributed to, like, stroke or blow to the head or something like that. I had that. I had amnesia from being from a blow to the head, and that sucked. Oh, yeah. And they can't usually remember where they are or how they got there or any of that kind of stuff. And then, but the keyword is transient. It gets better.

All of a sudden, it all comes back, and they're fine. So anyway, that's what this guy is talking about. And it wasn't as quick as the recovery as maybe you might have let it on to be. Of course, because everything I'm saying today is incorrect. He started out, luckily I was in the car with him. He did not remember where or why we were going to a certain meeting. He asked me that like four or five times. and then what

triggered something was wrong for him was he did not remember getting dressed that morning I rushed into the hospital thinking that he was having a stroke they do all like the normal CT scans all that other good stuff this whole time

it didn't take like a half hour for him to kind of bounce back it took almost the full day he did remember who he was who my mom was who I was and who my brother was, but anything within, anything new within like a year, couldn't remember.

Couldn't remember that my brother was engaged or who his fiancé was. Remembered their long-time dog, but didn't remember that they had just gotten a new dog about two years prior, didn't, no clue who that dog was. Don't remember if he remembered who the president was or not, but it took the full day for him to recover and to this day he he does not remember that day it does not exist for him in his memory the day before and the day after knows like the back of his hand well it was almost 10 years ago at this point so probably not that much um and you know it took almost 24 hours for him to come out of it yeah that's all right yeah it's still transient global amnesia the the hallmark of

Transient Global Amnesia is that it's no more than 24 hours. It's usually shorter. The ones that I saw were within hours, and their return of their memory is usually gradual, and yeah, they don't have recent head injury. The criteria are sudden onset of memory loss verified by a witness, and they're saying retention of personal identity despite memory loss. I swear some of the people came in saying that they couldn't remember their name, but maybe I'm wrong about that.

That was almost 30 years ago. But their cognition is normal. It's not like they're goofy. I mean, they're sitting, they're talking like we're talking. They just can't remember things that they ought to be able to remember. And they can process things. They can follow directions. They can name familiar objects.

But they can't form any new memories. You know, they're like living totally in the present. And you also have to rule out any sign that there's damage. to any particular part of the brain. And, yeah, no evidence of seizures or active epilepsy. So, you know, it is interesting. Now, people who are at risk, people age 50 or older, and people with a history of migraines.

That sort of makes sense, because migraines start with a decreased blood flow in some of the vessels that are surrounding the brain. and when those vessels, when they constrict, that's when you have that aura and they may see things in your vision, and then when they relax, they over-relax and they dilate, and the body interprets that that they're ripping. And so when then you get a pounding,

a pound, pound, pound with the heartbeat because they'll dilate even a little bit more when the pressure increases, you know, against that arterial wall. But anyway, so that's interesting that people with migraines are more at risk of having something like this. Now, my amnesia episode was idiotic, like most things for me today. So I would just tell you another story of me being stupid is when you're riding home from seventh grade and you're carrying your sociology book in your right hand while you're, you know,

riding your bicycle using no hands and just using your weight to to balance and not touching yeah just sitting up straight and then when you get home instead of stopping the bike and getting off you throw that this counterweight on the steps the next thing you know you're waking up and you don't remember what grade you're at good chunk that's what happened to me and my mom was like well just you're fine and so we went inside i couldn't remember what grade i was in. I was looking in my book trying to see if maybe I wrote little Stevie you know, grade 7 or whatever in there, but I didn't and it drove me crazy. And she's just like well, back to school because back then we went home for lunch

which I think now is weird. Oh God, if you can try leaving lunch now they'll throw you in the bus. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We went home for lunch. And so I was home for lunch and then I went back and back then you had to go home to smoke a cigarette while

that's true i had to smoke three on the way but uh and but my mom was just like unconcerned and just dropped me off i guess she had bridge club that day and she dropped me off at school and as soon as i hit the grounds it all came back to me oh wow that was crazy woke you back up yeah i i i said i the only thing i can remember is going to sixth grade but i know i'm not in sixth grade but i can't convince myself that i remember what grade i'm in there's weird hey there's nothing like getting a good lick to the head. Yeah. Ooh, man.

Yeah, I'm sure there's some kind of deep trauma in there. Not from the falling, but from my mom just being so unconcerned about me. All right. Jesus. Oh. Time's up. Time's up. Thanks, guys.

Happy two years. The other day on his show, our friend Anthony Komia, was talking about he has possible gout or whatever, and he talked you and he's going to his doctor. And that's, you know, all well and good. But he was also saying how he's so mad about working out and not getting anywhere because of his age that he's going to demand from his doctor that he gets some like testosterone. Now, does he understand that a legit doctor probably won't give him that unless he's at a certain, you know, low level? Just wondering what you think about this. Well, I don't know what he understands, but I can tell you that People are under-treated for this.

Yes, they are. They are the hell under-treated for this because a lot of doctors look at this normal range and go, well, yeah, the normal range is 300 to 800 to 1,000, and yours is 305. Guess it's normal. You must be perfect. Exactly. And that, my friends, is bad medicine. And they don't look at the symptoms. Now.

Or listen, listen to their complaints. Listen to their patients. to the complaints, yes. There are studies that show that if you treat low normal testosterone in people who are symptomatic, it will improve their health-related quality of life. That would be me, by the way. And here's why. Now, Sully, I know you think that these scientists are, you know, they're all geniuses,

and some of them are, but they garbage in, garbage out when it comes to data, right? So the way that they determine the normal range is that they take a, let's say, a, thousand people and they get their testosterone and then you have an arithmetic mean and then you go to standard deviations from the mean that's normal but what if

and this is true that 95% of people who actually have symptomatic low testosterone go undetected or undiagnosed I should say so now when you go to get your normal controls you have a whole pool

of people who actually have low symptomatic testosterone that just think that aging is you know you feel tired and that your libido goes down and they so they're not diagnosed so they include them in that normal range well now these people are skewing the number down so that the normal range is actually lower than it should be and then you have physicians and I'm going to blame it mostly on physicians because I'm sure the nurse practitioners and PAs are smart enough to know the difference but I'm I'm yelling at my colleagues at this point that don't know that. And so when they see someone with a 305, they go, dude, you're normal.

I can't treat you. And that is incorrect. May I add just a little bit more to that? Yes. Well, I'm going to throw one out. Yeah, yeah. You don't have to apologize. I just want to throw this out.

It's okay. Because if you don't, I'll forget because I'm scatterbrained AF today, that if you have an issue like this, email me and you can go to the website. site, click contact, ignore all the warnings, and just let me know. And by the way, double-check your email address when you put it in. I have all these people send me really cool questions. I can't answer them back because they put their email address in wrong. And I can send you an article to show to your provider that says treating low testosterone

in symptomatic people with classic symptoms of low testosterone or hypogonadism is worth doing because it improves their health-related quality of life. Go Scott. Yeah, real quick. I was just saying most of the times you don't get your testosterone checked until later in life anyway, so you don't have a baseline that they start testing it at 10 when you're 10 years old. So if you might have it 300, but your normal is 900, you're more than two standard deviations below. You know, mine I told you before was 45, 45 until I started getting treated.

Did you ever do steroids? No, nothing. You never did. No, nothing. I had no nothing. Because the one time I saw one that low was, you know, well, I heard about it, was in somebody that was, you know, had been using steroids. I had, I had every opportunity to playing college baseball, but never did, never, never touched it. And we just assume it's, I must have always had it, but was never symptomatic.

You know, my biggest, my biggest complaint was insomnia, insomnia and fatigue. Yeah. Yeah. And once we finally figured out, you know, I was 35 years old, it's like, shit, no wonder you feel terrible. Yeah. If you have loss of libido, erectile dysfunction, fatigue, weakness, any of those kind of. Insomnia, let's throw insomnia in there, too. If you've ever had chemotherapy, you need to get your testosterone check.

If you've ever been, if you've been on pain medication, opioid pain medication for a long time, you need to get your testosterone check. Mood swings? But, yeah, sure, I'll go with that. I think anybody, any male that comes in with any of those kinds of complaints, it should be a knee-jerk reaction. In addition to all these other things we're going to do, check your thyroid, check your complete blood count and all that kind of stuff. Maybe you do a sleep apnea test, check your testosterone because you'll pick them up. Now, is Anthony going to get enough testosterone to be building big old muscles? That excellent question.

I'm going to give you one of these. Because bringing someone up to therapeutic amount is not the same thing as pulsing somebody. But you would think that you would certainly be able to be able to be. build muscle better if you can add a little bit better mass yeah if if you're normal rather than being low I mean just look at these goods you can tell I really yeah I mean I think about it all the time 12 ounces of the time I do I used to have guns and then I got I used to work out when I was in medical school I've worked out every day would could do the highest on the curl machine when doing free weights and everything and I've got pictures of me holding my nieces up and you look at me now and

I'm just a wimpy little turd. And it's because I got epididymitis, and I didn't know what to do about it then. And so every time I'd lift, I get the horrible pain in my nuts, so I just had to give it up. And you deflate pretty quickly. Yeah, buddy. Yeah, anyway. All right. Well, perfect time to end this cluster F.

Yeah, you're welcome for the good show, by the way. Yes. Thank you, Tase. Yep, you're welcome, everybody. You jealous. Sons of bitches. Well, let's get the hell out of here. We can't forget Rob Sprantz, Bob Kelly, Greg Hughes, Anthony Coomia, Jim Norton, Travis Teff, that Gould Girl, Hogan's mom, Lewis Johnson, Paul Uphcharsky, Chowdy 1008, Eric Nagel, Roland Campos, Chris's sister, Sam Roberts, Pat Duffy, Dennis Falcone, Matt Kleinschmidt, Dale Dudley, Holly, Holly from the Gulf, great Rob Bartlett, Bernie and Sid, Martha from Arkansas's daughter, Ron Bennington and Fez Watley, whose support of this show has never gone on appreciated. Listen to our Sirius XM show.

On the Faction Talk Channel, SiriusXM, Channel 103, Saturdays at 7 p.m. Eastern, Sunday at 6 p.m. Eastern on-demand, and other times at Jim McClure's pleasure. Many thanks to our listeners whose voicemail and topic ideas make this job very easy. Go to our website at Dr. Steve.com for schedules and podcasts and other crap. Until next time, check your stupid nuts for lumps, quit smoking, get off your asses and get some exercise. We'll see you in one week. One week. For the next edition of Rear Medicine. Happy New Year, everybody.

Goodbye, everyone. Hell with you, is what I say. Hell with you. Very New Year's, such a bitch. You know, Thank you.