WEBVTT - Charles Strom on the Diagnostics Industry 0:00:00.080 --> 0:00:06.080 M. This is Mesters in Business with Very Renaults on 0:00:06.200 --> 0:00:10.920 Bluebird Radio. This week on the podcast, I have an 0:00:10.920 --> 0:00:14.720 extra special guest. His name is Dr Charles Strom, and 0:00:14.800 --> 0:00:18.840 he is the CEO and co founder of Liquid Diagnostics, 0:00:19.239 --> 0:00:25.040 an advanced testing company. He has several decades of experience 0:00:25.440 --> 0:00:30.320 in the field of genetic testing. He ran Quest Diagnostics 0:00:30.440 --> 0:00:34.559 Labs for sixteen years, and we really just began to 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:37.640 scratch the surface of his mark. I didn't get to 0:00:37.680 --> 0:00:40.720 the sixty Minutes episode he appeared on, or or his 0:00:40.800 --> 0:00:45.680 appearances on Oprah, but we did talk about COVID testing 0:00:45.760 --> 0:00:49.840 and why we're not looking at antibodies. Dr Strom thinks 0:00:49.880 --> 0:00:52.280 we should be. If you want to decide whether you 0:00:52.320 --> 0:00:55.600 need a booster or a second booster, wouldn't it be 0:00:55.600 --> 0:00:58.520 helpful to know if you're actually at a high level 0:00:58.560 --> 0:01:01.280 of antibodies or a low level of anybodies. When we 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:05.440 talk about that early detection for certain types of lung 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:09.720 cancers and how the world of genetics is just rapidly 0:01:09.920 --> 0:01:15.520 changing the way we not only detect potentially dangerous diseases, 0:01:15.560 --> 0:01:19.320 but some of the treatments we do, it's really quite fascinating. So, 0:01:19.400 --> 0:01:23.800 with no further ado, my conversation with Liquid Diagnostics Dr 0:01:23.920 --> 0:01:30.520 Charles Strom. This is Mesters in Business with very renaults 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:36.280 on Bloomberg Radio. I'm Barry Hults. You're listening to Masters 0:01:36.280 --> 0:01:39.360 in Business on Bloomberg Radio. My special guest this week 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:43.520 is Dr Charles Strom. He is the CEO and co 0:01:43.720 --> 0:01:47.920 founder of Liquid Diagnostics. Dr Strom has pioneered the use 0:01:47.960 --> 0:01:53.720 of DNA testing for forensic and paternity applications before joining 0:01:54.160 --> 0:01:58.800 Quest Diagnostics, where he was the medical director for genetic testing. 0:01:59.680 --> 0:02:02.600 His work has led him to appearances on such shows 0:02:02.760 --> 0:02:08.639 as Sixty Minutes and Oprah. Dr buck Strom, Welcome to Bloomberg. 0:02:09.040 --> 0:02:12.079 Thank you for having me, Baron my pleasure. So let's 0:02:12.080 --> 0:02:15.600 start a little bit with your educational background. You graduate 0:02:15.680 --> 0:02:19.680 University of Chicago with both a PhD in biology and 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:25.200 a medical degree. Was the plan always to work in genetics. Yes, 0:02:25.400 --> 0:02:27.960 from the time I was in seventh grade, I knew 0:02:28.000 --> 0:02:32.400 I wanted to be a scientist, and as an undergraduate 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:39.799 I became interested in prenatal diagnosis in particular. And when 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:44.120 I was an undergraduate, I did research and found that 0:02:44.240 --> 0:02:47.440 one of the centers to do that research was at 0:02:47.520 --> 0:02:51.320 University of Chicago. In one of my early mentors. Albert 0:02:51.320 --> 0:02:56.280 Dorfman had published paper on prenatal diagnosis for Hunter syndrome. 0:02:57.000 --> 0:03:01.080 So I actually sent him a letter. Uh, typed it 0:03:01.080 --> 0:03:05.000 out on my Smith Corona electric typewriter, send it to him, 0:03:05.360 --> 0:03:08.200 and lo and behold. A month later, I got a 0:03:08.200 --> 0:03:11.480 packet of information saying how would you like to come 0:03:11.520 --> 0:03:15.639 work on my lab over the summer, and uh, that 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:19.720 led to my entering an m D pH d program 0:03:20.000 --> 0:03:22.680 that was called the Medical Scientist Training Program. Was a 0:03:22.680 --> 0:03:28.400 federally funded program paid for my tuition and gave me 0:03:28.720 --> 0:03:32.440 a living stipend as a six year program turned my 0:03:32.600 --> 0:03:35.080 m D and PhD. So yeah, I was always my 0:03:35.200 --> 0:03:38.280 plan to be a medical scientist. And you worked under 0:03:38.520 --> 0:03:44.320 biochemical geneticist William Nihan, who's kind of legendary in that field. 0:03:44.360 --> 0:03:47.000 Tell us a little bit about working with Dr Nihan 0:03:47.120 --> 0:03:49.280 and what you learned from him and what that experience 0:03:49.320 --> 0:03:52.760 was like, Yeah, well that was fabulous. So again this 0:03:52.960 --> 0:03:57.080 was a cold call. I started out in between my 0:03:57.160 --> 0:04:02.400 freshman and stophmore year of college, and um, my advisor 0:04:02.480 --> 0:04:08.320 and the master of my college was a scientist named 0:04:08.360 --> 0:04:12.520 Richard Goldslee, and UH said, Hey, I have a buddy, 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:17.160 Dr William Ihan out in San Diego. Uh, maybe I 0:04:17.200 --> 0:04:19.560 could send a letter and you could go out and 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:22.239 work for him over the summer between your freshman sophomore 0:04:22.279 --> 0:04:24.919 year in college. And it was like, you know, somebody 0:04:24.960 --> 0:04:27.480 asking me if if I wanted to work for the pope, 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:31.080 and I said, yes, sure of course I do. And 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:34.240 same thing. He welcomed me. He had me in the 0:04:34.320 --> 0:04:40.400 laboratory and he and and his partner Larry Sweetman got 0:04:40.440 --> 0:04:45.839 me hooked on biochemical genetics. And then after I you know, 0:04:46.360 --> 0:04:51.479 went to medical school got my MDI got my PhD. Uh. 0:04:51.520 --> 0:04:54.320 The obvious choice for me to do a residency was 0:04:54.440 --> 0:04:57.120 at University of California, San Diego, where Dr and I 0:04:57.200 --> 0:05:00.920 had had become the chairman of the department. So that 0:05:01.080 --> 0:05:03.679 was just the no brainers. So I ended up doing 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:06.839 my residency there and for the three years of my 0:05:06.960 --> 0:05:11.080 residency and fellowship, I worked with William Nihan, who has 0:05:11.160 --> 0:05:15.640 an encyclopedic knowledge of biochemical genetics, and it was just 0:05:15.720 --> 0:05:18.760 a fabulous experience for me. Yeah, I can imagine. So 0:05:18.880 --> 0:05:22.480 tell us about some of the grants to pursue genetics 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:25.680 of growth disorders that you were working on at the 0:05:25.760 --> 0:05:30.400 University of Chicago. They seem really quite fascinating. So from 0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:33.760 a very early age, I was interested in developmental biology, 0:05:33.839 --> 0:05:38.760 which is the science studying the mechanisms by which we 0:05:38.920 --> 0:05:44.360 go from UM an embryo in which all cells are 0:05:44.360 --> 0:05:49.080 identical UH, to an adult where we have hundreds of 0:05:49.200 --> 0:05:54.400 difference of specialized cells. And Albert Dorfan my mentor University 0:05:54.400 --> 0:05:59.920 of Chicago, was working on the differentiation of cartilage in chickens. UH. 0:06:00.080 --> 0:06:03.359 So I was cutting off them buds from nine dozen 0:06:03.440 --> 0:06:06.640 chickens a week UH and growing up in tissue culture 0:06:06.839 --> 0:06:11.200 and UH they would differentiate into mature contraslits, into mature 0:06:11.279 --> 0:06:15.800 cartage cells and tissue culture. And so I worked on that. 0:06:16.040 --> 0:06:21.400 And then when that was all before DNA sequencing DNA 0:06:21.480 --> 0:06:29.480 analysis was available. And then when cloning started, gene cloning UM, 0:06:29.520 --> 0:06:32.960 I got a grant to UH to clone the gene 0:06:33.040 --> 0:06:37.160 for humans cartless specific collagen and to see how that 0:06:37.200 --> 0:06:41.560 got turned on during development. It was very exciting. So 0:06:41.600 --> 0:06:47.280 how does that lead to pioneering DNA testing for forensic 0:06:47.320 --> 0:06:52.320 and paternity applications? So I've always been what I call 0:06:52.720 --> 0:06:56.719 an applied scientist. You know, the scientists out there really 0:06:57.400 --> 0:07:01.400 come in two forms. One is the basic scientists, the 0:07:01.480 --> 0:07:06.440 person that really wants to delve incredibly deeply, UH into 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:10.040 one particular problem. UH. There used to be a thing 0:07:10.080 --> 0:07:15.480 about the medical practitioners that the general practitioner knows nothing 0:07:15.520 --> 0:07:19.320 about everything, that the specialist knows everything about nothing, and 0:07:19.360 --> 0:07:22.200 the pathologist knows everything about everything, but it's too late 0:07:22.240 --> 0:07:27.840 to do any good. So the basic scientists delves very 0:07:27.880 --> 0:07:32.520 deeply into a single subject. I always was more interested 0:07:32.600 --> 0:07:35.080 in how are we going to use these developments to 0:07:35.120 --> 0:07:40.440 help people, in particular the medical aspects. Now they would 0:07:40.480 --> 0:07:43.400 call it translational medicine, but how are we going to 0:07:43.520 --> 0:07:46.480 take what we learned at the lab bench and put 0:07:46.560 --> 0:07:50.360 it into practice? So I was the professor at University 0:07:50.400 --> 0:07:56.080 of Chicago. DNA testing for forensics was just in its infancy. 0:07:56.400 --> 0:07:59.880 There was the Blooding I don't know if you remember that, 0:08:00.240 --> 0:08:04.480 where an entire village was genotyped UH in England to 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:09.480 find a rapist, and forensics DNA had not yet been 0:08:09.520 --> 0:08:13.840 admitted into courts in UH. In Illinois, I was approached 0:08:13.960 --> 0:08:20.160 by several different prosecutors who had very difficult cases and 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:24.480 asked if I could you know, if I could do 0:08:24.640 --> 0:08:29.360 DNA testing to support their cases, and being in academics 0:08:29.360 --> 0:08:33.440 and having some academic freedom, I I said yes and 0:08:33.640 --> 0:08:38.640 did the did some DNA testing and UH in UH 0:08:38.960 --> 0:08:42.360 in legal in Illinois. I don't know if this is 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:45.720 around the United States. There's something called a fry hearing 0:08:46.240 --> 0:08:51.120 where before UH laboratory evidence can be introduced in court, 0:08:51.200 --> 0:08:54.720 it has to pass a certain amount of standards, um, 0:08:55.400 --> 0:08:59.920 whether it's generally accepted in the scientific community, whether it's reliable, 0:09:00.920 --> 0:09:04.800 those sorts of things. And so I participated in several 0:09:04.840 --> 0:09:10.000 pry hearings in Illinois to allow the admission of DNA 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:14.200 testing and forensics. And my famous case, the one I 0:09:14.360 --> 0:09:20.560 published about, was a gentleman who had actually murdered his 0:09:20.640 --> 0:09:27.679 wife and then burned her body to UH near completion 0:09:28.240 --> 0:09:31.720 in the steel drum in his garage. UH. Then he 0:09:32.320 --> 0:09:37.120 went to the police station and decided to confess, and 0:09:37.160 --> 0:09:40.520 then when he got an attorney, he withdrew his confession. 0:09:41.200 --> 0:09:44.839 So the prosecutors kind of knew that he had done it, 0:09:45.200 --> 0:09:49.320 but I had no way. There was nobody to h 0:09:49.480 --> 0:09:52.440 to be identified. So we were able to actually to 0:09:52.559 --> 0:09:57.079 identify his wife from the charred remains in UH the 0:09:57.240 --> 0:10:00.920 steel drum. UH and you know, the pry evidence was 0:10:00.960 --> 0:10:06.120 accepted and he was convicted. So that was basically my 0:10:06.120 --> 0:10:09.199 my moment in the sun in forensics, and I never 0:10:09.200 --> 0:10:14.440 really did anything after that. Quite fascinating. So you work 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:16.480 at QUESTS for a couple of years where you're head 0:10:16.520 --> 0:10:21.040 of the research labs, and eventually, um you're working with 0:10:21.160 --> 0:10:26.560 Dr David Wang tell us about Imperial technology and what 0:10:26.760 --> 0:10:31.040 Dr Wang had created. So I had worked in QUEST 0:10:31.080 --> 0:10:35.840 Diagnostics or sixteen years basically running all the genetic laboratories. 0:10:36.559 --> 0:10:42.720 And after I left, I took a temporary position to 0:10:42.760 --> 0:10:46.800 be the director of the molecular pathology laboratories at u 0:10:46.840 --> 0:10:50.040 c l A. This was because of they were trying 0:10:50.040 --> 0:10:53.679 to recruit a permanent director. I was in semi retirement 0:10:53.920 --> 0:10:57.160 and so you know, I took a temporary job working 0:10:57.160 --> 0:10:58.760 out for u C l A for a couple of 0:10:58.800 --> 0:11:02.760 days a week. Then one day my boss calls me 0:11:02.800 --> 0:11:06.240 in and she says, um, buck, we have a problem. 0:11:06.280 --> 0:11:10.199 There is a dentist in the dental school by the 0:11:10.320 --> 0:11:14.400 name of David Wong who has just gotten a grant, 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:18.600 and part of the grant was that our laboratory would 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:22.240 validate the test. As a laboratory developed test so it 0:11:22.240 --> 0:11:26.600 could be offered clinically. Um, the pathologist who had co 0:11:26.720 --> 0:11:31.440 written that Grant had left the left the institution, and 0:11:31.480 --> 0:11:33.320 so she says, you've got to go up and see 0:11:33.320 --> 0:11:36.600 what's going on and see what we can do. So 0:11:37.000 --> 0:11:39.600 I take the elevator up to the seventh floor the 0:11:39.640 --> 0:11:44.160 Basic Science Building at U C l A. And I 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:47.000 go up to meet with Dr Long and it was like, 0:11:47.360 --> 0:11:51.160 oh my god, that's the guy, because I had met 0:11:51.280 --> 0:11:54.960 him about ten years previously when he had given a 0:11:55.000 --> 0:11:59.120 talk at Quest Diagnostic and he had dedicated his life 0:11:59.280 --> 0:12:03.680 to saliva based diagnostics. And when he gave a talk, 0:12:03.880 --> 0:12:06.840 I was blown away and said to myself and came 0:12:06.840 --> 0:12:08.880 home and said to my wife, you know, this guy's 0:12:08.880 --> 0:12:12.360 a visionary. And we had lunch afterwards and we had 0:12:12.360 --> 0:12:15.439 a wonderful talk and it was like you know, a 0:12:15.559 --> 0:12:18.520 rom com. We saw each other in the hallway and 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:22.440 it was Bucked. It was David Uh and he said, 0:12:22.520 --> 0:12:25.640 let me show you what I got here. And Um. 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:28.800 He had developed a platform which at that time was 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:33.840 called e Firm we now call it Imperial, which could 0:12:34.160 --> 0:12:39.040 do UH diagnostics of anti biomolecule including d n A, 0:12:39.320 --> 0:12:45.679 including antibodies including protein on saliva UH as an open 0:12:45.720 --> 0:12:50.839 platform UH, and he had used this UH to actually 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:57.000 UH demonstrate that he could UH detect circulating tumor DNA 0:12:57.360 --> 0:13:00.400 in patients with early stage lung cancer, something that had 0:13:00.520 --> 0:13:05.280 never been done before successfully. UM and I looked at 0:13:05.280 --> 0:13:08.520 this data and it knocked my socks off, and I said, 0:13:08.679 --> 0:13:11.360 you know, baby, I want to work with you here. 0:13:11.800 --> 0:13:17.720 So it began a wonderful collaboration UM and I became 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:21.240 blown away by the potential of this platform. The problem 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:24.200 is that Dr Long is an academic. He had no 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:27.240 idea of how to commercialize anything. I had come from 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:31.920 sixteen years in the diagnostic industry, so my expertise was 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:36.480 it was complimentary to his. I knew how to make 0:13:36.679 --> 0:13:40.160 essays that could be used hundreds of thousands of times 0:13:40.640 --> 0:13:45.320 and give accurate results. So I was very excited. But 0:13:45.440 --> 0:13:49.160 in order to commercialize the intellectual property has to be 0:13:49.240 --> 0:13:52.480 in order. There has to be an organization, there has 0:13:52.520 --> 0:13:56.760 to be funding. And then I reached out to friends 0:13:56.760 --> 0:14:00.240 of mine who were also UH leaders in their deal 0:14:00.960 --> 0:14:07.000 Bob AGNERN, who was an executive in Amaco for many years. 0:14:07.000 --> 0:14:11.800 I was a lawyer and ran businesses for Amaco, Jeff Weisberg, 0:14:11.880 --> 0:14:16.719 who started uh Atina Diagnostics, one of the major neurology 0:14:16.760 --> 0:14:21.080 diagnostics companies and was a financial guy. And my friend 0:14:21.200 --> 0:14:25.040 Rich Bender, who was a medical oncologist. All of these 0:14:25.080 --> 0:14:28.000 people I knew from from past life. Bob, where I 0:14:28.040 --> 0:14:32.200 knew from from little e Um, and the other two 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:35.520 I admit a quest diagnosis and full disclosure. I met 0:14:35.560 --> 0:14:39.520 you through Bob Agdern, who is my brother UM, and 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:41.680 I was so intrigued by the work you guys have 0:14:41.760 --> 0:14:44.560 been doing. We've been talking about this for a couple 0:14:44.560 --> 0:14:47.440 of years. Before we move on to COVID, I have 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:52.320 to you know, you kinda buried the lead about the 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:59.360 lung cancer. The key thing about those early indicators is 0:14:59.400 --> 0:15:02.640 that this is very difficult to diagnose, and if you 0:15:02.760 --> 0:15:06.600 catch it early, it's very treatable, and if you catch 0:15:06.640 --> 0:15:09.320 it late, it tends to have a very bad outcome. 0:15:09.400 --> 0:15:13.200 Is that a fair way to describe it. Absolutely, About 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:16.920 eight lung cancer now is diagnosed. That stage is three 0:15:16.920 --> 0:15:20.480 to four where it's not curable. Um, you know, you 0:15:20.520 --> 0:15:24.000 can be treated, it can prolong your life, but basically 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:27.160 you're going to die. A lung cancer stage one and two, 0:15:27.200 --> 0:15:29.600 which is what we call early stage lung cancer. It 0:15:29.760 --> 0:15:34.440 is still potentially curable with both surgery and chemotherapy or 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:38.400 a combination of both, and that's why it's so important 0:15:38.520 --> 0:15:42.000 to diagnose this early. But eight percent of the time 0:15:42.120 --> 0:15:46.200 it's not. There is a screening test now that's available, 0:15:46.240 --> 0:15:49.800 which is a spiral CT scan for people who have 0:15:50.040 --> 0:15:56.360 long histories of smoking and UM. The problem with with 0:15:56.720 --> 0:15:59.800 spiral CT scanning is that you get these things called 0:16:00.120 --> 0:16:03.720 terminate nodules. So some people have you do the CT 0:16:03.920 --> 0:16:06.040 scan and it's, oh, this has got to be cancer. 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:09.240 Sometimes you do the CT scan and it's negative. But 0:16:09.360 --> 0:16:11.840 about thirty of the time you do the CT scan 0:16:11.960 --> 0:16:14.560 and there's something there, but you don't know whether it's 0:16:14.600 --> 0:16:17.880 cancer or not. UH. And we have an NIH funded 0:16:17.920 --> 0:16:21.600 study to use our platform to look at these patients 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:28.120 within determinate nodules using either saliva or plasma or both 0:16:28.600 --> 0:16:32.360 to see if we can inform the decision about who 0:16:32.440 --> 0:16:36.080 needs a biopsy UH and who doesn't need a biopsy, 0:16:36.440 --> 0:16:39.880 and how the results have been so far, we're in 0:16:39.960 --> 0:16:42.160 the middle of it. We have not yet done any 0:16:42.400 --> 0:16:46.560 of the data analysis we're right now. We're collecting, we're 0:16:46.600 --> 0:16:50.280 collecting samples and they'll be analyzed actually next year. So 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:53.960 I can't tell you how it's going, uh, but we're 0:16:54.000 --> 0:16:57.440 hoping that it's it's going to give us positive results. 0:16:57.520 --> 0:17:00.640 So that was the original plan. When you form liquid 0:17:00.680 --> 0:17:05.320 diagnostics and then you know COVID and the pandemic starts 0:17:05.320 --> 0:17:09.080 and we go into lockdown, how did you guys pivot 0:17:09.600 --> 0:17:13.000 to using this technology to either detect COVID or look 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:19.399 at antibodies or both. So interesting story. So, Uh, doctor 0:17:19.720 --> 0:17:25.200 Wong is a dentist and he had an incredible interest 0:17:25.359 --> 0:17:30.000 in a disease called Schogrin syndrome. Schogrin syndrome is an 0:17:30.040 --> 0:17:33.520 autoimmune disease where the body attacks itself and it causes 0:17:33.680 --> 0:17:37.600 dry mouth and dry eyes. Uh. There's actually four million 0:17:37.680 --> 0:17:41.200 people who present to their physicians every year with that complaint, 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:45.119 either dry mouth, dry eyes or false um. It was 0:17:45.280 --> 0:17:48.400 known that some of these patients who present with dry 0:17:48.480 --> 0:17:52.280 mouth and dry eyes actually have a disorder called chogrin syndrome, 0:17:52.800 --> 0:17:57.320 which is where the salivary glands make anna where antibodies 0:17:57.359 --> 0:18:01.840 are made that attack the salivary glands. UM. The the 0:18:02.160 --> 0:18:06.240 diagnosis of chagrin syndrome was incredibly difficult because the blood 0:18:06.240 --> 0:18:11.680 based antibodies, UH, we're not particularly sensitive or specific for 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:15.560 the disease, so people often had to have biopsies UH, 0:18:15.560 --> 0:18:17.960 and most people didn't want to have a biopsy of 0:18:18.000 --> 0:18:22.359 a salivary gland. UH. So he began to use our platform, 0:18:22.440 --> 0:18:27.240 Imperial platform, to look for antibody in saliva. And it 0:18:27.320 --> 0:18:30.639 turns out that that is a much better way of 0:18:30.680 --> 0:18:34.919 diagnosing chagrin syndrome than in blood. So we knew that 0:18:35.000 --> 0:18:38.800 we could use this platform for antibodies. So I remember 0:18:38.840 --> 0:18:41.600 it was mid February and the beginning of the pandemic, 0:18:41.680 --> 0:18:45.480 and I said to our group at Liquid Diagnostics, you know, 0:18:45.520 --> 0:18:48.200 I think we could use this to measure covid antibody. 0:18:48.760 --> 0:18:51.240 And I remember Bob said, well, you know, how much 0:18:51.320 --> 0:18:53.439 is that going to cost? And they said, well, you know, 0:18:53.520 --> 0:18:56.200 maybe you know, five or ten thousand dollars to buy 0:18:56.200 --> 0:18:58.919 the re agents or things, um, and the rest they 0:18:58.960 --> 0:19:01.800 say is history. We were able to make a saliva 0:19:01.880 --> 0:19:07.160 based diagnostic, which is quantitative, which is very different from 0:19:07.200 --> 0:19:12.520 almost all other antibody measuring tests available that can measure 0:19:12.880 --> 0:19:16.680 your unoglobulin g R I d T levels to U 0:19:17.640 --> 0:19:20.159 Sorrow's c O G two which is the virus that 0:19:20.320 --> 0:19:23.919 causes UH COVID nineteen. So so let me interrupt you 0:19:23.920 --> 0:19:26.600 and just translate that into English for a second. Most 0:19:26.640 --> 0:19:29.760 of the tests, either the rapid test or the PCR 0:19:29.840 --> 0:19:32.560 test is going to give you thumbs up thumbs downy, 0:19:32.560 --> 0:19:35.600 either you're showing this or you don't. You're able to 0:19:35.680 --> 0:19:40.800 do a measurement that quantifies shows you your levels of COVID. 0:19:40.840 --> 0:19:44.640 Anybody's am I saying that? Right? That's correct. They'll very 0:19:44.880 --> 0:19:49.760 PCR doesn't measure antibodies. PCR measures viruses. But yes, most 0:19:49.880 --> 0:19:52.880 most of the well all of the home tests are qualitative. 0:19:52.960 --> 0:19:56.120 They're not quantitative, which means they tell you positive or negative. 0:19:56.400 --> 0:19:59.920 The laboratory tests are what's called semi quantitative. They give 0:20:00.000 --> 0:20:02.879 you a number that's pretty meaningless. It says, you know, 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:06.040 three point one or three point two, and you don't 0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:08.680 really know what to do about it. Our test actually 0:20:08.720 --> 0:20:12.560 gives you the level of your antibody, and then we 0:20:12.680 --> 0:20:16.760 also tell you how you stand with respect to you know, 0:20:16.880 --> 0:20:20.199 several thousand samples that we have from individuals who have 0:20:20.240 --> 0:20:23.640 been vaccinated. So they'll say, Barry, your level is four 0:20:23.720 --> 0:20:26.680 point two. An anagrams per m L when you say 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:29.119 what does that mean? Then we tell you you're in 0:20:29.160 --> 0:20:33.520 the eightieth percentile for all patients who have been vaccinated 0:20:34.040 --> 0:20:37.959 against COVID, so you know you've got good, healthy levels. 0:20:38.000 --> 0:20:40.440 On the other hand, you could get a level that says, 0:20:40.560 --> 0:20:43.000 you know, it's ten managrams per m L and this 0:20:43.119 --> 0:20:46.120 is at the tenth percentile, which means you know that 0:20:46.200 --> 0:20:49.920 you are you're low on the scale. UH. The other 0:20:50.240 --> 0:20:53.119 beauty of this test is because it's saliva base, you 0:20:53.160 --> 0:20:56.560 don't have to have your blood drawn, and it's relatively inexpensive. 0:20:56.760 --> 0:21:00.119 You can have multiple tests. So, for example, we have 0:21:00.240 --> 0:21:03.760 a clinical trial going which I'm a participant, where we 0:21:04.040 --> 0:21:09.119 looked at people's levels every two weeks UH for for 0:21:09.240 --> 0:21:12.359 six months. And when we looked at that, we could 0:21:12.359 --> 0:21:16.040 see that that most people's levels went up after their 0:21:16.080 --> 0:21:19.639 second vaccination, but then they slowly came down so that 0:21:19.760 --> 0:21:21.880 by from four to six months they were almost back 0:21:21.920 --> 0:21:25.000 down the baseline, which would mean that we could have 0:21:25.080 --> 0:21:27.720 probably predicted that you're going to need a booster after 0:21:27.800 --> 0:21:31.080 six months. That that sounds like it's really useful given 0:21:31.200 --> 0:21:34.400 that there's been a pretty big push to not only 0:21:34.400 --> 0:21:37.000 get people to get boosted, but then to get a 0:21:37.080 --> 0:21:41.679 second booster. So I'm vaccinated, I'm boosted. I would like 0:21:41.800 --> 0:21:45.480 to know if I should get a booster now heading 0:21:45.480 --> 0:21:49.040 into the summer or in the fall, when I usually 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:52.720 get my flu shot, because that's when when we move indoors. 0:21:52.760 --> 0:21:55.920 These viruses seem to be spread around the most in 0:21:56.240 --> 0:22:00.600 at least in the cooler areas of the country. Yeah. Right, 0:22:00.640 --> 0:22:03.119 that's a great point. So you know, the issue is, 0:22:03.680 --> 0:22:08.640 you know, I know now that after my third booster, 0:22:08.920 --> 0:22:12.920 the third shot, so the first booster, that my levels 0:22:13.040 --> 0:22:16.520 now eight months out are the same as they were, 0:22:17.160 --> 0:22:21.119 uh two weeks after my third booster. So I don't 0:22:21.200 --> 0:22:24.600 feel that at this moment I need a fourth booster. 0:22:25.640 --> 0:22:28.840 And you know, there's no dated to say that that's 0:22:28.920 --> 0:22:32.480 good or bad. Unfortunately, FDA says that a person of 0:22:32.600 --> 0:22:36.640 my age could get a fourth shot if I wanted, 0:22:37.240 --> 0:22:40.639 But there's no reasonable way for me to make that 0:22:40.720 --> 0:22:43.879 decision right now. A lot of my friends that said 0:22:44.000 --> 0:22:47.520 I'm going to take I'm going to take the fourth shot. Um. 0:22:47.680 --> 0:22:50.400 Your point is is well taken that if you take 0:22:50.440 --> 0:22:53.560 the fourth shot, who knows if you're gonna be able 0:22:53.600 --> 0:22:57.840 to get a tip shot. UM or when? So you know, 0:22:57.880 --> 0:23:01.399 we have that luxury of those who have participated in 0:23:01.440 --> 0:23:05.359 our trial of knowing that our levels are stable over time. 0:23:06.119 --> 0:23:10.200 Um again, you know this is this is the personal 0:23:10.240 --> 0:23:13.880 decision that I'm making, you know, with myself and my position, 0:23:14.440 --> 0:23:17.040 and I can't say that you know that there's a 0:23:17.040 --> 0:23:20.680 recommendation about this sort of thing, But this is the 0:23:20.760 --> 0:23:23.520 kind of data that we need. The beauty of our 0:23:23.680 --> 0:23:27.920 tests is that we could actually get the data that 0:23:28.040 --> 0:23:31.399 would inform these kinds of decisions. So we could look 0:23:31.520 --> 0:23:35.440 at a whole bunch of people, say, you know, everybody 0:23:35.560 --> 0:23:39.679 in a city, or everybody in a large company, and 0:23:39.800 --> 0:23:44.840 we could test people every month for their quantitative antibody levels, 0:23:44.960 --> 0:23:47.640 and then we can follow them and see who gets COVID, 0:23:47.720 --> 0:23:51.000 who doesn't get COVID, who goes into the hospital, who 0:23:51.000 --> 0:23:55.080 gets long COVID, you know, who dies, and then correlate 0:23:55.200 --> 0:23:58.640 that with our antibody levels and see if our hypothesis 0:23:58.680 --> 0:24:02.159 are correct. The problem is, as far as I know, 0:24:02.280 --> 0:24:06.719 nobody is doing these sorts of tests because the blood 0:24:06.720 --> 0:24:10.320 tests are only semi quantitive at quantitative At the moment, 0:24:10.359 --> 0:24:14.560 the quantitative tests are expensive to do, and this study 0:24:14.560 --> 0:24:18.000 would be very expensive to perform. So it frustrates me. 0:24:18.200 --> 0:24:21.040 Is I believe we have a tool we published on 0:24:21.200 --> 0:24:25.800 this Imperaview Publications where we could do these sorts of studies. 0:24:25.840 --> 0:24:29.159 We could get the information because COVID is not going away. 0:24:29.240 --> 0:24:32.399 That's the one thing that's sure. Uh this is going 0:24:32.440 --> 0:24:35.520 to be part of our lives for the foreseeable future, 0:24:36.119 --> 0:24:39.119 and we need to start getting information that will allow 0:24:39.240 --> 0:24:44.159 physicians and people to make informed decisions about things like vaccines. 0:24:44.240 --> 0:24:47.920 For example, what if your vaccine level, your your antibody 0:24:48.000 --> 0:24:51.760 level is very low, and you've already gotten your four 0:24:52.480 --> 0:24:55.080 uh M R and a booster as well. Now there's 0:24:55.119 --> 0:24:58.240 gonna be a new vaccine this summer. I hear that's 0:24:58.280 --> 0:25:02.800 based on the old technology of antagine technology. So maybe 0:25:02.840 --> 0:25:05.480 that would be someone who would want to get that 0:25:05.680 --> 0:25:09.600 vaccine because they're not responding very well to the m 0:25:09.760 --> 0:25:12.919 RNA vaccines. Now, one of the issues, you know, in 0:25:13.040 --> 0:25:17.480 public health, everybody is treated like they're the same, and 0:25:17.720 --> 0:25:22.040 what we're finding in terms of antibody production and antibody 0:25:22.080 --> 0:25:26.880 affinity is that everybody is not the same. Um. For example, 0:25:26.920 --> 0:25:30.679 with all macron, some people's i g G antibodies that 0:25:30.760 --> 0:25:36.680 were made with the the original visor M dinner vaccines. 0:25:37.000 --> 0:25:42.720 They cross react, you know, nearly, so that the antibodies 0:25:42.760 --> 0:25:45.560 that these people make are just as good against A 0:25:45.680 --> 0:25:49.800 macron as they were against the original virus. On the 0:25:49.840 --> 0:25:54.000 other hand, some of the people their antibodies have less 0:25:54.000 --> 0:25:58.480 than fifty of the affinity. Uh, then thanking for the 0:25:58.520 --> 0:26:02.240 wild type. So sort of uh. And we're able to 0:26:02.320 --> 0:26:05.200 make that assett because it's an open platform. We can 0:26:05.240 --> 0:26:09.520 make an asset for O macron within weeks of when 0:26:09.560 --> 0:26:13.800 O macron is first identifying. So I think that these 0:26:13.840 --> 0:26:18.239 sorts of these sorts of studies could really help inform 0:26:18.280 --> 0:26:21.280 on what's going on. Some of the you know, critics 0:26:21.280 --> 0:26:24.640 of antibody testing say, well, we don't want people doing 0:26:24.760 --> 0:26:29.080 risky behavior because they know they have antibodies. My response 0:26:29.119 --> 0:26:31.520 to that is, well, if you don't you have antibody 0:26:31.720 --> 0:26:34.280 and you've been vaccinated, you should feel free to do 0:26:34.359 --> 0:26:37.760 everything that the CDC says a vaccinated person should do. 0:26:38.600 --> 0:26:40.840 But I'm looking at the flip side. What if your 0:26:40.880 --> 0:26:45.320