Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to WIKA F Daily with
Speaker 1: Meet your Girl Danielle Moody. Recording from the Brooklyn Bunker, Folks,
Speaker 1: I am recording this before the State of the Union.
Speaker 1: And you know, at the time of this recording, there
Speaker 1: are two Democrats who are going to offer rebuttals to
Speaker 1: the President's State of the Union. What's funny about that
Speaker 1: is that usually people from your own party don't offer rebuttals,
Speaker 1: but we have a member of the Progressive Caucus, a
Speaker 1: member of the Congressional Black Caucus offering their rebuttals to
Speaker 1: what Biden is going to say. And here's the thing, Um,
Speaker 1: I will give fuller and more detail if you're if
Speaker 1: you follow me on Twitter and all of those things,
Speaker 1: you will have seen that. But here's what I will
Speaker 1: say about the State of the Union. I was racking
Speaker 1: my brain because always, you know, the day of the
Speaker 1: State of the Union, everyone offers their hot takes, myself included.
Speaker 1: People tweet out them. They'll say the state of the
Speaker 1: Union is and then allow their followers in the comments
Speaker 1: to fill in the blank. And here's what I tweeted.
Speaker 1: Instead not offering, you know, to hear necessarily from other
Speaker 1: folks about their thoughts because I'm grappling with my own.
Speaker 1: I mean, the point, you know, if we if we
Speaker 1: want to be real friends, the point of the State
Speaker 1: of the Union is to offer a kind of report
Speaker 1: card for the American people from that president, to say,
Speaker 1: these are the things that we have done, these are
Speaker 1: the things that we are working on. And I got
Speaker 1: to be honest with you, the State of the Union
Speaker 1: is not fuck be strong. And I really wish that
Speaker 1: we had a president who had the courage to stand
Speaker 1: up and tell the fucking truth. And I think that
Speaker 1: what gets me really pissed off about politics in general
Speaker 1: these days. And you know, let's just be real. Politicians
Speaker 1: are notorious for the lies that they tell, for the
Speaker 1: hope that they spread, and then you know the concrete
Speaker 1: policies that they do not offer, because once they get
Speaker 1: into the job, then they tell you that the job
Speaker 1: is just too hard for them to get things done
Speaker 1: that they told you on the campaign trail that they
Speaker 1: were going to do. Not all politicians are like that,
Speaker 1: but a lot of them are. And so here's what
Speaker 1: we know to be true. We know that the Biden
Speaker 1: Harris administration took over and essentially are playing janitors right
Speaker 1: to the absolute fucking cesspool mess that Donald Trump left behind.
Speaker 1: But here's the other thing that we know to be true.
Speaker 1: They decided really not to hold the past administration accountable
Speaker 1: for the fucking cesspool mess that they left. Joe Biden
Speaker 1: had the opportunity right to choose a US Attorney general
Speaker 1: right that had actual teeth, that had an actual spine,
Speaker 1: that was going to do what needed to be done,
Speaker 1: because that was the conviction, not only just to restore
Speaker 1: our thoughts in institutions right and in systems and our
Speaker 1: faith in them, but to show the American people that
Speaker 1: when you do wrong by us, regardless of if you
Speaker 1: are a regular normal citizen walking on the street or
Speaker 1: the president of the fucking United States, that you're going
Speaker 1: to be held accountable for that. So they failed in
Speaker 1: that regard. Right, then they come in and they tell us, yes,
Speaker 1: we are going to get vaccines, and yes they did
Speaker 1: roll that out, but they rolled it out and they
Speaker 1: did a shit job doing it, which is difficult to do.
Speaker 1: So let me give you my two be sure difficult
Speaker 1: to do when you had the former president politicize right
Speaker 1: every aspect of a global health pandemic. So I'm not
Speaker 1: saying that it was an easy lift, but what I'm
Speaker 1: saying is that you can't shoot yourself in the foot.
Speaker 1: You're already starting the race behind. And somehow Democrats always
Speaker 1: manage to when they get the baton, to throw it
Speaker 1: fucking behind them, right, Like that's what they are doing.
Speaker 1: And so what I tweeted in my thoughts about the
Speaker 1: state of the Union, this is what I said. I said,
Speaker 1: the state of the Union is over four hundred voter suppression,
Speaker 1: voter suppression bills. I don't say gay bill in Florida,
Speaker 1: anti transgender bills in Texas and nineteen other states, vigilante
Speaker 1: anti abortion laws in Texas. Thousands still dying each day
Speaker 1: of COVID and unrelenting racism and anti blackness. I mean, folks,
Speaker 1: when you think about just the last couple of months
Speaker 1: in terms of headlines, like we are in March, right,
Speaker 1: So I'm saying, couple of months, Let go to fucking January. January,
Speaker 1: we recognized the one year anniversary of the direction, and
Speaker 1: yet we still have active members of Congress who we
Speaker 1: know participated in that insurrection, whether by giving floor plans,
Speaker 1: giving money, giving access, and they're still there. This President
Speaker 1: has said really nothing, really tough talk on oh insurrection
Speaker 1: and what it means to be a patriot, but then
Speaker 1: gets up at the prayer breakfast and refers to Mitch
Speaker 1: McConnell as his good friend, right, who is an honorable man.
Speaker 1: So every time that Joe Biden gets a little bit
Speaker 1: gets a little bit of gully into him, he fucking
Speaker 1: takes ten steps backwards. So I don't know how he's
Speaker 1: going to stand up before the American people and tell
Speaker 1: us that all is okay. The fucking dow Jones fell
Speaker 1: off another motherfucking cliff, right, as we are headed into
Speaker 1: day seven of Putin's war in the Ukraine, and to
Speaker 1: boot on top of all that, we are seeing all
Speaker 1: of the terrible coverage of people losing their homes and fleeing.
Speaker 1: What are we seeing on top of that anti fucking blackness?
Speaker 1: So not only not only do you get to black
Speaker 1: person in the Ukraine, whether you are a black American
Speaker 1: student right or from an African nation, but what we
Speaker 1: are getting reports of, right are people being told all
Speaker 1: blacks off the bus, all blacks to the back of
Speaker 1: the line. So I ask you, what is this administration
Speaker 1: saying to their fellow members of the EU that this
Speaker 1: is something that we will not tolerate. That let's not
Speaker 1: make matters fucking worse, right, that the people that are
Speaker 1: fleeing are deserving of safety just as well as their
Speaker 1: white counterparts that are fleeing along fucking side them. Like,
Speaker 1: why is it that regardless of where black people in
Speaker 1: this diaspora are, they're always told to get to the
Speaker 1: back of the bus or better yet, get the fuck off.
Speaker 1: You know, it is really difficult for me to go
Speaker 1: along with the get along right now, which is the
Speaker 1: constant refrain that we need to just unite as Democrats
Speaker 1: behind our president. And here's the thing, folks, I'm united
Speaker 1: behind people, right, not a person, but people who recognize
Speaker 1: how fucked up this country is and is going to
Speaker 1: actually call it out. And I don't know who that is,
Speaker 1: but it's not Joe Biden, right. Joe Biden, if folks remember,
Speaker 1: was not my first, second, third, or fourth choice for president.
Speaker 1: He was my fifth. I swallowed that pill because I
Speaker 1: figured that we needed a stabilizing figure. But when Joe
Speaker 1: Biden came in, I honestly thought that the worst was
Speaker 1: behind us. And that was me being naive, right, all
Speaker 1: of us being naive, thinking that the only work that
Speaker 1: we had to do was to get rid of Donald
Speaker 1: Trump and then we could begin the slow progression back
Speaker 1: to normal, because the assumption that I made was that
Speaker 1: our democracy was going to be reinforced by serious guardrails,
Speaker 1: right like a new voting rights bill, right like fortifying
Speaker 1: Roe v. Wade, which, by the way, on Monday, Joe
Speaker 1: fucking Mansion voted against us even having debate on it,
Speaker 1: and was the sole Democrat decide with Republicans. So people
Speaker 1: keep saying like, oh, we need Joe Mansion. Tell me
Speaker 1: what for, because I've never seen more of a Republican
Speaker 1: than that man. You're voting against women having the ability
Speaker 1: to get the reproductive healthcare services that they need, knowing
Speaker 1: good goddamn well that Republicans set in the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: by June will strip it away, and you don't even
Speaker 1: want to have fucking debate on that. And instead of
Speaker 1: this president opening the doors to the White House to
Speaker 1: try and beg and plead with Cinema and with fucking Mansion,
Speaker 1: maybe you should have used your platform, your time, your
Speaker 1: air time, to be calling these motherfuckers out. There are
Speaker 1: times in our political lives where you have to call
Speaker 1: people out and then decide who you are actually calling in.
Speaker 1: Joe Mansion is not the one to call in. Joe
Speaker 1: Mansion and Kirsten Cinema's records are bullshit, right when you
Speaker 1: hold them against the rest of the Democratic Party. But
Speaker 1: of course what we have is that instead of calling
Speaker 1: out the white people who are obstructionists to our progress,
Speaker 1: what this Democratic Party is doing already eight months ahead
Speaker 1: of midtime at midterms is calling out the progressives who
Speaker 1: have been carrying the water for Biden's agenda. This is
Speaker 1: why you have rashided to live giving a response tonight. Now, again,
Speaker 1: this is being recorded before, so I don't know what
Speaker 1: she's going to say, but my assumption, my assumption is
Speaker 1: that she's going to talk about how the progressive in
Speaker 1: the House had been doing the most, passing the most bills,
Speaker 1: only for them to go to the Senate and to die,
Speaker 1: only for the senators like Joe Mansion and Kursten Cinema
Speaker 1: to be negotiating on our fucking backs. Right, So I
Speaker 1: hope that one of them tells the fucking truth tonight
Speaker 1: in terms of what is happening in America, Like you know,
Speaker 1: Here's here's a little anecdotal thing. Right. The reality, right,
Speaker 1: it is this, we have an entire party that bet
Speaker 1: everything on following the science right and saying that we're
Speaker 1: going to follow the science with COVID, whatever the doctors say,
Speaker 1: whatever the scientists say, We're going to do that. And
Speaker 1: then as the calendar year changed, right, so did everybody's
Speaker 1: fucking tune. My mother right, who sat by right, watched
Speaker 1: every press conference, didn't take our eyes off at MSNBC
Speaker 1: says I'm no longer listening to the CDC or the president, right, Like,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna mind my own damn business and wear my
Speaker 1: mask and wash my hands and do what I need
Speaker 1: to do to keep myself safe. Later in the show, today,
Speaker 1: I will speak with doctor Cameron Webb, who is returning
Speaker 1: guests to woke f and is a senior White House
Speaker 1: policy adviser for COVID equity, and I will ask him, so,
Speaker 1: what do you say to the people that for the
Speaker 1: past thirteen months of this administration, but the past two
Speaker 1: plus years have been doing the quote unquote right thing,
Speaker 1: and now the CDC is telling them take your masks off, right,
Speaker 1: Like we don't need to show vaccination cards, everything is down.
Speaker 1: All is well, so you will listen to what doctor
Speaker 1: Cameron Webb says. Coming up next, our friend, doctor Jonathan Metzel,
Speaker 1: is going to be testifying today in front of the
Speaker 1: committee in the House to talk about the mental health
Speaker 1: issues that we are not addressing as it pertains to
Speaker 1: the collective trauma that we have experienced over the past
Speaker 1: two years. How suicides are through the roof, not just
Speaker 1: for teens, but for everyone across the board, and what
Speaker 1: are we doing about that? Folks. You know, the state
Speaker 1: of our union, as I said, is not strong. Our
Speaker 1: union is actually hobbling on. You know, I don't even
Speaker 1: know if it was a stool, it'd be a three
Speaker 1: legged stool, right, It is hobbling. We are hollowed out,
Speaker 1: and there is no signs of anyone recognizing how important,
Speaker 1: how urgent this time is. If Joe Biden stands before
Speaker 1: the American people and says all is well and wants
Speaker 1: to talk to me about the economy, I'm gonna fucking scream.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna fucking scream instead of talking about the fascist
Speaker 1: war that Republicans are waging in our classrooms right in
Speaker 1: our courts, and talking about that don't give me rose
Speaker 1: colored glasses when when I take them off, all I
Speaker 1: see is a nightmare. The American people deserve the truth
Speaker 1: after all that we've been through. We deserve the truth,
Speaker 1: and we deserve a leader that has enough faith in
Speaker 1: us to not bullshit us. And I'm just wondering who
Speaker 1: that is going to be. Coming up next, dear friends,
Speaker 1: my conversation with our friend and in house doctor, doctor
Speaker 1: Jonathan Metzel and doctor Cameron Webb. Folks, I am very
Speaker 1: happy to bring it to you today, our friend, doctor
Speaker 1: Jonathan Metzel in house, a doctor who is standing outside
Speaker 1: of an airport. That's how dedicated he is to woke
Speaker 1: a f because he's on his way to Washington, DC
Speaker 1: to testify before Congress. M Jonathan, thank you so much
Speaker 1: for making the time before you get on air, before
Speaker 1: you get in the air, tell us about the testimony
Speaker 1: that you're going to give tomorrow and why it's so important. Well,
Speaker 1: thank you. It's of course I would never miss. This
Speaker 1: is our weekly therapy, so I would never miss this conversation.
Speaker 1: I've seen outside the Nashville airport. There's a gentleman next
Speaker 1: to me smoking a really nice looking stogie. He's saying hi,
Speaker 1: everybody there he is so so everything is everything is great.
Speaker 1: It's nice here, but but so so we're having a
Speaker 1: big hearing tomorrow for the Houseways and Means Committee, which
Speaker 1: will be today for when this broadcastings, and the theme
Speaker 1: is they're doing a two part series on mental health
Speaker 1: and mental illness in America during the pandemic, and the
Speaker 1: theme tomorrow is addiction, suicide, and depression and how those
Speaker 1: have been going up really over the past three years,
Speaker 1: not surprisingly. And so my testimony really will be about
Speaker 1: you know, I'm a psychiatrist, right, so they want to
Speaker 1: know what to do about it. But I mean, the
Speaker 1: message I'm going to say is that we should just
Speaker 1: step back and think about wide mental illness is important
Speaker 1: in this moment anyway, which is not just about oh,
Speaker 1: here's a circumscribed group of people who have mental illness
Speaker 1: and there's them and there's us, which is maybe what
Speaker 1: we used to think. But that the pandemic and that
Speaker 1: you know, reckoning with racism we've had and so many
Speaker 1: of the other moments of our people we've had I
Speaker 1: have made us really realized that we're all vulnerable as
Speaker 1: a species in a way that we're all, we're all
Speaker 1: a little bit or a lot mentally old right now,
Speaker 1: and so addressing the crisis of mental illness is really
Speaker 1: a way of thinking about how we can repair our
Speaker 1: country right now, and that in addition to individual treatments,
Speaker 1: we really need to be thinking like what structural ways
Speaker 1: can we come together to heal during I mean, oh
Speaker 1: my god, a moment, it's even more stressful. I mean
Speaker 1: every week they just turned up the volume on us.
Speaker 1: And so, I mean last week was nothing compared to
Speaker 1: even today. And so I think the hearing will be
Speaker 1: what can we do to heal? And what is mental
Speaker 1: health at a time like this? You know, one of
Speaker 1: the things that we've been talking about, and I've been
Speaker 1: so grateful for you, and I don't I think that
Speaker 1: it has been missing from the mainstream media discourse is
Speaker 1: about mental health, that those people who were already had
Speaker 1: mental health issues, that how they had been exacerbated during
Speaker 1: this time, how depression and anxiety and all of these
Speaker 1: things had been exacerbated. But then for those people, and
Speaker 1: I'm myself included, who have you know, not have not
Speaker 1: been medicated, but have been in therapy for five years.
Speaker 1: My own therapist has told me that you know that
Speaker 1: her numbers in terms of her clients that she's seeing
Speaker 1: has risen over this time. What do you think is
Speaker 1: the thing that we are missing as a collective. And
Speaker 1: I like the fact that you said that us versus them, like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's these people over there that have a problem as
Speaker 1: opposed to something that is rising nationwide. Well, that's a
Speaker 1: great question. That's really at the heart of all of this,
Speaker 1: I think. I mean, first of all, we should recognize
Speaker 1: that the pandemic and everything that's happened over the past
Speaker 1: couple of years have been a stress accelerator on par
Speaker 1: with nothing we've really ever seen. I mean, social isolation, despair, anxiety,
Speaker 1: fear of death, addiction, all these things, you know, they
Speaker 1: all I mean, if you look at psychiatric textbooks from
Speaker 1: before the pandemic, people will say, you know, don't spend
Speaker 1: time by yourself, and fear of you know, fear of
Speaker 1: immortality is a link to anxiety and PTSD like and
Speaker 1: in a way every you can just go through the
Speaker 1: checklist of every stressor for every psychiatric illness and they're
Speaker 1: just floating in the air. And so I think part
Speaker 1: of the issue is for me, we haven't had a
Speaker 1: national reckoning, which is what it meant to what it's
Speaker 1: meant to go through a pandemic as a country. I mean,
Speaker 1: we all gone through something really really deep and really stressful,
Speaker 1: and instead of having some kind of conversation about trying
Speaker 1: to understand other people's experience, everybody feels like they've gone
Speaker 1: through it alone or with their tribe. And so part
Speaker 1: of what I'm advocating for is actually having a national
Speaker 1: referendum on what mental health means at a time like this,
Speaker 1: because we really haven't had that. And if you think
Speaker 1: about it, I mean, we haven't had any kind of
Speaker 1: we haven't had any kind of town hall at least,
Speaker 1: you know, not even with the you know, with the present,
Speaker 1: but we haven't had a town hall, let's say, with
Speaker 1: you know, a bunch of doctors like yourself, to talk
Speaker 1: about the complexities of this moment, to talk about how
Speaker 1: even you know, the anxiety that many of us feel
Speaker 1: with the new regulations that are just being rolled out,
Speaker 1: particularly in New York, right where you and I have been,
Speaker 1: and they are saying, oh, well, we don't need vaccination cards,
Speaker 1: we don't need masks, we don't need this, and we
Speaker 1: don't need that and I don't think that we're talking
Speaker 1: about the effects of what it was a to adapt
Speaker 1: to the measures that were put in place to supposedly,
Speaker 1: you know, uplift the safety of the public, but then
Speaker 1: now being removed or how we flip flop back and forth.
Speaker 1: And the stress is that that's how that has occurred
Speaker 1: there and so much of that is internalized. Also, I
Speaker 1: think that's part of the point that everybody feels this uncertainty, anger,
Speaker 1: um and and we kind of internalize it and then
Speaker 1: we lash out or something. Just the intensity of our
Speaker 1: emotions are so are so isolating, and there's there's so
Speaker 1: um you know, there's it's so psychological, but there's no
Speaker 1: there's no way of talking about it. It's not just
Speaker 1: feeling anger, feeling despair and then and then either internalizing
Speaker 1: through addiction or despair or externalizing um by by anger
Speaker 1: or lashing out. I'm because the nice man on, the
Speaker 1: nice man on one of the one of the things
Speaker 1: Jonathan two that has been coming up. And I don't
Speaker 1: if this is again something that you've talked about, um,
Speaker 1: you know, with your students in different spaces and places
Speaker 1: that they're going to be in. But work is changing
Speaker 1: right the way that your bosses and deal with mental health.
Speaker 1: There are a lot more people and I don't know
Speaker 1: if that's by virtue of you know, gen Z and millennials,
Speaker 1: but really transforming how work views mental health. People need
Speaker 1: are asking for mental health days and not being met
Speaker 1: with you know, what is that or what you know?
Speaker 1: Why do you need it? Or what have you like
Speaker 1: it's being given? So can you talk a little bit
Speaker 1: about how those shifts are happening that you may also
Speaker 1: have noticed as it pertains to work and mental health. Well,
Speaker 1: you know me, I'm a structuralist, right, So the main
Speaker 1: point I'm going to make when I speak at Congress
Speaker 1: tomorrow is that we have to create structures that accommodate
Speaker 1: the kinds of anxiety that we're experience right now, and
Speaker 1: also build bridges between people so that people feel like
Speaker 1: they're in this together. And so, um, you know what
Speaker 1: I was saying is, in addition to individual treatment, we
Speaker 1: need to make therapy more accessible, we need to make
Speaker 1: addiction treatment more accessible, and we need more money for
Speaker 1: crisis hotlines and see US hot hotlines. All those things
Speaker 1: are true, but at the same time, we also have
Speaker 1: to think about what kind of structures. Can we build
Speaker 1: work structures, health structures that can make people feel like
Speaker 1: they're part of a team and not going out and
Speaker 1: a loan which I think has been such an important
Speaker 1: and really devastating aspect here, which is not just the
Speaker 1: mental health crisis, but how it's tied to a crisis
Speaker 1: of isolation and so um, you know the Also I
Speaker 1: can tweet out because it'll the public record tomorrow my
Speaker 1: written testimony, but I but I basically show I basically
Speaker 1: show how um we've you know, we have the I mean,
Speaker 1: like I'll give you one example, the Affordable Care Act.
Speaker 1: When people got health insurance in their neighborhoods, it didn't
Speaker 1: just affect their own access to healthcare, they also felt
Speaker 1: much more connected to civic engagement to their neighbors. That
Speaker 1: had all of these effects of people feeling like they
Speaker 1: were they were had a safety net that connected them
Speaker 1: to other people and healthcare. Health in terrances is one
Speaker 1: example of the kinds of the different kinds of social
Speaker 1: infrastructure we can build that again not only accommodate mental
Speaker 1: home illness symptoms, but also think about, you know, think
Speaker 1: about how how people are, how people are connected and
Speaker 1: can feel supported Yeah, I think that that's right, and
Speaker 1: I think that it's important. I mean, I'm grateful for
Speaker 1: the fact that this hearing is even happening, right, that
Speaker 1: these numbers are not being overlooked. We've we've talked about
Speaker 1: them on here, you know, with teens and the and
Speaker 1: the anxiety and the stresses and attempted suicides being at
Speaker 1: an all time high. You know, we've talked about and
Speaker 1: have seen, you know, on headlines and in the news
Speaker 1: that like a lot has changed, right, And I think
Speaker 1: that there is this to go back to normal, but
Speaker 1: not but recognizing that, you know, wouldn't you say, Jonathan,
Speaker 1: that we are all living through collective trauma and so
Speaker 1: how do you go back to quote unquote normal when
Speaker 1: this traumas has been a part of our lives for
Speaker 1: the last three years. Yeah, I mean, and it's and
Speaker 1: the trauma is leading. I mean, just think about I
Speaker 1: you know, I think about how different you are, I
Speaker 1: am than we were three years ago. Just the thought
Speaker 1: that we could catch an airborne pathogen and get really sick,
Speaker 1: or that somebody close to us could do it. I mean,
Speaker 1: you're living and I just keep thinking, like like the
Speaker 1: early studies of post traumatic stress disorder. For example, they
Speaker 1: would study airline fighter pilots in Vietnam and the idea
Speaker 1: was basically, if you if you thought you were going
Speaker 1: to die by flying sorties for ten hours, you had
Speaker 1: a ten percent chance of gating PTSC, and if you
Speaker 1: flew forty hours, you had a forty percent chance of
Speaker 1: getting PTSC. And so basically the assumption was if you
Speaker 1: ever thought your mortality is at risk, that that was
Speaker 1: a hyper stress event that would lead to a sense
Speaker 1: of I think, and then think about during the pandemic,
Speaker 1: like every time you walk outside and open your mouth
Speaker 1: you could catch a deadly illness or something like going
Speaker 1: to the grocery store. Any yeah, yeah, yeah, And so
Speaker 1: we're living with a kind of collective trauma, collective hyper vigilance,
Speaker 1: a collective just fight or flight response that is really
Speaker 1: almost unparalleled. Really it's certainly in our lifetimes in a
Speaker 1: particular way. And then you put on top of it
Speaker 1: all the political issues that are happening, you know, war
Speaker 1: and tribalization and polarization, and so I just think it's
Speaker 1: a moment. I mean, I it's funny. I would never
Speaker 1: think I would be the person who would say this
Speaker 1: three years ago. But it's a moment to really think
Speaker 1: what structures do we have to build to promote collective healing.
Speaker 1: What is some of the pushback that you're prepared for.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know that you're you know, it's not
Speaker 1: not supposed to be a combative hearing, but I'm certain
Speaker 1: that there will be you know, people members probably honestly
Speaker 1: of both part at this point, that are just like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, COVID is done, and we're rolling out all
Speaker 1: of these things, and you know, people just need to
Speaker 1: get over it. What will be your response to the
Speaker 1: kind of get over it, let's move on, you know,
Speaker 1: things will go back to normal mentality. I mean, I
Speaker 1: study guns, right, so I'm getting ready for some pushback,
Speaker 1: right And you know, if you can't ask me about
Speaker 1: suicide without me talking about my research on guns and suicide.
Speaker 1: You know, the biggest risk factor for a gun suicide
Speaker 1: to our number one overwhelming to spare social crisis anxiety,
Speaker 1: which we're feeling, and having a gun in a home.
Speaker 1: And so we know that millions of guns have been
Speaker 1: sold over the course of the pandemic into homes that
Speaker 1: didn't have guns before. And so what we're doing is
Speaker 1: we're adding, we're adding a vector, we're adding a pathogen.
Speaker 1: And so really, even as we say we support the second,
Speaker 1: what's our plan for promoting safety when there are all
Speaker 1: these guns in these homes that that become risk factors
Speaker 1: for harming yourself or partner violence, things like that. So
Speaker 1: we've kind of spread the vector without really spreading a
Speaker 1: safety plan, and so that I mean, if we're talking
Speaker 1: to talk about suicide, it's kind of like, what's our
Speaker 1: plan for what's our plan for gun suicide? Because I
Speaker 1: don't think more guns stop more gun suicide. More guns
Speaker 1: are risk factor for more guns suicide. So I'm sure
Speaker 1: I'll get some pushback from that from from that, you know,
Speaker 1: people on the committee on actually on both sides, who
Speaker 1: are strong support of gun rights. But I think, you know,
Speaker 1: if we're thinking about mental health, the point is not
Speaker 1: to penalize everybody. That's to balance, um, you know, individual
Speaker 1: rights with with with public safety, and so I don't
Speaker 1: think we have to be done about it. So I
Speaker 1: think certainly guns will be one issue. Um And then
Speaker 1: of course building communal infrastructure just takes resources, right, you know,
Speaker 1: building healthcare networks. So I guess the question is the
Speaker 1: tension about infrastructure is really one about resources and should
Speaker 1: we you know, should we fund the government to do that?
Speaker 1: Should we fund industry? Honestly, I don't care. I just
Speaker 1: think we need more industry. I think we need more
Speaker 1: infrastructure right now that it supports people because you know,
Speaker 1: another thing we have even talked about is wealth and balance. Right,
Speaker 1: many people made out really well during the pandemic, and
Speaker 1: many people are fell into into the seed of despair,
Speaker 1: and so you know, again, I just think these are
Speaker 1: these are hard issues and they tie into real, real
Speaker 1: political heart potatoes right now. And the last question for you,
Speaker 1: because I know that you have to run, um, you know,
Speaker 1: what are your hopes for how this how this hearing
Speaker 1: it lands right, and what are your hopes for the
Speaker 1: conversations that it will um continue following this initial hearing. Well,
Speaker 1: I'll send the links so we can tweet it out tomorrow.
Speaker 1: It's going to be I think on c SPAN, but
Speaker 1: I'll send you I'll send all the information. But I
Speaker 1: very I feel very encouraged by the fact that we're
Speaker 1: having this hearing at all. This is the second in
Speaker 1: a series of hearings about about mental health and the
Speaker 1: pandemic and I hope we just amplify these messages and
Speaker 1: really start thinking not just about what how can we
Speaker 1: treat mental almost but what structures do we need in
Speaker 1: place to promote to promote promote public health, but mental health.
Speaker 1: I think, I think mental health is really something we
Speaker 1: really need to focus on, and hopefully it's something I mean, look,
Speaker 1: what's happening over the past two weeks, like people people
Speaker 1: work together who we never imagine good work together before
Speaker 1: in the face of common cause, and hopefully mental health
Speaker 1: it becomes another one of those issues. I hope that
Speaker 1: it does. Jonathan, and I you know, I'm so excited
Speaker 1: one that you are one of the people that are
Speaker 1: that are speaking before the committee. But I'm you know,
Speaker 1: I'm really hopeful that by having these conversations that once
Speaker 1: again we normalize mental health in a way, particularly during
Speaker 1: these heightened times of trauma. I mean, we didn't even
Speaker 1: get to touch on what is happening in the Ukraine,
Speaker 1: what is happening, you know, in in Ethiopia, what's happening
Speaker 1: in these places, and just by virtue of watching it
Speaker 1: from here, how it is affecting all of us. So
Speaker 1: I hope that we will continue that conversation next week,
Speaker 1: dear friend, So good luck um and you know, and
Speaker 1: we will share the link when you send it along
Speaker 1: with this episode. We appreciate you. THANKI all right, folks,
Speaker 1: I am very happy to welcome back to wok F
Speaker 1: doctor Cameron Webb, who is Senior White House Policy Advisor
Speaker 1: for COVID equity for the Biden administration. Doctor Cameron, you
Speaker 1: don't join us. What will air tomorrow a couple of
Speaker 1: hours before the President's State of the Union. What can
Speaker 1: you tell us about what President Biden is going to
Speaker 1: offer with regard to where we are with COVID. We
Speaker 1: are experiencing a lot of guideline changes that came out
Speaker 1: by the CDC, a lot of vaccination and mass changes
Speaker 1: that we are seeing m state by state in my
Speaker 1: state of New York, which led the way in terms
Speaker 1: of how we were going to use mitigation efforts. So
Speaker 1: what can you tell us about where we are right now? Well,
Speaker 1: you know, I think the President, you know, tonight, in
Speaker 1: the State of the Union, he's going to speak to
Speaker 1: the arc of this pandemic over the last thirteen months,
Speaker 1: over the course of the Biden Harris administration thus far
Speaker 1: and in the tremendous progress that we've made and acknowledging that,
Speaker 1: but also acknowledging the tools that we've built up to
Speaker 1: fight this pandemic. We have more tools than ever before,
Speaker 1: from the masks, the high quality masks that are available,
Speaker 1: to testing home testing that you can do within thirty minutes,
Speaker 1: to the therapeutics you have with you, the monoclone antibodies
Speaker 1: in the the oral intelvirals that are critical to keeping
Speaker 1: people out of the hospital, keeping folks from dying, and
Speaker 1: then finally now two fully FDA approved vaccines that are
Speaker 1: highly effective, highly safe, and have been saving well over
Speaker 1: a million lives. At this point in time, I think
Speaker 1: thinking about all the tools that we have and how
Speaker 1: we are applying those in this moment. And so the
Speaker 1: President's going to speak to that, He's going to talk
Speaker 1: about how even with all of that, we can't get complacent.
Speaker 1: We can't, you know, think about these tools or think
Speaker 1: about the fact that cases and hospitalizations and depths are
Speaker 1: coming down from this omicroncert over the last couple of
Speaker 1: months and say the job's done. The job's not done.
Speaker 1: And what's critical is people continue to use and leverage
Speaker 1: those tools as appropriate in their community. To keep making progress,
Speaker 1: and if you see that things are moving in the
Speaker 1: wrong direction, make sure that we're ready to use those
Speaker 1: tools again because we've learned how to apply them, We've
Speaker 1: learned how to get the greatest benefit out of them,
Speaker 1: and that's how we're going to save lives. I think
Speaker 1: the President is going to speak to where we are
Speaker 1: and also where we're heading. So let me ask you
Speaker 1: this because I am one of those people that have
Speaker 1: a lot of anxiety. I have a lot of anxiety
Speaker 1: every time that we have guidelines that come out that
Speaker 1: shift things, that tell us, now, you know, we don't
Speaker 1: need to wear masks indoors, and we're going to have
Speaker 1: children start not to mask at schools. What do you
Speaker 1: say to people who, for this entire pandemic, not just
Speaker 1: during the course of the Biden Harris administration, but the
Speaker 1: entire pandemic, that have been doing the quote unquote right thing,
Speaker 1: that have been following all the guidelines and now have
Speaker 1: a deep sense of anxiety and concern about the mitigation
Speaker 1: efforts being rolled back. Well, you know a couple of things.
Speaker 1: I go back to an old phrase in the black
Speaker 1: community that when white America gets a cold, black America
Speaker 1: gets pneumonia. I think about the disproportionate impact this pandemic
Speaker 1: has had since the very beginning. So when you talk
Speaker 1: about that anxiety or those concerns, that that's shared across
Speaker 1: the community because of how disproportionately Black Americans have been
Speaker 1: hit by this pandemic. You know, just today in Virginia,
Speaker 1: the mask requirement was rolled back in schools, and my
Speaker 1: ten year old daughter could not sleep last night because
Speaker 1: she was worried about going to school today and kids
Speaker 1: not wearing masks. That's despite having two parents who are
Speaker 1: physicians who've explained this science, who've explained to her how
Speaker 1: her continuing to wear her K and ninety five mask
Speaker 1: is going to help really keep her safe. But she's worried,
Speaker 1: And I think that that comes from from a place.
Speaker 1: It comes from having family members who've had COVID, It
Speaker 1: comes from from having parents who are on the front
Speaker 1: line lines and worrying about what this pandemic, with this
Speaker 1: disease has done. So the first thing I tell you
Speaker 1: is that just because public health, local, state, or federal
Speaker 1: entity tells you to take off your mask, where you
Speaker 1: can take off your mask, doesn't mean you have to.
Speaker 1: And for me, personally, I'll continue to wear masks in
Speaker 1: public spaces as long as I continue to see cases
Speaker 1: and hospitalizations in my community to create that cause for concern,
Speaker 1: and I look to public health officials to give me
Speaker 1: a sense of what those levels of concern are. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, I'm always going to use an
Speaker 1: abundance of caution because what's at stake is my kids
Speaker 1: and their safety and their well being. It's my parents
Speaker 1: and their well being. I want to do everything I
Speaker 1: can to stay safe, so I give that encouragement just
Speaker 1: to say, if you take additional mitigation measures to stay safe,
Speaker 1: that's okay. And I think that a lot of people
Speaker 1: are going to continue to do that. I think the
Speaker 1: CDC guidance does nothing to discourage people from doing that.
Speaker 1: But I think that we have to keep in mind
Speaker 1: there's a countervailing opinion. There are a lot of people
Speaker 1: who say, I am so overmask I want nothing to
Speaker 1: do with masks. Unfortunately, it's because of how it's been politicized. Right,
Speaker 1: Masks in and of themselves are a political statement, but
Speaker 1: they've become that. I think that just making sure that
Speaker 1: people recognize this is a moment of less transmission, lower hospitalizations,
Speaker 1: fewer deaths. If there were a moment in the last
Speaker 1: several months where you can feel a little bit more
Speaker 1: confident that there's a largely immunized population and lower transmission,
Speaker 1: this might be a reasonable moment to take a break
Speaker 1: from masks. But keep in mind there are people with disabilities,
Speaker 1: keep in mind their immuno compromise folks. Keep in mind
Speaker 1: there are folks who are anxious or worried or have
Speaker 1: a higher level of concern because of what they've seen
Speaker 1: in their family and their community, and many of us
Speaker 1: are going to continue to wear masks. We can both coexist,
Speaker 1: but again, we all have to be pulling in the
Speaker 1: same direction. If the dynamics change, can I get I
Speaker 1: want to ask a question too with regard to the
Speaker 1: patterns that we have seen. Right, so, initially we saw alpha,
Speaker 1: the alpha variant of COVID. Then what was it? I
Speaker 1: would say, what eight months to a year, we then
Speaker 1: saw delta and then quickly Amicron followed that, what is
Speaker 1: the thought process of where we are with the patterns
Speaker 1: that we've seen, with there being new variants that come
Speaker 1: within six to eight months of each other, and taking
Speaker 1: these measures. Now, yeah, you know, I think that we're
Speaker 1: not at a point where you can say we get
Speaker 1: new variants every six months. Right. What we know is
Speaker 1: that there are dozens hundreds of different variants that are
Speaker 1: created by this virus every time it replicates. Where there's replication,
Speaker 1: there's the opportunity for mistakes in that replication that can
Speaker 1: create new variants if it creates a survival advantage for
Speaker 1: the virus. The thing to keep in mind is there
Speaker 1: was a lot of transmission around the world in folks
Speaker 1: who haven't been immunized against COVID nineteen. There are more
Speaker 1: folks who are vaccinating, more folks who are immunized, more
Speaker 1: folks who had natural immunity, and so there's less viral
Speaker 1: transmission than there were at certainly their points. So I
Speaker 1: don't want to create the expectation you're going to see
Speaker 1: new variants every six months, but I do think it's
Speaker 1: reasonable to think that there will be more variants in
Speaker 1: the future. I think where we are now is that
Speaker 1: we've got a little bit of experience with dealing with variants.
Speaker 1: We've got a little bit of experience of saying here's
Speaker 1: how you surge resources to different communities. So we don't
Speaker 1: see spikes like we've seen in the past. In the past,
Speaker 1: we have more tests available than we've ever had before.
Speaker 1: We have the ability to tell folks listen, when things
Speaker 1: are a little safer, we'll tell you can relax some
Speaker 1: of those masks requirements. But when things are more dangerous,
Speaker 1: we're going to tell you put those masks back on.
Speaker 1: We want you to trust us and trust the scientific
Speaker 1: rigor behind both of those recommendations. So I think that
Speaker 1: you know where we are. Yes, we're going to continue
Speaker 1: to see threats, but I think people just need to
Speaker 1: stay really attuned to the messaging coming from public health
Speaker 1: leaders and trust that its rooted in science. It's rooted
Speaker 1: in the interest of preventing spread, preventing hospitalizations, and preventing deaths.
Speaker 1: And if people buy into that notion, I think that
Speaker 1: it's going to help us as we move forward. Well,
Speaker 1: I know that you're not a psychiatrist, but I did
Speaker 1: want to touch upon the mental health aspects of the
Speaker 1: trauma that people have faced that we have as a collective,
Speaker 1: as a global citizens have faced with regard to COVID.
Speaker 1: We've seen spikes and suicide attempts, spikes and you know,
Speaker 1: overdoses with drugs and alcoholism. You know, do you think
Speaker 1: that we are talking enough as a nation, not just
Speaker 1: about the physical effects of COVID and long COVID, but
Speaker 1: that we're also having a conversations as a country about
Speaker 1: the emotional effects and the mental health exhaustion around COVID. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, the short answer is no, we're not talking
Speaker 1: enough about it. And you know, I lost a really
Speaker 1: close friend the suicide and the first year of the pandemic.
Speaker 1: My wife lost a really close friend and colleague to
Speaker 1: suicide in the first year of the pandemic. But that
Speaker 1: impact wasn't limited to just those early or days. It continues.
Speaker 1: The number of children who've lost guardians, lost parents, or
Speaker 1: grandparents that reverberates. That has a huge impact on families,
Speaker 1: has a huge impact on development, and even beyond that,
Speaker 1: the increase in substance abuse that we're seeing. You mentioned suicides.
Speaker 1: We just know there's a huge impact that this has
Speaker 1: from a mental health standpoint. The good news is that
Speaker 1: I do know that's a huge emphasis within the Biden
Speaker 1: Harris administration. I do know that we have an entire
Speaker 1: agency within the Department of Health and Human Services called
Speaker 1: SAMSA and actually The director is an African American woman,
Speaker 1: Miriam Delphin Ritman, who's a PhD from Yale. She's phenomenal leader,
Speaker 1: was leading in Connecticut before then. But she's taking a
Speaker 1: very equity focus lens to the mental health challenges that
Speaker 1: we're seeing in the setting of the pandemic. And she
Speaker 1: and I have traveled to cities around the country together
Speaker 1: to talk about mental health in this kind of twandemic
Speaker 1: of mental health crises, and so I think we have
Speaker 1: to continue to have those conversations, continue to lift that up,
Speaker 1: continue to normalize it because this has been a collective
Speaker 1: trauma for our communities and it continues to be and
Speaker 1: so we just have to have that perspective as we befoward.
Speaker 1: So finally, uh, doctor Webb, what are what are your
Speaker 1: what are your hopes as we you know, try to
Speaker 1: live in this new normal? Right the understanding that you know,
Speaker 1: while we're telling folks they can ease their mass uh
Speaker 1: pull you know, pull them down now that they can
Speaker 1: ease their mitigations, but that threats still remain. So what
Speaker 1: do what do you what is your message to people
Speaker 1: that are are feel off balanced, feel imbalanced by the
Speaker 1: messaging that they've received because they still believe that that
Speaker 1: threat is ever present and looming, and they're just waiting
Speaker 1: for that breaking newsticker to come across. That's right, you know.
Speaker 1: I think my hope is that ultimately, the way that
Speaker 1: people trust and engage with the public health experts in
Speaker 1: our country, it's a lot like the way they engage
Speaker 1: with the you know, the weather forecasters in their community.
Speaker 1: It's the reality that over the course of time, gonna
Speaker 1: have some moments that feel like hurricane season. You're gonna
Speaker 1: have some moments feel like a snowstorm, You're gonna have
Speaker 1: some moments that feel like a really sunny afternoon in July.
Speaker 1: And the recommendations are going to be different at different
Speaker 1: points in time based on the prediction, based on the
Speaker 1: evidence that scientist is sharing with you. But you trust
Speaker 1: that individual to be an honest broker and tell you
Speaker 1: what you're going to have to prepare for, what tools
Speaker 1: you're going to have to have to navigate the environment
Speaker 1: that you're going into in July or September or December.
Speaker 1: And I think that's what my hope is, is that
Speaker 1: we can use moments like this to say, hey, the
Speaker 1: temperature is getting a little bit better. Hey, the storm
Speaker 1: is calming down a little bit, and you can change
Speaker 1: what you're doing. If we get to that point of trust,
Speaker 1: If we can restore that dynamic of trust, I think
Speaker 1: that we have a chance to move forward really thoughtfully
Speaker 1: together with public health guidance rooted in science being our
Speaker 1: true north. That's really what my hope is, and I
Speaker 1: hope that just by communicating thoughtfully that that is our goal,
Speaker 1: you take a step in that direction. Doctor Cameron Webbitt's
Speaker 1: always good to see you. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: making the time to join Woke f and thank you
Speaker 1: for your continued work and effort not only with the
Speaker 1: entirety of the Abiden administration, but particularly adding a voice
Speaker 1: to the racial inequities that we have seen during the
Speaker 1: course of COVID nineteen. So we appreciate you. Thank you
Speaker 1: so much. Thanks for having me. Take care folks, for
Speaker 1: your moment of woke wellness. You know, today I went
Speaker 1: for about a little over a four mile walk. I
Speaker 1: had decided that I was going to go to bed
Speaker 1: right when I was tired. I find that we don't
Speaker 1: often peel ourselves away from the news from social media,
Speaker 1: particularly these days, as things just get grim. You know,
Speaker 1: remember when your parents or your caregivers used to set
Speaker 1: a bed time for you and say, all right, lights out,
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's seven o'clock, it's eight o'clock, depending
Speaker 1: on what age you are. I think that in order
Speaker 1: for us to preserve our mental health get the rest
Speaker 1: that we need because we're also physically and emotionally exhausted,
Speaker 1: that we need to bring back the bedtime. We need
Speaker 1: to put ourselves to bed and start with deciding an
Speaker 1: hour before, right, because this is what all of the
Speaker 1: reports and science will say, an hour before you are
Speaker 1: actually ready to put your head on the pillow, put
Speaker 1: your phones on, do not disturb, log out of social
Speaker 1: media for the day. Begin to quiet your mind at
Speaker 1: least an hour before you are ready to rest, so
Speaker 1: that you are beginning to send your body and your
Speaker 1: mind signals that the day is done. I have been
Speaker 1: My friends have been joking me, because friends, most days,
Speaker 1: I will be in bed by nine thirty ten o'clock
Speaker 1: at night, like I am done. There's no reason for
Speaker 1: me to stay up just to binge watch another episode
Speaker 1: of blah blah blah, right, like I need. What I
Speaker 1: recognize is that I need my strength, and in order
Speaker 1: to have my strength and to have my health, I
Speaker 1: need to have rest. And so I've begun my own
Speaker 1: process of logging myself out of things and then beginning,
Speaker 1: you know, to have a nighttime ritual. How I'm putting
Speaker 1: myself to bed as an adult, and I'm telling you
Speaker 1: I am sleeping better, i am waking earlier and feeling
Speaker 1: like I can do more. And when I need to
Speaker 1: during the day, I rest right because I'm still fortunate
Speaker 1: enough to work from home right and make my schedule
Speaker 1: that I can also allow my body to tell me
Speaker 1: what it needs instead of me telling my body what
Speaker 1: it needs. So try, friends, a nighttime wine down ritual,
Speaker 1: and if you have one, tell us in the comment
Speaker 1: sections what you do to begin your wine down so
Speaker 1: that you can all be a little less jittery when
Speaker 1: we awake in the morning. That, friends, was your woke
Speaker 1: moment of wellness. Stay well and stay woke as fuck.
Speaker 1: That is it for me today, folks, on this Woke Wednesday.
Speaker 1: As always, Power to the people and to all the people. Power,
Speaker 1: get woke and stay woke as fuck.