Speaker 1: Good morning, peeps, and welcome to Okay EFFI Daily with
Speaker 1: me your Girl, Danielle Moody, recording live from Podstream Studios
Speaker 1: here in Times Square, Folks, I am going to get
Speaker 1: into a very in depth conversation with our friend and
Speaker 1: in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel about where we are
Speaker 1: with COVID nineteen and kind of unpacking the confusion around
Speaker 1: the booster shots. Do we get them, do we not
Speaker 1: get them? Are they going to be widely available? Are
Speaker 1: they not going to be widely available? But before we
Speaker 1: get into that conversation with Jonathan, this breaking news has
Speaker 1: just come in, which is this. According to MSNBC, COVID
Speaker 1: nineteen has now killed about as many Americans as the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighteen nineteen nineteen Spanish flu pandemic. And let's just
Speaker 1: say this if you are unclear about where the number
Speaker 1: stands right now, is that right now, COVID nineteen has
Speaker 1: killed six hundred and seventy five thousand Americans. Think about
Speaker 1: that for a moment. Six hundred and seventy five thousand
Speaker 1: Americans have lost their lives through this pandemic. We know
Speaker 1: that a large portion of those that lost their lives
Speaker 1: happened in twenty twenty, before there was a vaccine that
Speaker 1: was eligible, before we knew that we were going to
Speaker 1: have a vaccine, and we were still understanding how this
Speaker 1: virus was working and moving. It's so hard for me
Speaker 1: to really think about where we were last year, when
Speaker 1: we were applauding healthcare workers, when we were sending encouraging
Speaker 1: notes and sending pizzas and cupcakes to hospitals, and now
Speaker 1: a year later, we're holding protests and taking horse hormones
Speaker 1: and doing everything and anything that we can to either
Speaker 1: deny the fact that COVID nineteen exists, to really trample
Speaker 1: on the memories of those who have lost loved ones.
Speaker 1: And let me remind you, I am one of those people. Right.
Speaker 1: My family lost my step grandmother just a couple of
Speaker 1: you know, when you look at it, November will be
Speaker 1: a year. Right. She was a very healthy, vibrant, seventy
Speaker 1: something year old woman who got COVID and within three
Speaker 1: weeks was gone. There are so many Americans now that
Speaker 1: have that story. Because when we think about the six
Speaker 1: hundred and seventy five thousand people that have lost their lives,
Speaker 1: how many families, how many friends, we are getting to
Speaker 1: a place where every single one of us will know
Speaker 1: someone close to us that will have been lost to
Speaker 1: this virus. And yet we still have politicians going on
Speaker 1: television spreading lies and we do nothing. They're not fine,
Speaker 1: they're not jailed, they're not called treasonous. It's just the
Speaker 1: way of the world now. And what I want folks
Speaker 1: to understand two and this it will be part of
Speaker 1: the conversation that I have with Jonathan later, is the
Speaker 1: fact that there is no going back to normal. And
Speaker 1: I understand that that is an overwhelming thing to wrap
Speaker 1: our minds around, because to me, pre COVID life seems
Speaker 1: lifetimes away. It seems like I don't even really remember
Speaker 1: what happened in twenty nineteen. I don't really remember what
Speaker 1: it was like to get on the train and not
Speaker 1: double mask, or to not want to sit next to people,
Speaker 1: or to go to large events. Now, of course, there
Speaker 1: are people who have been acting like nothing has changed
Speaker 1: over the course of the last nineteen months and continuing
Speaker 1: on with their selfish ways with life is normal. But
Speaker 1: it's not. And no matter how many types of gas
Speaker 1: lighting that the Republican Party tries to throw our way,
Speaker 1: I mean, go and talk to your local mortician, Go
Speaker 1: to the local funeral home, Go to the local hospital,
Speaker 1: and not for a protest, but to talk with healthcare workers, right,
Speaker 1: who can tell you firsthand what they've been seeing and
Speaker 1: what they've been going through. Go sit down with one
Speaker 1: of the members of your community. I'm sure there are
Speaker 1: many that have lost loved ones to the pandemic. This
Speaker 1: is something that I don't think that America is ever
Speaker 1: going to get over. And when we finally have some
Speaker 1: distance between us and this pandemic, I can't wait to
Speaker 1: see what is going to be written, because my assumption
Speaker 1: is that it's going to be the same kind of
Speaker 1: bullshit that's written about slavery, or not written at all. Right,
Speaker 1: we're going to pretend that Americans were all together, and
Speaker 1: we're going to pretend that there wasn't divisiveness, and we're
Speaker 1: going to pretend that doctors and healthcare workers weren't being
Speaker 1: beaten up or threatened. Right, We're going to pretend that
Speaker 1: Americans were united and that we were patriots and that
Speaker 1: we face this problem together. That will be the fucking
Speaker 1: fiction that is fed to children generations from now, if
Speaker 1: in fact the planet is still around. You know, because
Speaker 1: we also ignore the fact that climate change is ravaging
Speaker 1: this country as well as this health pandemic. You know,
Speaker 1: it's a troubling place that we are in, and what
Speaker 1: continues to come up for me is that this is
Speaker 1: just the way things are, and I feel that that's
Speaker 1: what is getting my spirits down. And why I say
Speaker 1: to folks, we got to be very conscious of boosting
Speaker 1: our own serotonin levels, of creating protective boundaries around ourselves,
Speaker 1: around our loved ones, so that we don't allow these
Speaker 1: you know, joy vacuums to steal. You know, what goodness,
Speaker 1: what little bit of goodness does exist on a day
Speaker 1: to day basis, But it is our job to find
Speaker 1: that goodness, to find those silver linings, because there is
Speaker 1: just so many clouds around us everywhere that we look.
Speaker 1: And so friends, you know, as we go through and
Speaker 1: have this conversation with Jonathan and unpack where we are currently,
Speaker 1: I will again reiterate that it is important for you
Speaker 1: to ground yourself in something other than misery. And I'm
Speaker 1: not telling you to not pay attention, but I'm saying
Speaker 1: to do so in sparingly ways. Protect your spirit, protect
Speaker 1: your energy, and protect yourselves so that you have the
Speaker 1: strength and the wherewithal to be able to navigate during
Speaker 1: these hard pressed times. Coming up next, dear friends, is
Speaker 1: my conversation with our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel
Speaker 1: to unpack what is the latest and what we need
Speaker 1: to know with regard to COVID. The booster is, the
Speaker 1: FDA and the CDC. I am always so pleased to
Speaker 1: work through the apocalyptic present that we are living in
Speaker 1: with our friend, our in house doctor, doctor Jonathan Metzel,
Speaker 1: the most patient man in America. Jonathan. One of the
Speaker 1: things that I wanted to talk to you about that
Speaker 1: happened at the end of last week was the FISER
Speaker 1: board voting against the booster shots, right the expansion of
Speaker 1: the booster shots outside of sixty five and up who
Speaker 1: have pre existing conditions, and the board deciding that now
Speaker 1: is not the time for that booster shot, but then
Speaker 1: coming back and saying that it's fine for those that
Speaker 1: are sixty five and older. Can you talk about this
Speaker 1: voting and why they voted against the booster shot, and
Speaker 1: then why the administration initially came out and said everybody
Speaker 1: needs a booster and the boosters will be widely available
Speaker 1: in October, and now that is not the case, and
Speaker 1: because this back and forth, right, like even I was
Speaker 1: sitting at home with my family, My mother, because she
Speaker 1: had brain surgery last year, would be eligible. My dad, no,
Speaker 1: he would He would not be because he doesn't have
Speaker 1: a pre existing condition and is not in the age
Speaker 1: range category, but they were. My mother, who is a
Speaker 1: retired registered nurse. It like everything just seems so confusing.
Speaker 1: And we're sitting there and we're very studied and like
Speaker 1: thoughtful people, and we're like, what the hell is going on?
Speaker 1: So can you walk us through the decision by Fizer,
Speaker 1: then the voting of no, then the voting of yes,
Speaker 1: and how it is in contrast to what the administration
Speaker 1: had said, which is then in contrast to what the
Speaker 1: CDC said with regard to the booster shot. Well, it's
Speaker 1: certainly confusing, and I understand that people are confused. I
Speaker 1: mean people have to realize, first of all, this is
Speaker 1: happening in real time, right, It's we're what are we
Speaker 1: It feels like nine thousand years into this pandemic, but
Speaker 1: it's pretty much really it really is, like you know
Speaker 1: it's so but you know, it's going to take us
Speaker 1: ten years to figure out what exactly the right thing
Speaker 1: is to do here, I will say, and you you can.
Speaker 1: I feely feel pretty strongly that what's going to happen
Speaker 1: here a couple things. First of all, boosters are going
Speaker 1: to become much more than norm. I think the problem
Speaker 1: was the file that was given to the FDA had
Speaker 1: just a very low number of cases, so it wasn't
Speaker 1: convincing data from a kind of mass population standpoint to
Speaker 1: justify everybody getting a booster, and so I think they
Speaker 1: were rightly skeptical because what's called the end the number
Speaker 1: of people who who were in the study was just
Speaker 1: not high enough to know what's the benefit of this.
Speaker 1: But there is a lot of research happening in places
Speaker 1: like Israel where boosters are very widespread that I think
Speaker 1: is showing that the boosters increase antibodies, they increase defense
Speaker 1: as they give you probably another six months of protection,
Speaker 1: and things like that. So I do think that's where
Speaker 1: we're going. The issue is though, that now the whole
Speaker 1: world needs to get vaccines, and so as we move
Speaker 1: toward I mean, this was just the beginning of the
Speaker 1: decisions about boosters. Again, I'm very certain that boosters are
Speaker 1: going to become the norm going forward, because they work.
Speaker 1: I mean, the study is in Israel, for example, and
Speaker 1: a Jay and Jay study that came out today showed
Speaker 1: a real significant benefit at least in the short immediate
Speaker 1: term from boosters in the face of what we're finding
Speaker 1: to be waning efficacy unfortunately from the vaccines over time.
Speaker 1: But the issue is also going to be a supply issue,
Speaker 1: because more important than boosters are getting everybody in Africa vaccinated,
Speaker 1: getting everybody in South America vaccinated. And so I think
Speaker 1: that we're going to like there's a moment now where
Speaker 1: there's just a lot of surplus in the United States.
Speaker 1: And I think the one downside of the way this
Speaker 1: is playing out is that boosters are going to become
Speaker 1: more the norm as potentially supply goes down. And I
Speaker 1: think that's what I think, That's what I don't know,
Speaker 1: but I think that's what the Biden iministration was trying
Speaker 1: to do, is to push the boosters even as they
Speaker 1: obviously we're you know, we're giving a lot of buyers,
Speaker 1: a lot of vaccine to other parts of the world
Speaker 1: right now. Um, But so I think it's not the
Speaker 1: it's not the end of this story. It was just
Speaker 1: that the file that was given to the FDA didn't
Speaker 1: have enough sample stuff. But again I don't I think
Speaker 1: that what was anticipated to happen will probably be happening
Speaker 1: pretty soon, because again, there was an eleven thousand person
Speaker 1: study in Israel and it did show that the vaccines
Speaker 1: we're kind of doing what what we thought. The initial
Speaker 1: you know, the boosters are are pretty helpful. So let
Speaker 1: me ask you this too, because again I'm I'm not
Speaker 1: a medical doctor, is what is the difference between a
Speaker 1: booster and your second shot of the vaccine. So, for instance,
Speaker 1: if I'm concerned, right, I got my maderna shot at
Speaker 1: the beginning of this year, right, And so now we're
Speaker 1: moving into a place where I'm just like, am I
Speaker 1: still covered? Right? I obviously live in New York, So
Speaker 1: we're wearing masks and you know, and you have to
Speaker 1: be vaccinated to be inside, and you know, and wearing
Speaker 1: masks even still and trying to stay outside for as
Speaker 1: long as possible until you know it's unbearable, and then
Speaker 1: I'll probably just go back into my Brooklyn bunker for
Speaker 1: the winter. But what is the difference between a booster
Speaker 1: shot and me going into you know, one of the
Speaker 1: pharmacies and just getting another shot of the vaccine just
Speaker 1: so that people understand, like what is there a difference
Speaker 1: and what you know and what that is. Well, I
Speaker 1: mean no, I'm just saying there's so much to say
Speaker 1: about this right now, and so part of the issue
Speaker 1: is so remember we were just saying that you have initially,
Speaker 1: you have your antibody response in your your blood, and
Speaker 1: then you have memory cells because you you can't have
Speaker 1: too many. Like if you add antibodies to every foreign
Speaker 1: pathogen that you came across, you know, dirt and your
Speaker 1: neighbor's terrible music and all these kind of things you
Speaker 1: your you wouldn't have blood because you have so many antibodies.
Speaker 1: So your your antibodies are like your first line of defense,
Speaker 1: and then your your blood then also creates these these
Speaker 1: longer term kind of like a stockpile stored away somewhere
Speaker 1: of defense and so um. So boosters stimulate the antibody response.
Speaker 1: That's why people after they get boosters applied for two, three,
Speaker 1: four weeks, they could walk through the valley of COVID
Speaker 1: and not get it, which isn't what they do long term,
Speaker 1: whereas the long term cells basically they you can get
Speaker 1: infected if you have not antibodies but these longer term cells.
Speaker 1: But the minute it's in your then they mobilize. And
Speaker 1: that's why people don't get as sick is because these
Speaker 1: long term cells won't let the virus take over your lungs,
Speaker 1: for example, or other kinds of dramatic effects. And so
Speaker 1: there are like two lines of defense, and the boosters
Speaker 1: are just are just stimulating that in the face of
Speaker 1: what looks like potentially waning immunity from the vaccines. And
Speaker 1: so I mean TBD about how this is all really
Speaker 1: going to play out. I mean, I personally thought a
Speaker 1: couple months ago that the way the boosters were going
Speaker 1: to play out was we were actually going to get
Speaker 1: boosters that were specifically targeted toward the delta variant. But
Speaker 1: I don't know. That seems to have cooled down a
Speaker 1: little bit, so we'll have to see what happens. I mean,
Speaker 1: I certainly think that. Remember we called the coronavirus like
Speaker 1: a million years ago, the novel coronavirus, right because it's
Speaker 1: band new, so no humans had any defense against it.
Speaker 1: And really, every time you get something like a shot,
Speaker 1: you're just you're just teaching your teach your body to
Speaker 1: defend itself against this brand new threat. The hard part
Speaker 1: is there are vaccines, and we were hopeful this would
Speaker 1: be the case that stop a virus dead in its tracks,
Speaker 1: like the polio vaccine, for example. After years and years
Speaker 1: of trying, we found a vaccine that stopped polio dead
Speaker 1: in its tracks. But unfortunately, because covid is an airborne virus,
Speaker 1: it's just like there's too much of it kind of
Speaker 1: floating out there in the air. And so part of
Speaker 1: the issue is the covid vaccine I don't think right
Speaker 1: now is ever really going to function like the polio
Speaker 1: vaccine where you just get it once and you're done
Speaker 1: and you're not going to get it or something like that.
Speaker 1: So this is this is a lot of kind of
Speaker 1: learning in real time right now, as like our economic
Speaker 1: and political systems, you know, stry to screare everything up.
Speaker 1: So I think, I mean, honestly optimistically, I hope we're
Speaker 1: getting there again. I would follow places that have you know,
Speaker 1: politics aside, read that online newspapers of places that are
Speaker 1: doing a lot of a lot of boosters, just to
Speaker 1: see how they're reporting on it, Like I read arts
Speaker 1: the Israeli paper as often as I can um other
Speaker 1: places that are doing vaccine, that are doing boosters, like
Speaker 1: just seeing it, you can see for me it's no
Speaker 1: big deal. Just go get another shot at CVS or
Speaker 1: something like that. But but I think we'll have to see.
Speaker 1: I mean the downside, and I apologize there's a lot
Speaker 1: of information at once, But the downside is we know
Speaker 1: that boosters shorten your immediate Boosters give you an immediate
Speaker 1: immediate defense, but we don't know a year from now. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so we're figuring it out. But again I would err
Speaker 1: on the side of boosters personally. Um so, but we
Speaker 1: just don't And and do we know for instance, um again,
Speaker 1: I was vaccinated at the beginning of this year. Do
Speaker 1: we know the efficacy of the vaccine? You know now
Speaker 1: that it's been eight months, right, it's been seven or
Speaker 1: eight months since I was initially vaccinated. The efficacy of
Speaker 1: the vaccine, like how it is how long does it
Speaker 1: take for it to start weaning or not being as effective? Well, again,
Speaker 1: we're figuring that out. You're in good shape. You're in
Speaker 1: good shape because you've got the maderna which I think
Speaker 1: it's a higher dose of a shot than the visor.
Speaker 1: And so again, the Israeli data was all from Visor
Speaker 1: and they found about six to eight months that that's
Speaker 1: when people started seeing like we didn't even know. Imagine
Speaker 1: over the summer, early in the summer, we didn't even
Speaker 1: know they were breakthrough infections. Remember how shocking all that was.
Speaker 1: And what we found was they were breakthrough infections six
Speaker 1: months to eight months into it, and people weren't remember
Speaker 1: these people were getting infected because they didn't have antibodies,
Speaker 1: but then the memory cells were largely protecting them from
Speaker 1: severe illness. And so I think that the key question
Speaker 1: a high level of anti bodies is how long does
Speaker 1: that memory self protection last? And that's really the million
Speaker 1: dollars question right now? How long is that memory self
Speaker 1: protection last? Right? But unfortunately, the issue is going to
Speaker 1: be there's not going to be a world except Tennessee
Speaker 1: on the party bus where we're not going to also
Speaker 1: have to be doing all the other stuff, right, So
Speaker 1: it's it's also going to be we're still going to
Speaker 1: be wearing you know, our favorite mask and you know,
Speaker 1: all those kind of things. We're still going to be
Speaker 1: doing that for a while. So this is people say
Speaker 1: it's the new normal. I think it's the new abnormal.
Speaker 1: But this is the world we're living in right now.
Speaker 1: All in all, it's good to have a vaccine, you know,
Speaker 1: But I mean, I think, you know, the reality, the
Speaker 1: reality is stark, right. You know, we were kind of
Speaker 1: at the beginning of this pandemic, you and I were
Speaker 1: talking about the fact that well, the you know, the
Speaker 1: Spanish flu lasted for two years. Well we're moving into
Speaker 1: nineteen months, right of COVID being an exist on the planet,
Speaker 1: and because of Republicans, right, we're never getting rid of it, right.
Speaker 1: And the reality is is that the desire to go
Speaker 1: back to normal normals seem so far from where we
Speaker 1: are right now. And I don't think that we're going back.
Speaker 1: I do think that this is the new normal. I
Speaker 1: think that getting regular shots, wearing masks are going to
Speaker 1: be like our future. I don't see twenty twenty two
Speaker 1: being any different than twenty twenty other than the fact
Speaker 1: that we have, you know, a vaccine and we'll have boosters.
Speaker 1: But I don't see how it's really that different. And
Speaker 1: I guess that's my last question for you, is you know,
Speaker 1: I don't see there being much of a difference in
Speaker 1: twenty twenty two to where we are right now, or
Speaker 1: twenty twenty three or twenty twenty four. What are you
Speaker 1: thinking about as the calendar moves on and you know,
Speaker 1: and we're four months, you know, away from the new year. Well,
Speaker 1: think about those first months of pandemic here in New
Speaker 1: York where it was NonStop sirens. I mean, that was
Speaker 1: that was about for our lifetimes as traumatizing a time
Speaker 1: as you can imagine. And so I just want to
Speaker 1: emphasize that we are in a much better place than
Speaker 1: we were then where we had no idea what we're
Speaker 1: doing and we had no treatment. So now we have
Speaker 1: a treatment and we also know. I mean, it just
Speaker 1: depends how you look at it. Like I'm I feel like,
Speaker 1: as I said before, there's an apex predator on our
Speaker 1: planet who's not us, But that apex predator has gifted
Speaker 1: us the outdoors. Right, you can go outside. I'm pretty
Speaker 1: much not worry about COVID, So it lets us go
Speaker 1: outside and we have to probably get shots until we
Speaker 1: figure out a better long term plans. So for me,
Speaker 1: that's better than those first couple months of pandemic where
Speaker 1: everybody was dying like that was. That was horrific, and
Speaker 1: it's still happening in parts of the country. So on
Speaker 1: a medical and public health standpoint, we're a lot better
Speaker 1: off than we were in the beginning. But the problem
Speaker 1: is now it becomes not just about medical treatment, it's
Speaker 1: about functioning political systems. And our political system is so
Speaker 1: dysfunctional that it really is putting us behind the curve
Speaker 1: if you compare us to New Zealand or Iceland or
Speaker 1: you know, Fluto, pretty much anywhere else in the galaxy,
Speaker 1: because our political system is so fractured and becoming so
Speaker 1: much more fractured because you know, you can either you
Speaker 1: can engage with public health or you can weaponize public health,
Speaker 1: and it's just being weaponized way too much right now.
Speaker 1: That is it for Today's Woke, a f daily podcast.
Speaker 1: To hear more from today's show, including my full interview
Speaker 1: with doctor Jonathan Metzel, support me on Patreon at patreon
Speaker 1: dot com Slash Woke AF Power to the people and
Speaker 1: to all the people. Power, get woke and stay woke
Speaker 1: as fuck.