Bloomberg Businessweek Daily Live From NYSE with LifeMD (Part One)

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1:47Carol Massar:Podcasts. Radio. News. This is Bloomberg Business Week Daily, reporting from the magazine that helps global leaders stay ahead with insight on the people, companies and trends shaping today's complex economy. Plus, global business, finance and tech news as it happens. The Bloomberg Business Week Daily podcast with Carol Masser and Tim Stenevek on Bloomberg Radio. We are doing a special deep dive Bloomberg Business Week Daily. We're talking about health technology and health care. And more on that specifically when it relates to women's care. And there's been some research that's out. Yeah, the Menopause Society reporting that osteoporosis, which is highly prevalent in postmenopausal women, has long been associated with an increased risk of fractures.

2:35There's a new study that suggests it may also increase women's overall risk of death by as much as 47%, especially within specific ranges of bone mineral density. Results of the study were published just last week in Menopause, the journal of the Menopause Society.

2:48Carol Massar:And it's not just women. It's men, too, although women have a higher prevalence than men. Let's get into this. It's somebody we've talked to before about this area. It's great to have back with us, Dr. Doug Lucas. He's an orthopedic surgeon leading the clinical side for bone health and longevity science over at LifeMD. He's here in studio. He also has his own YouTube show. It's called the Dr. Doug Show, Longevity Through Bone Health. Welcome back. Nice to talk with you again. Thank you for having me back. I have to say, I was surprised. I think we were surprised kind of reading in that, yes, it impacts both men and women, but it's more prevalent.

3:19Carol Massar:It seems to be much more discussed about for women. Why is that? Well, it's... I'm not complaining. I'm glad we get attention somewhere. But it impacts all of us as we age. True. It is more common in women simply because women have lower bone density to start with. So men just have a bigger room to lose bone density before they actually reach that threshold of osteoporosis. So when we think about it from what new research has told us or given us, is there any indication that we can start doing stuff earlier for preventive measures, eating differently? Last time you were on, we talked a lot about what's being done with hormone replacement therapy.

4:01What does the data say? What do the data say? Yeah, so the challenge with osteoporosis is that in the conventional model, we really look at it as a chronic disease. And like most chronic diseases in the conventional model, we tend to just think pharmacology or maybe surgery. But like most chronic diseases, osteoporosis does respond really well to dietary interventions, exercise interventions, potentially even some over-the-counter supplement type things, depending on what your diet looks like. So there is a lot of room for opportunity to actually improve bone density. How early, though? Yeah. Well, we start losing bone in our early 30s, both men and women.

4:38So I would argue let's start as early as possible. Let's learn what our bone density is, what our trajectory is, and then intervene when we need to.

4:47Carol Massar:Are the health insurers game for this, for you to start early? Because it just feels like there's so many parameters about what's okay in terms of testing. Yeah, it's difficult with insurance because insurance is generally going to want to pay for the doctor's visit and the drugs if you need them, if you qualify for them. prevention is challenging in our conventional medical mind. Why is that? Why is that? We're supposed to be about preventive medicine. We've been talking about that for years. And yet? Well, we're better than we used to be. So now some preventive services are covered. But the system as it's built is just not good at educating on nutrition in a way that's meaningful for bone health, especially.

5:25Not good at focusing on sleep because these things take time. They take a lot of question and answers and back and forth and accountability. And the system is just not built for it. But I guess what I don't understand is in the long run, wouldn't they save the safe resources? Would it mean less stress on the system? And by system, you know, I mean for our own bodies, but also the health system. I mean, financially, if we could prevent chronic disease, of course, the system would spend less on chronic disease. There just isn't a way that I can see in the system to do that.

5:54Carol Massar:Yeah. I mean, I think about this, too. I was thinking about your YouTube and what you must focus on, and I don't know if people can call in and ask questions, but I mean, what are we all doing wrong when it comes to bone health? So if we have to be kind of our own activist and advocate, what should we be doing from age 30 on? Well, I love looking at, you mentioned my YouTube channel, the longevity piece, right? I love looking at bone health through the lens of longevity because I think every 30-year-old wants to live as long and as healthy as possible. and when you look at it through bone health, it gives you a recipe for that.

6:28So the diet that's good for bone health is good for your brain, it's good for your heart, it's good for your skin, it's good for your energy, it's good for your sleep, right? So focusing on eating a protein-forward whole foods diet gives you all the tools that you need. Exercise that gets you out and moving, resistance training for your muscles, potentially impact for your bones if you can tolerate that. Those are the foundational pieces. And you can just keep stacking on top of that. Better sleep, better mindset, potentially hormone optimization for those that qualify. Yeah, I mean, the food, there's a lot of stuff that we can dive into here.

6:57I want to dive into the food part a little bit. Do you think there's a misunderstanding? Oh, I take notes. Well, do you think there's a misunderstanding about, like, saturated fats, fats? Because if you think about a protein-forward diet, some people might say, wait a second, if I'm going to eat all that yogurt, for example, to get all that protein, then I'm going to just blow past what the USDA recommends for, or FDA recommends for saturated fats. Are we a little behind when it comes to this stuff? It's challenging because if you look at the saturated fat recommendations, it's for the entire population.

7:26But the entire population is not sensitive in a bad way to saturated fat. So we have to kind of step away from these global recommendations from a nutrition perspective and start getting really individualized. What I need to eat, what you need to eat, what you need to eat are all different. So, yes, I think saturated fat and dietary fat in general has been demonized in a bad way. And so people are afraid of it. And that does result in less protein, especially from animal sources being consumed.

7:51Carol Massar:Like, I do think about that with nutritionists. Like, should we all be seeing a nutritionist early? Like, I can see your kind of, your facial expression, not so sure. Why? So nutrition's a very challenging space. There is honestly not great research because it's difficult to do nutrition research in a randomized control trial meaningful way. There's too many inputs. So a lot of the older mindset in the nutrition space is really set off of these dogmas from the 50s, the 70s, the saturated fat, dietary fat restriction that really no longer applies. It has been hurting us for a long time. Doctor, always good to see you.

8:29Thanks for having me. Thanks. Thanks so much for joining us on the program today.

8:33Carol Massar:Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Businessweek Daily coming up after this. Amazon Health AI presents Painful Thoughts I, um, I can't stop scratching my downtown Yeah, but I'm not itching to go downtown and tell a receptionist I'm here to talk about my downtown Some things you'd rather type than say out loud There's no question too embarrassing for Amazon Health AI Chat your symptoms and get virtual care 24-7 Healthcare just got less painful. Support for the show comes from Public. Public is an investing platform that offers access to stocks, options, bonds, and crypto. And they've also integrated AI with tools that can assist investors in building customized portfolios.

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11:41Carol Massar:Yes, we talk a lot about tech lately, but health care, we've certainly seen companies over the years make their mark here at the exchange. And on health care and really public health, you remember last week we were talking about the Hantavirus with Dr. Amy Chidalja of Johns Hopkins. Now we're actually talking about Ebola. The U.S. has banned non-U.S. citizens traveling to the Democratic Republic of the Congo, South Sudan, or Uganda for the next 30 days to curb the spread of a deadly Ebola outbreak. It terrifies me. We've got a great voice, though, to talk about this. She served for more than two decades as a top federal government health official in the administration of four U.S.

12:15Carol Massar:presidents. And so we are delighted to have back with us Dr. Susan Blumenthal. She's retired rear admiral, former U.S. assistant surgeon general, and the first-ever deputy assistant secretary for women's health. I could go on and on and on, but we've run through. But you are, we love talking with you, your experience, your background. You've seen so much. When we talk about Ebola or a new virus, how do you think about these? I mean, is it just a matter of time before there's something that is akin to what we got with the coronavirus? Well, I think that what we need to realize is that there are more than 40 different infectious diseases circulating right now.

12:52Carol Massar:And that infectious diseases have killed more people than war. And that's why we need to stay vigilant against them. We need to keep our public health infrastructure strong and our ability for preparedness and response. And we're at a time where that's being deconstructed. And that's where the new tools of technology can help. AI is already helping us to really do predictive modeling about where outbreaks will occur and what the patterns might be. But we need to stay vigilant against these invisible enemies. Will the predictive models be enough or do we also have to make sure we've got the infrastructure, whether it's in government and in our health organizations?

13:31Carol Massar:We need to have the infrastructure. I mean, this is critical. And one thing that we need to do in rebuilding infrastructure and reimagining it is to build a seamless system of data and predictive analytics. And that means because when we saw in covid, some of our public health departments still were using fax machines and we weren't doing real time data monitoring. So we had to scrape the system to find different data sources, and we need to find new methodology, and AI will help to do this as we move forward in this decade and beyond. How does trust fit into this? Trust? Yeah, the question really that I have is, we talked about this with Dr.

14:08Adalja last week, is that if we think back to the Biden administration and, you know, during COVID and post-COVID, there was a lot of skepticism from the right, including people like Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who's now HHS secretary, about the COVID vaccines. He gets into power. Now he's communicating things from that perch. And there's an entirely different group of people who are skeptical of what he says. So now you have two different groups that are skeptical of what the government has said.

14:32Carol Massar:Well, it's very dangerous because vaccines were a landmark public health accomplishment of the last century and continue new kinds of vaccines being developed, like with mRNA. This has saved so many lives. You know, we wouldn't let our defense system decay, but we're letting our public health system decay. And this is a dangerous thing for the American people and people worldwide. You're talking about military defense, correct? Yeah, absolutely. Military defense. Because we want to have the shiniest missiles and methods of defending ourselves, but we're tearing down the defense for human beings in terms of our health.

15:09Carol Massar:Dr. Blumenthal, I'm so glad you went there because we talk about, you know, the size of budgets that we're talking about, what, one and a half trillion dollars or something, you know, extensive spending. And then there's cutbacks in other parts of the government. I mean, do you think this is a one administration thing or do you think whoever comes in next, we get back to a government that is more involved in these issues? Well, as the poet Emerson said, can we afford to? So as the poet Emerson said, health is the first wealth. You know, health is not only important to a foundation of our lives, but it's an economic issue.

15:44Carol Massar:We spend over$4 trillion on health care in America. We get the right treatment only 50 percent of the time. We rank 42nd on life expectancy. And there's a 20-year life expectancy differential based on your zip code in America. That's just a fragmented system. We need to do better. Fragmented and flawed, right? And that's why, again, new technology tools will help us move forward. And when it comes to women's health, I think this is an area that's been long neglected. It's a design flaw era because women were excluded from the research studies on heart disease and lung cancer. These are the number one killer of women is heart disease.

16:23Carol Massar:Lung cancer is the number one cancer killer of women. And yet women were excluded from those studies and prevention trials when we got people to stop smoking or to look at the 20 percent of people who don't smoke, four times as many are women. Why? So, again, we need to use AI and other technology tools to look at the patterns. We need to use it for discovery. We need to use it for access with telehealth and mobile devices to improve access in underserved areas and to do prevention. Why do we still need to be our own advocate? And I say that I'm a little bit older. I'm proud of it. But it's just I actually went to a doctor, not my GP, a specialist, not a heart specialist.

17:01Carol Massar:But she said, nothing wrong, but you should make sure you go to a doctor and get XYZ done, just as like a base thing. Like, because she was a woman, and just saying things are overlooked when it comes to women and heart health and some different things. Well, again, you know, our health care system, it was a design flaw. Women were excluded, and therefore, so many of the clinical recommendations are based on data from men. But you've been a doctor for how long? Like, women have been in the profession, right? So I built infrastructure for women's health. I know you did. It got mainstreamed. We were talking about all these issues 30 years ago.

17:37Carol Massar:But now we have to bring an innovation agenda back. What you were talking about, the misinformation that's out there. We need to use new tech tools to create a new communication environment because healthy messaging has to get out there. Are the incentives aligned for all the different stakeholders right now? Helen, I'm talking patients, I'm talking doctors, I'm talking hospital systems, I'm talking insurance companies. Well, as Hippocrates says, prevention is preferable to cure. But most of the funding has gone to treatment-oriented solutions. You know, women are 50 % of the population. They make 80 % of the health care decisions.

18:15Carol Massar:They make 85 % of purchases. And yet their health has been neglected. Only 6 percent of health care investing, private health care investing, has gone to women's health. And only 2 percent of venture capital has gone to women's health. Yet McKinsey has said, because women live longer on average in every country, in America it's five years, they live longer but 25 percent greater disability. If we invested in women's health, it's, McKinsey says, a$1 trillion boost to the economy by 2040 because of lower health care costs, more productivity. Seems like a no-brainer. A no-brainer. And so that's what, you know, this new sort of laser beam focus on innovation in women's health is all about.

18:58Carol Massar:And it will improve not only women's health, but the health of families, communities, and countries. I hate to tell you, man, there's no babies without us. But I just think about, like, you typically, sorry, but follow the money. Like, that's what I don't understand. Like, if they understand the economic impact, why hasn't it flowed? I don't think the economic impact has really been underscored as it might have been. And I think that's something that we really need to emphasize, the economic gain. And also the innovation agenda, that there are so many opportunities to explore how, for companies, diseases that affect women only, like endometriosis or ovarian cancer, diseases that affect women disproportionately, like autoimmune illnesses or Alzheimer's disease, and diseases that affect women differently, which are diseases like heart disease or lung cancer.

19:51Carol Massar:And that's where we need to really invest. And I think companies are starting to come along because this is the innovation agenda. And it's a new pipeline of opportunities for companies. Are you hopeful? I am very hopeful. As Madame Curie, who won two Nobel Prizes but was never admitted into the all-male French Academy of Sciences once said, I never see what has been done. I only see what remains to be done. And I think if we apply new tools like AI to discovery, make sure that women are included in those research studies, and importantly, that the data is reported and journals publish that data.

20:25Carol Massar:Because, again, AI is only as good as the algorithms, the data you feed into it. Right. And then, again, for prevention, for prediction, for early diagnostics, and for access, because it will help to bring care to people in underserved areas, women everywhere. where AI should stand for accelerated innovation, but also for everyone included. All right. People included. You're optimistic about AI in health care. No, but we can't buy us. But we need to. I am. Absolutely. Always love time with you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Great to be with you. Dr. Susan J. Blumenthal. She's retired rear admiral, former U.S.

21:00Carol Massar:assistant surgeon general, and the first ever deputy assistant secretary for women's health. She's also a visiting professor with the MIT Media Lab. Stay with us. More from Bloomberg Businessweek Daily coming up after this.

21:37for Amazon Health AI. Chat your symptoms and get virtual care 24-7. Healthcare just got less painful. Support for the show comes from Public. Public is an investing platform that offers access to stocks, options, bonds, and crypto. And they've also integrated AI with tools that can assist investors in building customized portfolios. One of these tools is called Generated Assets. It allows you to turn your ideas into investable indexes. So let's say you're interested in something specific like biotech companies with high R &D spend, small cap stocks with improving operating margins, or the S &P 500 minus high debt companies.

22:17Chances are there isn't an ETF that fits your exact criteria. But on public, you just type in a prompt and their AI screens thousands of stocks and builds a one-of-a-kind index. You can even backtest it against the S &P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Go to public.com slash market and earn an uncapped 1 % bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash market.