Real Coffee with Scott Adams - Episode 994 Scott Adams： Convalescent Blood Plasma, Biden, Golf, and Scarborough

00:00:00.000 Did you wonder where I was? I'm two minutes late. Couldn't get my Wi-Fi working.

00:00:13.880 Had a little power outage last night. Messed things up. But I'm good now. We're back.

00:00:20.360 And that means it's time for a little thing you call Simultaneous Sip. I call it that too.

00:00:30.000 And all it takes is a cup or mug or a glass of tank or chalice or sign a canteen jug or flask, a vessel of any kind.

00:00:38.000 Fill it with your favorite liquid. I like coffee.

00:00:41.620 And join me now for the unparalleled pleasure, the dopamine hit of the day, the thing that makes everything better, including the damn pandemic. 0.98

00:00:50.340 It's called the Simultaneous Sip and it happens now. Go. 0.98

00:00:53.280 Now, if you joined us last night, I had a little technical difficulty.

00:01:06.300 I was trying to bring on a special guest to talk about convalescent blood serum.

00:01:11.880 And as soon as he's ready, we're going to try that again this morning.

00:01:18.500 So I'll wait to see when Ian gets on.

00:01:24.620 All right. Let's tell him we're good now.

00:01:26.700 In the news, my favorite story is that President Trump apparently wanted to go golfing this weekend, but he didn't want it to be the biggest story.

00:01:40.160 So what do you do if you want to go golfing and you're the president and you don't want it to be the biggest story for three days?

00:01:50.620 Well, on the way out the door to golf, what you do is you send a tweet that accuses Joe Scarborough of murder.

00:02:02.700 Now, you have to appreciate how much fun that is.

00:02:07.320 Now, of course, not for the family of the victim who died many years ago, but the fact that Trump would accuse somebody of murder before he goes golfing is beautiful.

00:02:20.380 So I see Ian has joined.

00:02:22.480 So let me just finish this story and then I'll add him on.

00:02:28.020 Now, here's my take on that.

00:02:30.360 Now, on one hand, it's completely outrageous and inappropriate that the president of the United States would accuse Joe Scarborough of murder when there's no indication that he actually murdered anybody.

00:02:42.980 There was some young woman who hit her head and died in his office years ago.

00:02:48.940 Now, that's all we know.

00:02:50.160 And she had some health problem that suggests that she just passed out and hit her head.

00:02:54.040 But the fact that the president would say that, now you say to yourself, well, that's all wrong.

00:03:00.420 That is so wrong.

00:03:01.380 That is wrong on a level that's deeper than any wrongness.

00:03:05.440 Except, except we are talking about Joe Scarborough who did lie about the president in the worst possible way for years.

00:03:17.400 I believe he accused the president of suggesting people should drink bleach.

00:03:22.720 That never happened.

00:03:24.920 I think he suggested the president had called neo-Nazis in Charlottesville fine people.

00:03:32.700 That never happened.

00:03:34.840 So, is it fundamentally different to accuse somebody of being pro-Nazi versus saying you murdered your girlfriend?

00:03:47.400 Well, they're not that different, really.

00:03:51.780 Because once you've accepted that you can say absolutely anything in the political context, there's just no penalty.

00:03:59.200 You can say absolutely anything.

00:04:02.140 The president just took the rules and said, what are the rules?

00:04:05.580 Oh, the rules are you can say anything?

00:04:08.900 Really, just anything.

00:04:10.180 I can just make up anything.

00:04:12.640 And I can just say it in public and it's a headline?

00:04:15.140 All right.

00:04:17.400 How about Joe Scarborough's a murderer? 0.88

00:04:21.680 We'll see how that goes.

00:04:23.600 Went pretty well.

00:04:25.580 All right.

00:04:25.900 Let's see if we can get Ian on the line.

00:04:30.160 This will be a test of the technology.

00:04:33.180 I think we got it.

00:04:34.520 I think we got it.

00:04:35.600 Oh, seriously?

00:04:36.340 Because I know we had a Wi-Fi problem yesterday.

00:04:41.280 And it looks like we got a Wi-Fi problem today.

00:04:44.000 Well, whatever the problem is, it doesn't look like that's going to get solved.

00:04:47.880 I'll try it one more time.

00:04:49.260 But then I think we should maybe give up on this if it doesn't work this time.

00:04:55.020 Ian, we'll try you one more time.

00:04:57.520 Ian?

00:04:58.620 Hey, let's make this work.

00:05:00.700 This is the first time the technology has worked more than five seconds, so I feel good about it.

00:05:07.980 All right.

00:05:08.060 That's a good sign.

00:05:09.780 All right.

00:05:10.120 Good, strong signal.

00:05:11.520 All right, Ian.

00:05:12.980 First of all, let me see if I can pronounce your name correctly.

00:05:16.800 Ian Hilgart-Martizis.

00:05:19.180 Pretty close?

00:05:19.760 Yes.

00:05:20.740 Yes, you nailed it.

00:05:21.840 All right.

00:05:23.120 Can you tell the audience what your background is and how that relates specifically to the

00:05:29.040 convalescent blood plasma testing situation?

00:05:32.580 Give them a little background on you.

00:05:35.360 Okay.

00:05:35.900 So my background is that I worked in bioscience for about 10 years.

00:05:41.240 And then I ended up kind of leaving academic bioscience and taught myself to program and become

00:05:48.680 a data analyst and started working in corporate for a corporation as a data analyst.

00:05:59.160 And when the COVID stuff started to hit, I would figure out ways to harvest public data to do

00:06:07.160 public data analysis that I could publish to help people understand the situation a little

00:06:16.040 better.

00:06:16.340 And then through that process, I started to, you know, think about different answers that I thought

00:06:26.700 we needed that maybe we weren't getting from the media.

00:06:31.320 And one of the things I thought about as well is, you know, what can we do now?

00:06:37.900 What can we do before there's a vaccine?

00:06:40.160 Cause there's going to be people who can't wait that long.

00:06:43.460 Um, and the development of new therapeutics, it takes so long that, um, a lot of people

00:06:51.540 would, uh, end up dying while they wait.

00:06:55.980 And so, you know, we got to figure something out in the meantime.

00:07:00.680 So tell us what you did cause I was, uh, I was sort of, uh, following along early on and

00:07:07.300 you, and you put together your own tests, right?

00:07:10.540 Well, it wasn't necessarily my own test.

00:07:13.040 I bought a, uh, commercially available test kit.

00:07:16.920 Um, I just happened to become aware of its existence pretty early, I suppose.

00:07:23.600 Um, and the way that I became aware of it is that I just got like a spam email.

00:07:28.620 Cause you know, when you buy something from a vendor, they put you on a mailing list and

00:07:33.020 then they always blast out these, um, kind of spam advertisements.

00:07:37.220 And so I got one of those that said, Oh, Hey, we have these, um, COVID-19 antibody tests. 0.98

00:07:43.080 And so I thought, well, shit, I want to buy one of those. 0.97

00:07:45.800 And my friend and I were just going to test ourselves. 0.99

00:07:49.000 So we, so I bought one and then, um, it had space for 40 tests.

00:07:54.600 And so I thought, well, I might as well just fill this whole thing up and, um, run 40 tests

00:08:00.880 and kind of get a better sense of how many people are positive.

00:08:03.760 Cause at the time it was unclear of how far spread the virus had been.

00:08:08.960 So, so you were really, uh, I think you might've been the first person who did an, an amateur

00:08:15.280 or professional test of, uh, how many people had antibodies.

00:08:19.460 Do you know anybody tested before you did?

00:08:23.040 Uh, no.

00:08:24.380 Um, I, as far as I know, I was the first, uh, report or I did publish the first report

00:08:30.020 about, um, or on a community kind of serum survey for COVID-19 antibodies.

00:08:36.980 Now, so you've been sort of paying attention to the whole serum antibody thing.

00:08:41.800 And I know there was a, uh, there was a article in the Wall Street Journal that said they had

00:08:46.700 some small 39 people or something.

00:08:49.660 And how did that go?

00:08:52.180 So, so are we positive on, on this convalescent serum?

00:08:57.380 I mean, the idea of taking blood from somebody who's been infected and recovered and putting

00:09:01.760 their antibodies in somebody else, uh, what, what's the state of that in terms of the science?

00:09:07.660 I know you're surveying the field there.

00:09:09.280 Yeah, so, um, on Friday, I believe, uh, the first convalescent serum therapy, uh, clinical

00:09:18.880 study was published, um, and the authors claim it was the first in the world published, um,

00:09:24.760 or at least the largest, um, and so they did treat 39 patients, like you said, with convalescent

00:09:30.560 serum therapy, um, and it was controlled.

00:09:33.300 So there was a group that did not receive that, uh, treatment.

00:09:36.020 And there was a significant improvement in survival with the group that did receive the

00:09:42.800 convalescent serum therapy.

00:09:44.640 Uh, there was, uh, about 12.8%, um, uh, death rate for the convalescent serum therapy group,

00:09:53.060 but it was 24.4% for those who didn't receive it.

00:09:56.580 So that means that the serum therapy cut the death rate in half.

00:10:01.300 And that was for people who were pretty close to death to begin with.

00:10:05.640 And I, I think I saw in the article that they, they just assume it would work better if

00:10:10.420 you had it earlier, but it hasn't been tested, I guess.

00:10:14.200 Now, is there any reason to think that any of this would ever be dangerous?

00:10:18.480 Does it, it doesn't have to go through, it wouldn't have to go, I know this is sort of

00:10:22.960 outside your area, but I don't think this would have to go through a whole FDA, would

00:10:27.320 it?

00:10:27.760 The whole FDA approval?

00:10:29.420 Because it's, their antibodies, is this something we know well enough that we don't need to go

00:10:34.520 through the whole testing?

00:10:36.060 Well, well, it is actually FDA approved now, um, at least with an emergency use authorization.

00:10:43.460 Uh, so that was one of the first things that became approved as a treatment for COVID-19,

00:10:49.340 because it is generally safe.

00:10:50.800 There's a couple of different things people generally test for, like ABO blood typing,

00:10:55.900 you want to match the donor and recipient, and then RH factors.

00:11:00.740 But other than that, it appears to be safe.

00:11:04.820 So if, well, what would happen if you didn't match?

00:11:08.140 Would it hurt you, or would it just not help you?

00:11:10.860 Suppose you had the wrong blood type match.

00:11:14.880 Yeah, it could, it could definitely hurt you, um, down the road.

00:11:19.400 I'm not, you know, it has been done without ABO blood type matching, um, in fact, when it

00:11:26.800 was first used, or the reports I've seen when it was first used, or it's from the early 1900s,

00:11:31.940 and they were not doing ABO blood type matching at that time.

00:11:35.460 But all of those reports showed significant, um, improvement.

00:11:39.420 Well, well, if you had to guess, based on, uh, you know, isn't there, there are two other

00:11:47.260 cases where they've used this convalescent blood, um, serum approach, right?

00:11:52.540 Was it, uh, HIV was one?

00:11:56.200 Um, well, the, I don't think it was used, or I'm not aware of it being used for HIV, um,

00:12:02.840 but the, uh, treatment for HIV is monoclonal antibodies, and same with Ebola, um, and so

00:12:11.740 it's similar in a way because convalescent serum therapy is used, basically using antibodies.

00:12:18.640 It's more of, um, a kind of, um, gross product of antibodies where you're just taking everything

00:12:25.500 under the sun that's in somebody's serum and giving it to somebody else, and you're not

00:12:29.300 selecting for one specific antibody.

00:12:31.640 Um, but it has been used in SARS, um, there is actually a guy who got the 1901 Nobel Prize

00:12:40.800 for the development of serum therapies, and he, um, solved a diphtheria epidemic in Germany

00:12:47.800 in the 1890s, uh, by using serum therapies, and that's kind of where it started, and so

00:12:54.220 he's the pioneer in the field.

00:12:55.780 His name's, uh, Emil von Bering.

00:12:58.140 Now, do you, uh, do you know, uh, what it would take to scale this up?

00:13:03.720 Let's say that, uh, in a few weeks we said, yes, this is the thing.

00:13:07.280 We need more of this, um, given that you have to actually take it from people, unless you're

00:13:12.660 using machines to clone it, I guess.

00:13:16.120 How, how quickly can, I know you did some calculations on how quickly you could scale

00:13:20.680 up.

00:13:20.960 Um, like, what, what would you guess, I know this is an unfair question off the top of your

00:13:25.680 head, but let's say if we were to say, start today, and said, all right, we want to get

00:13:30.760 everybody kind of less on blood serum therapy.

00:13:33.780 Uh, like, how close are we to being able to do that?

00:13:37.500 Is that something that scales up very well?

00:13:40.700 Um, I think that it is generally reserved for the people that are in poor condition, you

00:13:46.300 know, in the hospital.

00:13:47.340 So not everybody is going to need it, but for those people, it would be possible, uh, is

00:13:55.860 obviously going to be dependent on your area.

00:13:58.360 New York got hit so hard that I don't know if they would have been able to keep up with

00:14:02.180 demand, um, but generally speaking, you have about 5% of cases who end up in the ICU, and

00:14:10.300 those are the people that would be, um, candidates to receive the therapy.

00:14:14.800 Would they really?

00:14:15.940 Because why wouldn't you give it to people even before they had it, so that they, if

00:14:21.100 they did get it, they could handle it more easily?

00:14:24.940 Uh, just because of scalability.

00:14:27.300 It is tough.

00:14:28.380 If you need to do, um, plasmapharesis to get the, uh, plasma from donors, you also have

00:14:34.260 to be checking people ahead of time to make sure that they actually have an antibody response

00:14:39.340 against the virus.

00:14:40.820 Let me ask you some sort of detailed questions.

00:14:43.660 If you're going to draw blood from one person and turn that one person's blood into antibodies,

00:14:49.160 how long would the whole process take from putting the needle in to draw the blood to, to having

00:14:55.860 it in your hand and, and, and ready to give somebody else?

00:14:59.980 Um, I think that you can do plasmapharesis, um, in a couple, uh, hours.

00:15:06.580 It depends on, obviously, how much you're trying to harvest.

00:15:10.120 The amount that the FDA allows, I believe, for a donation is a liter per week or two liters

00:15:17.060 every two weeks.

00:15:18.740 Um, and then in the, uh, study that you're taught, you're talking about, they used about

00:15:23.480 500 milliliters, which is a half a liter per patient.

00:15:27.140 So it looks like a donor to donate.

00:15:31.520 Go ahead.

00:15:32.800 To, to simplify that, each donor giving one donation could handle how many people?

00:15:40.120 Four.

00:15:40.760 It looks like if over a two week donation period or two.

00:15:45.180 About for one, one donation.

00:15:47.260 If I donate blood once, how many people would that handle?

00:15:51.560 Two.

00:15:53.300 So that's kind of hard to scale, isn't it?

00:15:57.520 Yes, exactly.

00:15:58.840 And so that's why I say it should be reserved for only the people that are in poor condition 1.00

00:16:03.480 or in the hospital.

00:16:05.460 Now, if you looked into the, I don't understand the, uh, the differences or the, the nuances

00:16:12.300 of monoclonal where you're just taking, you know, the best antibodies you can get from

00:16:18.620 one real person and then you're cloning it with machines to scale it up.

00:16:23.520 Is, is there a, uh, limit to how quickly you can do that if you just keep building machines?

00:16:28.980 I mean, could, could we do a ventilator type thing where we just say, all right, everybody's

00:16:34.360 building monoclonal, uh, devices.

00:16:37.920 If you looked into those, do you, do you, do you know if that's a path or not?

00:16:42.080 Yeah, those are, um, the first therapies that will come online for COVID-19 is the monoclonal

00:16:50.500 antibody therapies.

00:16:51.660 It takes a little bit of time to develop because of, uh, the process.

00:16:55.300 You build what are called hybridomas and that's a fusion between a cancer cell and an antibody

00:17:00.940 creating cell.

00:17:02.020 And, um, the cancer cell makes it immortal.

00:17:04.880 And then the antibody, um, secreting cell, uh, is fused and it starts just producing antibodies

00:17:12.460 and mass.

00:17:12.960 And then you can create a ton of those cells.

00:17:15.820 They're all identical and make a bunch of antibodies in a bioreactor.

00:17:20.060 And, um, that's being done now.

00:17:22.020 It just takes a little bit of time to identify the specific, um, antibody secreting cell that

00:17:27.440 you want to use.

00:17:28.160 That's making good antibodies.

00:17:29.640 Now, once you've identified the antibodies, isn't it just a question of making more of

00:17:36.740 those machines and more of those facilities?

00:17:39.720 Couldn't, couldn't you just keep scaling it up indefinitely?

00:17:43.340 Correct.

00:17:43.900 Yeah, you could, um, especially if, you know, you, somebody identified a good, um, antibody

00:17:49.460 secreting cell and then, um, made the hybridomas and if they were to share those with other

00:17:54.900 people and kind of, uh, uh, decentralize the production, um, and make it, uh, scale faster,

00:18:01.040 that would maybe be a good way to do it.

00:18:03.360 There's also, you know, you should be probably combining a lot of different hybridomas to get

00:18:08.760 good coverage for your antibodies.

00:18:10.520 Make sure that they're, uh, there's a good, strong protection there.

00:18:15.320 Uh, uh, do you, have you heard, I haven't seen any news coverage of the monoclonal anything.

00:18:21.800 Do you, do you know if anybody's getting any traction in actually doing that?

00:18:25.920 I haven't seen anything, um, that's become available yet with those, uh, I've seen some

00:18:33.180 anecdotal reports about strong protection there.

00:18:36.700 I think last week there was a report from a company that said they had a good candidate,

00:18:41.300 but, um, you know, it's still a little early.

00:18:44.300 And the other thing is that, uh, there's a difference between having an antibody that you

00:18:52.040 can see recognizes COVID-19 and then also whether that antibody neutralizes the virus.

00:18:59.280 So, um, I've actually seen some evidence in my hands where somebody can test positive for

00:19:05.560 antibodies that recognize the virus, but those antibodies don't necessarily neutralize the

00:19:10.360 virus.

00:19:10.660 And then conversely, somebody could have, uh, a low level of antibodies that, you know,

00:19:17.260 recognize the virus, but those antibodies are very strong at neutralizing.

00:19:21.900 So there is nuance there.

00:19:24.900 So, and do we have any more visibility on how long antibodies would last?

00:19:30.100 Let's say you got them either naturally by having it recovering or you got it from, uh,

00:19:35.580 from the plasma from somebody else.

00:19:37.580 Do you know, is there any difference in how long they would last?

00:19:42.000 You know, that, that's a good question.

00:19:44.160 I don't, um, you might expect there to be a shorter window for, um, donor antibodies because

00:19:52.760 they might have start to get marked as non-self by your immune system and then kind of removed.

00:19:59.160 But, um, it's a tough thing to study because, you know, you start to get this mix of potentially

00:20:05.520 like antibodies made by yourself and antibodies from the, the donor.

00:20:10.020 And how do you differentiate which one came from which?

00:20:13.700 Um, but, uh, I think generally like two years is what a lot of people say.

00:20:20.380 If you look at data from the original SARS, um, patients, uh, two years of protection is

00:20:27.200 what people were getting at least some, at least some got protection out to 17 years though.

00:20:34.120 Now, would you, would you say that it comes down to, uh, literally just how fast we can

00:20:40.600 make this stuff?

00:20:41.700 I mean, that's really the gating factor, right?

00:20:44.140 Because at this point we kind of know it's safe and we kind of know it works or all common

00:20:49.020 sense says it works, right?

00:20:50.900 I mean, it would be hard to imagine it doesn't work.

00:20:53.140 Um, yeah, yeah, it, it definitely works.

00:20:56.640 And, um, one of the limitations is just getting access to the, uh, people who are producing

00:21:04.540 those antibodies so that then you can kind of identify those antibodies secreting cells

00:21:09.540 and scale this.

00:21:10.960 So I would encourage anybody that's ever had it and recovered to look into getting tested

00:21:16.740 for antibodies and look into donating their serum for convalescent serum therapy because,

00:21:22.200 um, every, you could donate every week or every couple of weeks and that serum can be banked

00:21:28.780 for the future where, um, maybe in the fall we have a second wave or something.

00:21:34.200 So I think we should be stockpiling serum now, um, in anticipation for the fall and winter

00:21:40.460 time.

00:21:41.440 Interesting.

00:21:42.080 So there's, there's an idea I'd never heard before, which is we have all these strategic

00:21:46.180 stockpiles of everything from oil to PPE and ventilators.

00:21:51.160 Uh, it would make perfect sense to have a national stack, the stockpile temporarily.

00:21:55.740 I don't know how long you can store this stuff, but it would, that makes perfect sense to have

00:21:59.760 a national stockpile of convalescent serum.

00:22:02.460 That's actually a great idea.

00:22:04.200 I hope somebody is watching this.

00:22:05.400 We can do something about that.

00:22:06.500 Um, uh, yeah, go ahead.

00:22:10.140 Yeah.

00:22:10.700 And that, like I said, requires people who have had it to get tested for the antibodies and

00:22:15.920 be kind of active participants.

00:22:17.500 I think that, um, a lot of people are looking for something that they can do to help nowadays.

00:22:22.940 And that's one pretty easy way to do it.

00:22:26.300 And, you know, I, I think that those people should get paid to donate their serum.

00:22:31.500 Um, a lot of them have probably accrued pretty significant hospital bills along the way.

00:22:36.660 And this would be a way to offset those bills for them.

00:22:40.640 And, oh, yeah.

00:22:42.580 Oh, now you're, now you're, this is interesting.

00:22:45.300 So you're talking about how this might be a money making thing.

00:22:48.860 Um, do you, are you aware of anybody who's ever charged for their antibodies for any kind

00:22:54.420 of situation?

00:22:55.180 Has that ever happened?

00:22:56.020 I'm not aware of a specific instance where somebody's donated their antibodies because

00:23:02.840 they just had the, um, greatest antibodies out there.

00:23:06.740 But, you know, there's plasma donation centers all across the country.

00:23:11.540 Um, I don't know the name of one offhand, but I know there's national chains of plasma donation

00:23:16.560 centers and, um, they pay people.

00:23:19.740 So, this is very interesting because, you know, um, I, I think that the patriotic mood

00:23:26.520 in the country at the moment is so high that you could get all the, all the blood you wanted.

00:23:32.140 Basically, if the, if the president of the United States said, here's the deal, if you've

00:23:36.660 tested positive, I need you to do this.

00:23:39.740 Go in and offer your blood.

00:23:41.500 We're going to try to see how much we can get.

00:23:43.100 I, I believe that patriotism alone would give you all the blood you wanted, but if you really

00:23:49.500 wanted to take it to the next level, uh, people are people.

00:23:54.040 And if you could offer more money to, let's say, go in a second time or a third or a fourth

00:23:58.720 time, as you were suggesting, I would imagine that a monetary incentive would probably have

00:24:05.040 a gigantic, uh, benefit.

00:24:08.520 I mean, I like that as well.

00:24:09.460 So, yeah, and I, I've talked to some people about, you know, the monetary incentive and

00:24:15.080 people get a little bit uneasy sometimes about that.

00:24:18.280 But my perspective is that, you know, it's going to be administered in the hospital and

00:24:22.840 is the hospital making money?

00:24:24.800 Yeah.

00:24:25.480 So why shouldn't the donor?

00:24:27.360 Yeah.

00:24:27.660 So.

00:24:28.780 Exactly.

00:24:29.900 Now, uh, so we've got safety.

00:24:32.140 It's really just a production problem.

00:24:34.400 Uh, it seems to me.

00:24:35.840 And, uh, it's almost like, gosh, it, it feels like this is such a big deal.

00:24:44.340 You know, every, the, the biggest deal of course is wearing masks, but I would think that

00:24:49.020 the second most promising thing, you know, if we have to wait for vaccines for months and

00:24:53.900 months, but the things that we can do now, the second most promising thing is probably

00:24:57.820 this, wouldn't you say?

00:24:58.660 Yeah.

00:25:00.460 In terms of things that we know that work and not having to wait around for something

00:25:05.720 that, you know, may never actually happen.

00:25:08.380 Right.

00:25:08.940 We, there's no guarantee that we'll have a vaccine or anything like that, but we know this

00:25:13.260 works.

00:25:13.880 And, um, so, you know, why not embrace it while we also pursue other avenues to solve the problem?

00:25:21.080 Um, so, um, yeah, I was just going to point out, so I started a company that we're going

00:25:28.780 to be doing antibody testing as well.

00:25:30.900 And I'm specifically doing a neutralization tests, which means, um, we're not just testing

00:25:36.540 for the presence of antibody.

00:25:37.720 We're testing to see whether your antibodies neutralize the virus.

00:25:41.760 And, um, we plan to take that data and kind of publish it on, publish the de-identified

00:25:50.140 data on open source dashboards for anybody to check out, just so everybody can get a

00:25:55.780 general sense of where, uh, their community is in terms of, um, relative protection.

00:26:00.760 And then, uh, I plan on, uh, creating an avenue for people who test positive for neutralizing

00:26:07.060 antibodies to, um, be sent information on how to donate their plasma.

00:26:12.900 Right.

00:26:13.100 So we'll be identifying those candidates.

00:26:15.380 And so then they should be told, you know, here's what you can do if you're interested,

00:26:19.440 um, in helping other people with your, um, unique situation or unique set of antibodies.

00:26:26.940 So, uh, Ian, uh, I've been watching the comments and I just, I just want to call out something

00:26:31.460 that, uh, you know, I always talk about winning attitudes and losing attitudes and I'm watching

00:26:36.760 a lot of losing attitudes in the, in the comments, specific, specifically people who don't

00:26:43.780 quite appreciate, and I'm going to make them appreciate it now, uh, the power of your talent

00:26:48.640 stack, because people are sort of saying, oh, data analyst, what's that got to do with

00:26:52.820 this?

00:26:53.160 But the whole point is that you knew how to draw blood.

00:26:56.420 You knew how to get, uh, these tests.

00:26:58.260 You've got, what did you say your background was?

00:27:00.620 Biological what? 0.66

00:27:03.040 Bioscience.

00:27:04.020 Yeah.

00:27:04.200 Uh, so he's got a bioscience background.

00:27:06.000 So he basically compiled a whole bunch of skills together, including starting a new business

00:27:11.900 initiative to try to help with the coronavirus.

00:27:15.720 So would you see, uh, Ian jumping in?

00:27:19.020 And I, I was watching this from the beginning and on day one, Ian was saying, all right, I

00:27:24.360 have this set of talents.

00:27:25.980 How can I help in this coronavirus thing?

00:27:28.580 And then I've been watching as you've, you've, you've grabbed, you know, like one piece of,

00:27:34.060 one piece of it at a time and tried to assemble it into something that would be bigger than

00:27:38.120 the parts.

00:27:39.060 And I've, I've been, I've been completely impressed, not only at the early data visualization

00:27:44.140 stuff you were doing, because initially you were doing data visualization, some of the

00:27:48.460 best ones I'd seen on the internet.

00:27:50.060 And then you found that your talent stack could get you all the way to here.

00:27:53.920 And the next thing you know, there, you know, it could be, uh, you know, one of the

00:27:57.780 pivotal, at least informational parts of what would be the second most important thing

00:28:03.720 we do after masks.

00:28:05.780 So I'm very impressed at what you've done.

00:28:09.040 And, uh, for those who are, maybe don't have the winning mindset, what the hell did you guys

00:28:15.260 do?

00:28:16.140 Let me just say that while you're on the line, Ian, limit to your critics, because, because

00:28:20.460 you know, there's always going to be somebody on here, blah, blah, blah.

00:28:22.980 I hear this all the time, you know, Hey, you're a cartoonist while you're doing this,

00:28:26.640 blah, blah, blah.

00:28:26.960 But all of those people, you're not very successful, I'll bet.

00:28:31.120 Because if you're worried about staying in your lane, and you're worried that people

00:28:35.460 only have one talent, Ian's got more than one talent.

00:28:39.820 Sorry.

00:28:40.640 If you only have one talent, maybe you don't understand how that works.

00:28:44.340 But if you put enough talent together, you have a superpower.

00:28:47.920 And I think this is a perfect example of it.

00:28:49.920 So Ian, thank you for being a, a patriot.

00:28:53.540 Uh, and I mean that seriously, because in, in times of crisis, not everybody runs toward

00:28:59.320 the fire and you did, you know, on day one, you were running toward the emergency.

00:29:03.860 You know, what can I do?

00:29:05.860 And we need more of you and less of the people who are, who are nitpicking on here.

00:29:12.420 I really appreciate that, Scott.

00:29:15.180 And I just want to point out before I go, um, that I can't do it all by myself.

00:29:20.420 I have a lot of help, um, from McHale Statton and Brianna Knight.

00:29:24.500 They've been helping me get Cure Hub going and, you know, everything's, you know, about

00:29:30.240 being on a team and winning team and, um, you're, we're all in this together and, uh,

00:29:36.600 no one person can make anything work.

00:29:39.020 And I think it's, uh, you got to treat life like a positive sum game and then, um, you'll

00:29:45.140 start to find success all over the place.

00:29:47.480 Well, that's, that's America in a, in a nutshell right there.

00:29:51.920 So thank you so much.

00:29:53.260 Do you want to, uh, name a URL that you want people to look at?

00:29:57.820 Yeah, you can go to cure-hub.com.

00:30:01.580 Um, and we have a system in place where you can sign up and get, reserve your spot in line

00:30:07.860 to get antibody tested.

00:30:09.700 Um, and then you don't pay anything, but, um, you'll get on our mailing list.

00:30:15.020 And then as soon as we have the antibody tests approved, um, which should be a couple of weeks,

00:30:19.720 then we'll, uh, let you know.

00:30:21.540 And then you can join the study and, um, you know, donate a sample to get tested.

00:30:27.800 We'll test you.

00:30:28.960 Uh, and, um, yeah, let's.

00:30:33.400 All right.

00:30:34.360 So thank you.

00:30:35.180 Thank you again.

00:30:35.860 Thanks for being a great guest.

00:30:37.240 Uh, I'm going to go on with the rest of my program and I'll catch up with you.

00:30:40.980 Can I do one thing?

00:30:42.080 I missed the simultaneous sip.

00:30:43.880 Can I get another one live?

00:30:45.540 I got to do it.

00:30:48.140 All right.

00:30:48.780 I will give you the, the first ever, uh, second simultaneous sip.

00:30:54.740 And I'll use a cup or a mug or a glass of tango, canteen, jug, and flask of the vessel of any kind.

00:30:59.680 You ready?

00:31:01.020 Cheers.

00:31:02.340 Cheers.

00:31:02.740 The second simultaneous sip, even better than the first.

00:31:08.760 All right.

00:31:08.960 Thanks, Ian.

00:31:09.660 Thank you.

00:31:10.460 Bye.

00:31:13.160 All right.

00:31:13.960 So, you know, I, as much as the, the topic is interesting because I, in my opinion, it's

00:31:21.000 probably the most important topic besides masks, but, um, I also wanted you to get, get a feel

00:31:28.920 for Ian, you know, just, just get a feel for what your fellow citizens, if you're American

00:31:35.180 and I'm sure it's happening in every country around the world, people are just jumping into

00:31:39.680 the breach.

00:31:41.020 I mean, people are running toward this thing like crazy.

00:31:44.580 You know, when this is over, when this is over, you're going to be really proud.

00:31:51.000 That you were a human because humans are pretty awesome.

00:31:55.500 And, uh, and, and humans have done remarkable things in the past several months and there's

00:32:01.860 a lot more to come.

00:32:03.320 So, you know, we're, we're all lost in the details and just trying to get through life

00:32:07.720 and, you know, make it to the next, uh, time you can buy groceries.

00:32:11.400 And I know that that's got to be the focus, but when this is done, when this is done, there

00:32:17.640 are going to be some real, real things to be proud about.

00:32:21.000 All right.

00:32:22.520 Let's talk about some other things.

00:32:24.060 Uh, I got a suggestion on the locals platform where I've moved a lot of my non-dilbert stuff,

00:32:32.260 uh, from, uh, Ann Holt.

00:32:35.140 I don't know.

00:32:36.020 That's one name.

00:32:37.440 Ann Holt, A-N-H-O-L-T.

00:32:39.840 Anyway, I don't know his real name, but he started, uh, referring to people who watch CNN

00:32:46.140 and MSNBC as the poorly educated.

00:32:51.560 How much do you love that?

00:32:53.660 So I'm going to, I'm going to adopt that, uh, that concept.

00:32:56.820 So instead of what I'd be, what I used to be saying was, you know, it's two movies on

00:33:01.780 one screen and some people are siloed in their, in their news and they don't see the news from

00:33:07.380 the other side.

00:33:08.340 And I used to sort of describe it as, you know, in engineering terms, but I thought this is

00:33:13.940 so much more powerful to say, oh, you only watch these networks.

00:33:19.200 Well, you're among the poorly educated because it's literally true, literally poorly educated,

00:33:26.180 which I think is hilarious because you know how much they're going to hate that.

00:33:34.640 Um, so apparently in the, in the polls, including a Fox news poll, uh, Biden is ahead of Trump

00:33:44.720 by way more than even Hillary was ahead of Trump at the same time.

00:33:49.200 So apparently Biden is doing great by staying out of public and just gaffing himself and

00:33:57.380 decomposing in his basement. 0.98

00:33:59.300 Now, I don't know what could be more ridiculous or more funny than the fact that Joe Biden is 0.88

00:34:07.220 in his basement, literally just, you know, decomposing and he, and he's doing great. 0.92

00:34:14.800 Who knew?

00:34:17.160 Who knew?

00:34:19.200 No, honestly, are you ever just at home and you just start laughing about the whole Joe

00:34:25.920 Biden in the basement situation?

00:34:28.300 Because you know, the, the Biden in the basement thing sort of crept up on us, right?

00:34:34.600 Like, like, like it was like, Hey, I think there's this virus and Wuhan, all right.

00:34:40.060 You know, and you, and like, it looks like it might be coming this way.

00:34:44.100 All right.

00:34:44.960 And maybe we should, you know, stay with him public a little bit.

00:34:47.660 And the next thing you know, a major candidate for president is living in his basement and

00:34:53.660 babbling nonsense.

00:34:54.780 And because we, and because we sort of got there gradually, we've sort of accepted it.

00:35:00.480 Go on.

00:35:04.980 Are you, are you sure?

00:35:07.200 Uh, uh, can you tell me that you've never just, you were just sitting there by yourself

00:35:11.480 and suddenly you just sort of realize the situation we're in with Joe Biden decomposing in his basement

00:35:19.040 and leading, leading, leading in the polls to be the next president of the United States

00:35:22.420 and have his fingers on the nuclear, on the nuclear button.

00:35:28.260 If that's not funny to you, I don't know what is, but here's the thing that's funniest.

00:35:36.320 I'm not positive.

00:35:39.240 So, you know, you can't, you know, don't hold me to this later.

00:35:43.360 However, I'm not positive, but I think, I just think we might be witnessing the greatest

00:35:53.360 practical joke of all time.

00:35:57.720 And what I mean by the greatest practical joke is I think, I can't prove this.

00:36:04.900 I think conservatives are massively lying to pollsters because it's funny, right?

00:36:13.360 Do you, tell me I'm wrong.

00:36:15.480 Don't you, don't you sort of suspect because if you were saying to yourself, okay, I get

00:36:21.820 that President Trump's not popular and, you know, all the Democrats are going to vote for

00:36:26.260 whoever the Democrat is.

00:36:27.700 Yeah, I get that, you know, that's going to explain most of, of, of what you see, right?

00:36:33.460 But the, the fact that Biden's down there decomposing and leading the polls strongly suggests

00:36:42.860 it, it strongly suggests that what we're seeing is a really large national scale practical joke.

00:36:53.320 Because if the, if the polls still say Biden by eight points and then Trump wins by eight

00:37:00.220 points, it's going to be the greatest troll of all time.

00:37:06.740 Honestly, it will be, it will be the most epic practical joke ever played in the history

00:37:13.780 of practical jokes.

00:37:15.120 And I think that's what's happening.

00:37:17.440 Am I wrong?

00:37:19.340 Am I completely off base?

00:37:21.740 Because I'm seeing a lot of people in the comments are saying, oh, I think you're right.

00:37:26.080 I think you're right.

00:37:27.660 I think the Republicans are just lying to the pollsters because it's funny.

00:37:31.740 All right.

00:37:35.620 Speaking of funny pranks, Alyssa Milano got photographed wearing a crochet mask. 0.99

00:37:45.120 And you can imagine how the internet reacted to her crochet mask.

00:37:50.240 They of course said, hey, there are holes in your crochet. 1.00

00:37:52.660 Therefore, you fool, you idiot, you dumb Democrat, you Biden supporting fool, you fool. 1.00

00:38:03.860 How could you wear a crochet map mask? 1.00

00:38:07.260 And worse yet, if you're going to wear a crochet mask, don't get your photograph taken if you're

00:38:13.960 famous.

00:38:15.440 And so, of course, Twitter went on fire.

00:38:17.760 It's like, ah, it doesn't know anything. 1.00

00:38:19.560 You idiot. 1.00

00:38:20.140 Your crochet mask. 1.00

00:38:21.200 And then Alyssa Milano waited, wait, hold, hold, hold.

00:38:32.880 And then Alyssa Milano tweets to one of her critics, carbon filter inside, love.

00:38:42.580 It was a trap.

00:38:44.440 It was a trap.

00:38:45.700 Do you think she knew that people were going to get on her about her crochet mask, which

00:38:52.300 she says, and, you know, I think it's probably true.

00:38:56.020 She says it has a carbon filter on the inside.

00:38:58.900 It probably does.

00:39:00.260 It probably does.

00:39:01.180 Because if you've got those good N95 masks, they're the ugliest of the masks. 0.98

00:39:05.520 So if she figured out a way to put a, you know, a more pleasant cover over the ugliest mask, 0.95

00:39:12.120 which is also the best kind of mask.

00:39:16.080 Maybe.

00:39:17.480 Maybe.

00:39:18.460 I don't know if it was an N95, but she said a carbon filter, so maybe that's good, too.

00:39:23.820 All right.

00:39:24.160 If you're not watching, I've said this a billion times, but if you're not following Mike Cernovich

00:39:31.340 on Twitter, you're missing one of the best shows.

00:39:35.060 It's like a TV show that just goes on all the time.

00:39:38.540 It doesn't have a beginning or an end.

00:39:40.640 Like, every time I get on Twitter, it'll see, like, five Cernovich quotes, and every one

00:39:46.140 that makes you stop and go, huh, but this one, if you want to understand how to operate

00:39:55.480 on the next level, this tweet from Cernovich, this has made me laugh for two days.

00:40:01.840 This is the whole tweet.

00:40:03.100 He goes, self-confidence triggers mediocre men.

00:40:06.280 Now, of course, the beauty of it is that you can't complain about it without being labeled

00:40:18.820 a mediocre man, so it's like this perfect little trap.

00:40:23.160 It's like, I want to complain about that because I'm really mad about your self-confidence.

00:40:28.440 I'm like Cernovich, but if I do complain about it, does that make me a mediocre man?

00:40:34.440 So, watching Cernovich build these little Twitter traps for mediocre men is one of the funniest

00:40:45.640 things I've seen on the internet.

00:40:48.360 Telehealth has taken off.

00:40:49.660 I said this before, but there's even more signs of it.

00:40:52.180 Have you seen all the commercials?

00:40:54.960 Telehealth is basically just huge.

00:40:58.880 Now, we thought that might happen, but apparently it is happening.

00:41:01.680 The lasting benefit we're going to get from telehealth is going to be gigantic, and the ability

00:41:09.440 to practice across state lines, which I think will become permanent, would be huge.

00:41:16.020 And again, thank you to all of you who helped make that happen.

00:41:20.580 So, I'm just checking in on that because it's such a big topic, and it's going in the right 0.87

00:41:25.440 direction.

00:41:26.720 It's always good to hear some good news.

00:41:29.580 All right.

00:41:29.820 What else we got going here?

00:41:30.800 There's some kind of drug called ivermectin that's getting some good reviews, and I guess

00:41:40.360 it can interact with other medications and has some side effects and stuff, but there

00:41:45.360 were some initial trials that sort of looked good.

00:41:50.480 So, ivermectin, there's another one.

00:41:52.560 I think that in the next, over the next few weeks, you're just going to hear one therapeutic

00:41:59.860 after another, and it's just going to be all positive news.

00:42:03.620 Now, if you've done the math, I did this last night on Periscope.

00:42:07.000 I was talking about all the things which have cut the risk down.

00:42:10.320 So, masks are supposed to be 75% effective.

00:42:13.120 Distance, of course, is completely effective. 0.99

00:42:16.680 You know, maybe vitamin D, maybe summer will make a difference in the warm weather.

00:42:21.540 You know, maybe what we've learned about nursing homes and how to protect them.

00:42:24.760 Maybe what we've learned about ventilator use, not to kill people with ventilators.

00:42:28.880 If you take each of these many pieces of good news, each of them individually reduces risk

00:42:36.740 by some percentage, from 75% with masks down to maybe vitamin D makes a difference, or maybe

00:42:44.740 it's just correlation.

00:42:46.260 We don't know if it's causation yet, but maybe hydroxychloroquine and zinc, if you get them

00:42:51.800 early, is 20% benefit.

00:42:55.020 Maybe there's some people we can get with this convalescent blood serum.

00:42:58.880 So, we now have, off the top of my head, maybe 10 to 12 different things we've either

00:43:06.900 developed as a tool or learned, which also allows us to reduce risk.

00:43:13.760 I feel like we have all the tools to, within a few weeks, we're going to have the risk down

00:43:19.420 to, it's going to approach zero.

00:43:23.220 I mean, it's almost going to disappear, I think.

00:43:25.160 Monoclonal antibody is almost ready, somebody says.

00:43:30.720 Yeah, and that could be huge.

00:43:32.520 The monoclonal antibodies just could be huge.

00:43:36.120 All right.

00:43:40.520 And then somebody says, primarily immune system strength.

00:43:45.240 Let me ask you this.

00:43:46.600 I want to see this in the comments.

00:43:48.200 When this whole thing started, I was advising everybody to just make sure they took care

00:43:54.140 of their immune system.

00:43:55.720 So, in other words, you know, get out, get a little light exercise, get some sun, get

00:44:00.300 some sleep, eat right, you know, all the usual things.

00:44:03.420 How many of you have done that?

00:44:06.200 How many of you, in the comments, it'll take a little time lag here, but in the comments,

00:44:11.360 tell me if you feel that you've done something that would boost your immune system.

00:44:16.920 Have you intentionally boosted your immune system?

00:44:21.120 Look at all the yeses.

00:44:23.780 Wow.

00:44:24.900 Almost every person.

00:44:27.500 So far, every person who's answering is saying yes.

00:44:31.220 Think about that.

00:44:32.300 What kind of change does that make in your life and in civilization if suddenly 370 million 0.99

00:44:42.420 people just decided to get serious about boosting their immunity and their health?

00:44:48.260 Oh, my God.

00:44:49.180 I am so impressed.

00:44:51.520 For those of you who are listening to this, it is a non-broken string of yeses.

00:44:57.240 I've never seen so much agreement.

00:45:00.420 Somebody lost 20 pounds.

00:45:02.300 Bicycle riding outdoors, yes, definitely, yes, yes, yes.

00:45:07.060 CE, yes.

00:45:08.660 Immune system, way up, yes.

00:45:10.940 Oh, my goodness.

00:45:12.600 I am so, so impressed.

00:45:15.520 Very impressed.

00:45:16.720 I've never seen anything like this.

00:45:18.900 Are you as impressed as I am?

00:45:20.420 Take a look at these comments going by.

00:45:23.400 They're still absolutely, solidly yes.

00:45:27.060 Holy cow. 0.89

00:45:27.940 Well, this is one of the, this is the most underreported story of the year.

00:45:34.780 Isn't it?

00:45:36.320 Wouldn't you say this is the most underreported story?

00:45:39.120 If, if we had not had a coronavirus and suddenly you found that 370 million Americans, and I'm guessing other countries are doing something similar, if you found that hundreds of millions of people suddenly took seriously their health, what did we just do to the entire healthcare cost of this country?

00:45:59.480 How much of this is going to become habit?

00:46:04.660 And, you know, I'm wondering if you think that you'll be able to turn this into habit.

00:46:08.800 The trouble is, you know, a lot of us are not going to work in the normal ways.

00:46:12.440 We don't have the normal schedule, so it's going to be harder when you're trying to work it in with your normal schedule.

00:46:18.840 But, wow, I am so impressed with all of you.

00:46:21.060 Genuinely, somebody stopped smoking.

00:46:24.260 Congratulations.

00:46:26.480 Congratulations on stopping smoking.

00:46:28.740 That is hard.

00:46:32.900 All right.

00:46:33.580 So, well, that might be the good news for this.

00:46:36.840 Maybe our healthcare cost just took 20% hit simply because we're, we're in better shape and we know how to do this.

00:46:44.700 So, where can you outdoor shoot?

00:46:50.200 I don't understand that question.

00:46:53.060 All right.

00:46:53.640 Well, I'm impressed with you all and I'm going to leave you on that note.

00:46:57.980 Hope you learned something today and I'll talk to you tonight.

Real Coffee with Scott Adams - May 24, 2020

Episode 994 Scott Adams： Convalescent Blood Plasma, Biden, Golf, and Scarborough

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