Wendy Zukerman (Host)
Appearances
Science Vs
The War on Science
You know, because we covered the first Trump administration and it was nothing like this. It is just like nobody, I mean, you know, it goes far beyond science, but it's like nothing anybody has ever seen in their lifetimes. And it's just, it's just bizarre. It's like... What is this world we're living in? I mean, it's censorship. It's not scientific. It's just complete crap.
Science Vs
The War on Science
I mean, it's mostly just shocking. You just can't believe that this is happening.
Science Vs
Dire Wolves! They're Back?
Meet Remus and Romulus, the first two direwolves since the Pleistocene era.
Science Vs
Dire Wolves! They're Back?
At just 15 days old, the pups take their first wobbly steps before a much needed nap time.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman and you're listening to Science Versus. Today on the show, we are pitting facts against fluids as we dive into the gushing waters of... Squirting! Squirting! Yes, we're finally doing science versus squirting. And to help us on this journey is comedian Annie Letterman. Hey, Annie.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So when Samuel was a medical student, a lover of his squirted, and they were both so fascinated and curious by this, they tried to find out what the fluid was and they asked friends and doctors. But no one could tell them anything that really made sense.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So years later, Sam is doing his degree in sexology. He realizes he has access to a clinic where he can get some real answers on this. So, okay. Sam recruits seven women who were what he calls systematic squatters. Oh, it's going to get good.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Okay, so Sam gets these women to go to the bathroom and pee. And he takes an ultrasound of their pelvis and importantly their bladder. And he's making sure to see that it's empty. And now the next step is to get wet for science. So some of these systematic squirters brought a partner, some came on their own. They just use a beaker? And I want you to picture this classic ultrasound room.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Ooh. And the beaker, because that can't hold enough, so there's actually a big plastic bag on the bed to collect the squirt that comes out. So maybe if you've got like a Grey's Anatomy fantasy, this could be the study for you. Sam leaves the room, waits outside.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So this is just as the women are super aroused, like ready to squirt, but they haven't yet. And then Sam takes a second ultrasound. Of their bladder. He's out the door again. To see what's cooking in there. What's cooking, exactly. Then the femmes do their fountain. And when it's all done, Sam comes back in. And it's wet everywhere.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
He does a third ultrasound after the squirting's done. So, Addy, if you're counting along here, we've got three images of the bladder before, at peak of arousal, and then after. Okay, are we up to the moment?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yeah. Okay, so first ultrasound, just after they had a big whiz, their bladders were empty, no surprises there. But then, before we get to the post-bladder, something very interesting is happening at the peak of arousal.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
I can create this. This is incredible. Yeah, I don't know. This is cool. So he could see that like, you know, just in those whatever half an hour, the bladder was filling up again. And he's not the only study to show this. So another study that got a straight couple to have sex in an MRI, which you just imagine, you know, what people do for science.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So the show we are at is called Cirque du Squirt. Love it. And it's happening. I want you to picture sort of this cute little nightclub in Brooklyn. And Emily is about to witness a bunch of quirky performances, including a vibrator race.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
But they also found that during arousal, their blood is filled up again. Now, do the guys' bladders fill up? Yeah, both. Both, okay. In that study. In that study, okay. But then we got to get what happened after they squirted, right? What was happening to their bladders? This was your big question. This is their big question, right?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Sam also analyzed the squirt and found chemicals that you tend to find in urine, like urea, uric acid. Another study of seven women also found these particular P chemicals inside squirt, but at quite low quantities, kind of like diluted. We have a photo in Sam's study of all the different liquids that came out.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yes. So the darkest one was before squirt. Okay. And then that one that says S, that is squirt. That was squirt in this study.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Well, Sam said that when the study came out, some folks sent him these angry emails because they were so upset at the suggestion that this was just pee.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
But, you know, we do want more research, right? So I want to tell you about one more study in this that is related to this. We talked to a urologist from Japan called Dr. Miyabi Inoue who got five women who squirted and using a catheter, she emptied their bladders and then she inserted this blue liquid into it and she asked the women to squirt.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And the whole point is that if what came out was blue... She knew it was coming from the bladder. And Annie, she actually took a video of the experiment. And I have not watched this video yet because I wanted us to watch it together. I'm so excited. Okay. I think from the reactions of my team, it's a bit full on. So I think this is going to be a real bonding moment for us right now.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Gotta be blue. Okay, so what are we looking at here? Oh, someone finger banging themselves. Yeah. Yeah. There they are. They're going for it.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So you had said, I think there's something else there, right?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Something else has to be going on. I think so. And Annie, something else is going on. Ding, ding, ding, ding. After the break, we're going to look at this incredibly mysterious and misunderstood part of the body that some seem to say can transform this pee into a brand new sexy substance. Ooh, I love it. So if you're into the Powerpuff Girls, Chemical X is coming up after the break.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Welcome back today on the show, Squirting. We're here with comedian and squirting stan, Annie Letterman. We just learned that a lot of squirt lives in the bladder before it ends up on your bed, making it suspiciously seem like pee. Yes. But online and in this studio, you have heard folks say, no, no, no, it is not pee, and And the truth is that sometimes it's not just pee.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
There is this curious chemical found in squirt that comes from an even curiouser part of the body. And to tell us all about it, I called up Professor Helen O'Connell.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Helen and I kind of go way back. She's this pioneer when it comes to anatomy. So Helen was one of the first modern scientists to fully describe the clitoris. You know how now I hope everyone knows that the clitoris is way bigger than that little knob you see.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
It's bigger than the red ball. Bigger than the red ball. And now... Helen and a handful of other researchers are doing it all again, describing these amazing anatomical features. And this time, their target is the so-called female prostate, which one headline called the mystical source of female ejaculation.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yeah. Well, I mean, the fact that we don't know, I asked Helen about this. Why is there so much mystique around the female prostate? Why in 2025, as your team, are we still publishing basic anatomy about the female body?
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
All right, so once the vibrator races were done, the real reason that everyone was gathered at Cirque du Squirt tonight was to obviously see the squirting. And tonight we're not just going to see anyone squirt, but we're going to see the legend of liquid, the empress of emissions, the sorceress of squirt, Lola Jean. So Lola Jean...
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
It's annoying. Yeah. So to put some pages back into these anatomy textbooks, let's talk about this, what this gland does. It basically secretes these proteins that the male prostate does as well. And these proteins have sexy names like prostate-specific antigen, also called PSA, or PSAP is another one. Yeah. And basically these proteins will come out of the urethra in this very curious fluid.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Ah, okay. Other researchers have described it to us like that it's thick and milky. And if you've got a penis, your prostate will be pumping out these proteins that will end up in your semen, which is why some people have said that if Squirt has these proteins proteins in it, then it's basically a kind of cum, right?
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
It has to be. And when Samuel, our French scientist, and others have analyzed the chemicals in squirt, they often do find these prostate proteins in them, telling us that this female prostate does play some role. Where is the female prostate? It's like near the G-spot or what?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
This is a great question and actually one that scientists have still been arguing about because these pages have been ripped out of our anatomy textbooks. I am so mad about that.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yes, it's super important and it also can help us answer this question of how much this gland, kind of cummy, whatever, salivary, thick, milky stuff we're making because generally speaking, how big a gland is also helps us know how much of this stuff it's producing.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And so over and over again in textbooks, you see this description of the female prostate gland saying that it's basically two tiny tubes that sit on either side of the bottom of your urethra. So close to where pee comes out. But actually, Helen did this study that kind of turns us on this head in this really exciting way. So she got tissue samples from the urethra of seven women who had just died.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And Helen's team sliced up the urethra's crossways, kind of like how you would a baguette, I guess, like really thinly sliced. Oh. And then she looked at these little slices under a microscope. And even though what has been in a bunch of textbooks, you look online, you'll always see, you know, the prostate described. It's just these two little tubes down the bottom.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Actually, she could see this kind of constellation of glands all the way... throughout Urethra. Wow. Which is so cool. And so she said, you know, they're not just off to the side.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
holds the world record for squirting, which means that using nothing but her own fingers, she has squirted out 1.35 litres of fluid.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And Helen's not the first to uncover this. Other researchers have too. It's just no one's updated Wikipedia yet.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So the glands themselves, how big are they? Like a grain of rice?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So even if you squished all the webby, spider webby constellations together, it'd be really small. And how much liquid do they produce, all in all? It's probably more like several mils. Perhaps a teaspoon, we're talking. And what is cool, though, is that in some cases, that ejaculate can actually come out of your urethra on its own. And so... This is what scientists now call female ejaculate.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Okay. When just what's coming out of the female prostate comes out of your urethra. But yeah, it's different from, it's like a totally different process because it's not this huge gush. So then when it comes to this question of, okay, so are we ejaculating? Is squirt a mixture of pee and ejaculate? It is sometimes, but it's not always.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Which is about the same as two bottles of wine. Amazing. So Lola gets on stage with two other people. They're dressed in early 2000s boy band garb. They're lip syncing to this song, Liquid Dreams. And then it's about to be the main event. I asked Emily, who's there sitting in that crowd, to explain exactly what happened.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So in Sam's study, he found the sexy proteins in five of the seven squirt samples, meaning two were just pee. Miyabi's study out of Japan found it in four of five squirters. Which tells you that even though this female prostate is super cool, still what is coming out of us during squirt is mostly pee.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Research shows that those who think it's pee are more likely to be embarrassed about squirting as opposed to thinking it's a positive experience. But, you know, Helen says... Screw that.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Get it in the eye. Exactly. Miyabi, our Japanese urologist, said that if you're worried about pee being dirty, there's actually more bacteria in your mouth or your vagina. But it does raise the question of if this is mostly pee, and it is, why? Why doesn't it feel like peeing? When we asked academics about this, they said one reason could be the context is so different.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
I mean, you're not, you know, with peeing, you're scrolling through Instagram on the toilet. You know, in this case, you're doing something sexy. Context plays a huge role in how things feel in our body.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
But it's also possible that the actual physiological process of how the liquid gets out of your body, even though it is in the bladder and it's coming out of the urethra, that what triggers that whole process is different to pain, which would be super interesting. We need to learn more. We must.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
In my lifetime, I want to know. Yes. You know, we know peeing is voluntary. You know, you can hold it in. Your prefrontal cortex is like, hold it in, hold it in, let it out. Yes. Squirting for a lot of folks is involuntary. It just happens at this moment of arousal.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yeah. Also, in Miyabi's, in that Japanese study, lest we forget, with the blue liquid.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Mm-hmm. For four out of the five women, the squirt, Miyabi said that the squirt didn't shoot out like pee can, where it could be quite forceful. But she said it sort of dripped out, suggesting to her that maybe the muscles around the bladder weren't actually squishing in the same way. Because that's why pee shoots out. You have these muscles that contract around the bladder. Mm-hmm.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And you said it doesn't feel like pee. It just doesn't feel like pee. Yeah, and that really could be that just the processes are so different. But Carolyn Pakal says we're still learning the magical symphony that leads us to squirting.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And she said, there's this tarp on the ground that performers are standing over it.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
But given how smushed together the urethra, the vagina and the clitoris are, it wouldn't be a surprise to her if squirting is triggered in some way that is different. to pain. Here's what she said.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yeah, it's transforming it. It did transform it into a sexy new substance. Yes. Now, once we realized that there was all this mystery into exactly how we squirt, it did make us on the team wonder, could a penis squirt too? And it turns out, yeah, maybe. We talked to Carolyn about this as well.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So there was this case study out of Japan where scientists carefully tracked this 25-year-old man as he ejaculated normally. And then after he ejaculated, then this translucent, misty fluid came with levels of a chemical that you would generally find in urine, came out of his willy. For about a minute, they said it gushed out. And he was erect the whole time.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And so in this survey we did of our listeners, we actually asked folks with penises, have you ever squirted during sexual activity? Which we explicitly said, we are not talking about cum, lubrication, ejaculation, seminal fluid. Do you want to guess how many said yes?
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
It was 7% said yes. And we asked some urologists about this and they were very surprised, maybe even skeptical that the number could be that high. But I'm pretty sure ours is the only survey in the world in science that has ever asked folks with penises, have you squirted? So because there's just been this assumption, oh, this is just something just vaginas do.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So we're really in uncharted territory here. Wow, this is exciting.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
OK, so, yes, we're going to go back to people with vaginas for our final question for today, which is if you want to squirt, how can you do it? Lola Jean told us that she she hears a lot of people and you'll see a lot of this online is folks saying that, you know, the key to squirting is hitting your so-called G spot, which is really the back of your clitoris. We did a whole episode on it.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
But to get this area, you put your index finger and middle finger inside your vagina and kind of curl them towards your belly button. But for Lola Jean, she said hitting the G-spot is not the be-all and end-all. She told us that, you know, for her, she squirts everywhere. Anytime she hits a certain level of arousal.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
A paper interviewed more than a thousand women who had squirted and found that to build up to that squirting climax, going for the vaginal wall, aka the finger bagging technique, it only did it for around one in six women. So it might work for some, but definitely not all. For others, clitoral stimulation was the thing that got them going. Annie, do you have any tips personally?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Wow. And that'll make you squirt every time? Yeah, if I, yes. Glitzucker. Okay. Hot tip from Annie. Tell your friends. And then to release the squirt in this study, the thing that worked for some people was just relaxing their muscles. Uh-huh. Lola Jean told us this works for her as well. And she talked to our producer, Aketi Foster-Keys about it.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Interesting. And then does it make it less pleasurable generally if you're holding back? Yeah, for sure. Yeah. It's not clear that everyone is going to experience the splish splashy sound. Not maybe it's different for different squirters, but also we don't know that everyone can squirt. Just putting that out there.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And also this goes without saying, but we're going to say it anyway, is that now that squirting is kind of this sexy, porny thing that people have been pushing their lovers to squirt in this way that makes them quite uncomfortable. So Lola told us about this.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Oh, this is excellent. So, Annie, we when we asked you, do you want to come on the show to help us talk about the science of squirting? You could not have answered yes fast enough. What is your fascination with squirting? I am fascinated too.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Plus, our survey and other research shows that while a lot of people do get pleasure from squirting and feel this like fabulous release, like you've talked about, Annie, some people don't like it. So in one study around one in seven said that when they squirted, it wasn't pleasurable at
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And we don't know why, but sort of the point is, and Lola really stamped on this, is like, you know, if it happens for you and it feels great, that is awesome.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So what do you think of squirting now, now that you know all there is to know and more about squirting?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And it really does make you question, what is that fluid?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Is this something else? And so as part of our research for this episode, we did this big informal survey of our listeners. Almost 16,000 people responded. Annie, do you want to guess what percentage of folks with vaginas in our survey said that they had ever squirted? 30%. 45%.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And that's basically what other research has found. And so in our survey, we also asked these squirters, what do you think it is? Around 60% thought that it was either pee or pee with something else in it. The rest thought it was something else or they just weren't sure. Because there is this idea that it could be ejaculate. Right.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Like some that, you know, if you've got a vagina, you can ejaculate too.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Well, the thing is, you know, despite the pee propaganda, when we talked to Emily about what she thought this liquid was that was coming out, here's what she said.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And we spoke to Lola Jean, actually, the squirter on stage. And she told us that when it happens, it doesn't feel like when you're peeing.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And you're not, yeah, you're not the only one to say this. There was a study that interviewed 28 squirters, many of whom had smelt their squirt, even tasted it. And they also swore that it was something different.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So today on the show, we are going to get to the bottom of what is this fluid flying out of us, pee, ejaculate, something else. Plus, we're going to look at what's going on in our body when this happens. And if you are curious to bring some squirting into your life, Lola Jean's going to give us some tips. So exciting. I'm so happy for everyone. Great. And you know what?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
For those listening, I know this isn't you, Annie, but some might feel that this is some, you know, kinky little story about this strange sex phenomenon. But actually, the story of squirting goes so deep. It goes into the history of female ejaculation, which we're talking, we're going back hundreds of years, right up to groundbreaking science published just last year.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
We are going to finger bang our way through the research until the floodgates open and we understand everything everything there is to know about squirting.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
You ready to go? Oh, I feel so lucky. When it comes to squirting, there is a lot of... Finger banging. Yes. But then there's science. Science versus squirting is coming up.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Welcome back. Today, we are all about the science of squirt. We're here with comedian Annie Letterman. Hello. Hi. All right. So to find out more about what's going on with the science of squirting, we called up a friend of the show, Professor Carolyn Pucall, who's a sexual health researcher at Queen's University in Canada. And like us, she is amazed by squirting.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So these days, the idea that someone with a vagina can ejaculate is maybe a little controversial. But actually, centuries ago, things were quite different. So philosophers and scientists of medieval China, India and Europe were like, duh, of course a woman can ejaculate. Carolyn said that it wasn't controversial at all.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
There's this book on the history of female ejaculation called Juice that came out recently, and it has these amazing quotes from ancient texts. about this idea. And so here's one I wanted to read you. It was our personal favourite on the show. It's from a medieval Chinese sex book and it says, quote, When the woman's red ball grows, it is said to move swiftly and spray.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
The man then draws her ejaculate into his penis, a method that resembles a golden cicada clinging to a tree and imbibing dew.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And getting a woman to produce all of this liquid was considered super important back then because all the way up until around the 1500s, a lot of people thought that both women and men had sperm or seed inside their sexy wet stuff. And so basically, if you wanted to have a baby, both a man and a woman had to ejaculate. That was the thinking.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And so according to Deuce, this influential Catholic clergyman basically wrote that should the woman fail to secrete seed, no baby.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So it's amazing. So there's all these history books sort of giving these tips on how to make a woman get super, super wet. But then in the 1600s, the microscope is invented and science basically screws everything up. I mean, science does what science does. It learns. We discover sperm cells. We discover that women don't need to ejaculate to make a baby. And I talked to Carolyn about what happened.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And suddenly there's less and less advice about how to make a vagina resemble a golden cicada. And so I think to me what this point like really shows is how politicised and moralised the idea of female ejaculate is because these scientists of their day were observing women great fluids coming from a vagina and spraying. And then all of a sudden that function isn't necessary for procreation.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So you've already kind of picked the big question of the episode. Is it pee? Is it not?
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Exactly. Exactly. And so then all of a sudden, this physiological function that we have gets shoved aside, becomes taboo. We don't talk about it anymore. So let's talk about it. Let's really talk about it.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And I think even though they do have all these amazing descriptions of seeds and fluids and spraying, what is true is that in these texts, it's really not clear what fluid they are talking about.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
But so we're going to start this squirting journey in Brooklyn, New York, of course. And we wanted to start by checking out this very special show. So we sent producer Emily Foreman along.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
And the first one I want to look at is vaginal lubrication.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
That's right. Because how you make lube, it's actually really, really cool. I hadn't thought about it before. I don't know if you'd spent time. No, I never think about where that comes.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Yeah, it's amazing. It's amazing. So to tell us all about it is Dr. Nan Wise, a neuroscientist and sex therapist. So she says that, you know, when we get aroused... You're bringing blood flow into that area, Wendy, right? So blood flow starts to rush down to your vagina, making it slightly warm and swollen. And then some of that blood basically turns into lube. Whoa. Yeah.
Science Vs
Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Turning water into wine. We're like, Jesus. He's netting it.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Is anyone saying squirting is lube? No. No, no, no, no, no. So this cannot be what came out of Lola or you because, I mean, for one, with Lola, she pumped out over a liter of this stuff and you just don't produce that much lube. Plus, squirting actually comes out of a different hole.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
So the hole that Squirt is coming out of is the urethra, which is the hole that you pee out of.
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Squirting: What's Really Happening?!
Which does take us to suspect number two that we've discussed. Is it pee? And so for this, we called up Dr. Samuel Salama. He's a gynecologist working at the American Hospital in Paris.
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Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Versus. Today on the show, the insanely weird virus that is measles. For more than 20 years, the US had stopped the ongoing spread of measles. Yeah, I mean, we declared it eliminated. This is Grace Wade, health reporter at New Scientist magazine.
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Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
The vast majority of those, 96%, are unvaccinated, or we don't know their vaccination status. 800 cases. How many hospitalized? How many dead?
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Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
That is insane. That is up to two hours. On top of all of this, Catherine told me that you don't need to breathe in that many measles viral particles to actually end up sick, particularly when you compare it to something like COVID. This thing is seriously relentless. It's like the John Wick of viruses. You can't hide from it.
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Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
I read about this report from the 1991, what they called back then the Special Olympics, where there was an outbreak of measles and it was the athletes where the outbreak had happened and they tracked two spectators, got infected, and they were sitting in the upper decks 32 metres away.
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Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So, measles is looking like one tough opponent. But after the break, we fight back. Today's Ask Wendy Me Anything is brought to you by Amazon. Whether it's delivering medication to your door with Amazon Pharmacy or 24-7 virtual care with Amazon One Medical. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So I'm here with senior producer Rose Rimler, who has some questions for me from you guys, from our listeners.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
A lot of them are a little bit... Not safe for branded advertising, I think. But maybe one of the most awkward was when we were at the human composting facility and we were looking at this big tub of human compost and I really wanted to put my hands in it and I said, can I please touch that? Can I touch it?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Interesting. Okay, I really like this question, Steve. Thank you for asking it because I feel like... We get actually a lot of people sort of asking us this in this world where science has become so politicised. I think sometimes we get accused, if that's the right word, of being politicised ourselves or only delivering kind of woke science, if you want.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
But actually, when it comes to pitching for Science Versus, the more surprising thing that the science is, the more likely the episode is to get through.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
In the menopause episode, according to menopause social media, saying that hormone therapy increases your risk of breast cancer even slightly, that's the wrong answer. A lot of people are saying that hormones are magic. So that was the wrong answer.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Our recent episode on fluoride had some quote-unquote wrong answers by saying that, you know, the science here is actually more messy than we thought it was. So I guess in a nutshell, no, we do not leave episodes on the cutting room floor because they come to the wrong conclusion. We deliver the science, and that's why you come to us.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And now, online, there's all these people talking about measles and vaccines.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Yeah, yeah. Thanks, Rose. Thanks, Wendy. Today's Ask Wendy, me, anything was brought to you by Amazon. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful. Welcome back. Today on the show, measles. It's very contagious, but we have one weapon against it, the vaccine, and it works well. With two doses, according to the CDC, the MMR, or measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine, is 97% effective.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
That's Dr. Maru Shiel again, an infectious disease researcher. Now, concerningly, RFK Jr. recently said that one of the reasons that people are now getting measles in the US is because the vaccine is leaky and its effectiveness wanes over time. Is that true?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Right. I mean, just by virtue of the fact, when you look at the numbers of the current outbreak in the US, if the measles vaccine was leaky and its effectiveness waned over time, you would expect way more vaccinated people to be infected, right? Yeah.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Some say this is bad because measles is so contagious, while others say that measles isn't such a big deal. Why are we freaking out here? There's viral videos where people point out, didn't everyone just get measles back in the day?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
According to the CDC, in the current US outbreak, only 2% of those who have been infected were fully vaccinated. So this vaccine, it still works. And the fact that it works so well takes us to this kind of amazing possibility when it comes to measles. What is super interesting to me that I had no idea about before doing this episode is that measles doesn't infect other animals.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
It doesn't have a reservoir in, you know, birds or pigs or pangolins or bats or anything. And so that means we could potentially eradicate measles.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So we have this vaccine that works amazingly well over decades. There's no animal reservoir. Why haven't we conquered measles yet? Well, because a lot of people around the world don't have access to the vaccine. And then a lot of other people who do have access aren't vaccinating their children. And a big reason why is that they're worried about the risks here.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And, you know, this vaccine, it is made by taking the measles virus and then weakening it. And we basically inject this weakened virus into people. That's what creates this great immune response. But some worry that injecting a virus into an otherwise healthy kid is a bad idea. And you go online and people have all sorts of things to say about how dangerous this vaccine can be.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
The truth is that there are a couple of real risks, and then there's a lot of crap online you don't have to worry about. So first... Some kids might get a rash soon after the vaccine. Does it look like the measles rash? What kind of rash? It does.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
But important for people to know because that would be quite scary if you weren't expecting it. You give your kid the measles vaccine and all of a sudden they're getting a measles rash.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
The second thing to know about here is seizures. So in about one in 3,000 cases to about one in 4,000 cases, a kid may get what's called a febrile seizure after getting the MMR vaccine. Those figures come from the CDC. Dr Catherine Gibney told me that this does not mean measles is infecting your brain or anything. This happens because after you get a vaccine, it's pretty common to get a fever.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And in young kids, that can trigger a seizure. It's just any time you get a fever, you could get a seizure?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And by that, Catherine means that if you're a parent watching this happen to your kid, it can be really frightening. But according to the CDC, nearly all kids will recover quickly. When we think about sort of vaccine skepticism, I guess we should talk about autism.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
I don't mean to sound dismissive here. And, you know, I am still seeing a lot of stuff online connecting this vaccine to autism and But the thing is, over and over again, studies have compared thousands of kids, in some cases, hundreds of thousands of kids.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
They've looked at those who've gotten the vaccine and those who didn't, and they can't see higher rates of autism in the kids who got the MMR vaccine. Next question. What will it take to stop the outbreak in the US? I talked about this with Maru. So according to the World Health Organization, to prevent outbreaks, we need to vaccinate 95% or more of the population with two doses.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Meanwhile, the head of Health and Human Services, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is saying that part of what's causing this current outbreak is that the vaccine loses its effectiveness over time.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
When we look at the situation in the US, it's been reported that one county in Texas where there's an outbreak, the MMR vaccination rate is 82%. And then when you look across the US, MMR vaccination rates aren't great. In some states like Wisconsin, Alaska and Idaho, the number of kindergarten kids with two doses of MMR vaccine is less than 85%.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Given these numbers, how do you see this all playing out?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
I mean, given, I was just looking at the news and the messages coming from RFK Jr. and that sort of thing, and there's been really big cuts to the CDC and public health in general. If that's what it takes, you know, as someone, Maru, who's been tracking outbreaks around the world, if that's really what it takes, mass vaccination to stop it, that's really the only thing at this point.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And then, so, you know, we've talked a lot about the US situation where hundreds of people have been infected. When it comes to measles around the world, what's going on?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Wow. Measles is alive and well around the world. I mean, we are not even close to eradicating this.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
That's science versus measles. This episode has 98 citations in it. So if you want to learn more about measles or the vaccine, the MMR vaccine, then just go to the show notes of the podcast and click on the link to the transcript and you can see everything there. We'd love to hear how you felt about this episode. You can find me on TikTok.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So today on the show, how worried do you really need to be about this U.S. outbreak? What is measles doing in our body and our brains? And I'll tell you what, it's weirder than I thought. And how can we stop these outbreaks in their tracks and possibly even rid the world of measles? When it comes to measles, there's a lot of... If you have to get sick, you sure can't beat the measles.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
I'm at Wendy Zuckerman or we're on Instagram, science underscore VS. This episode was produced by me, Wendy Zuckerman, with help from Michelle Dang, Meryl Horne, Rose Rimler and Aketi Foster-Keys. We're edited by Blythe Terrell. Fact-checking by Eva Dasher. Mix and sound design by Bobby Lord. Music written by Emma Munger, So Wiley, Peter Leonard, Bumi Hidaka and Bobby Lord.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
A special thanks to the researchers who helped us with this episode, including Professor Rick Desfart. And a big thanks to Joseph Lavelle-Wilson and the Zuckerman family. Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original. Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
If you are listening on Spotify, you can follow us and tap the bell icon so you get notifications when new episodes come out. And whatever app you are listening on, we would love if you gave us a five-star review because it helps people find the show. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
But then there's science. Science vs. Measles is coming up just after the break. Welcome back. Today on the show, measles. So our first question is, how serious is this illness really? Because the majority of folks who get measles will recover fairly quickly. At first, you'll probably notice flu-like symptoms, coughing, sneezing, fever. This is because measles is a respiratory virus.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
A couple of days later, you might see these tiny white spots inside your mouth. They're called coplic spots. And then, of course, there's that blotchy red rash, which, fun fact, is triggered by the measles virus infecting your skin cells. In the current outbreak in the US, hundreds of folks who have gotten infected, almost 90%, were never hospitalised.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So you can understand why people are saying... What's the big deal here? But the thing is, even if you get a mild case of measles, What researchers are realizing is that this virus is actually doing something pretty weird that could have consequences on your health for years to come.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
This is Peter Kasson. He's a professor who studies viruses at Georgia Institute of Technology.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Peter told me that researchers have known for a while now that after young kids get the measles and get over it, they're more likely to contract other infectious diseases afterwards. So things like colds and flus. And sometimes this can actually get so bad that the kids get hospitalized.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And so this idea emerged that maybe measles is going after your immune system, or what Peter calls... Immunological destruction.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
It all started when there was this outbreak of measles in an Orthodox Protestant community in the Netherlands. This is a tight-knit community that isn't so crash-hot on vaccines. And so during this particular outbreak, researchers took blood samples from 82 kids who hadn't been infected yet. They then followed the children. 93% of them ended up getting measles.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Under half of those had a mild case, the others were pretty severe. On average, seven weeks after the kids got infected, the researchers took blood samples again. And they basically wanted to know how exactly was measles messing with their immune system? So as part of the study, they zoomed in on these immune cells that make antibodies. I talked to Peter about them.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
On the 20th of January, Texas reported a case of measles, and then another one, and another one.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
These are the immune cells that, you know, if you've been infected with a cold before or the flu or COVID, you have cells that remember this infection so that hopefully next time you get it, either you won't even feel symptoms because your immune system will kill it so quickly. It'll say, oh, I remember this enemy. I know how to kill it.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Or the disease will be much milder the second, third time around.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And this study on the Dutch outbreak, it was specifically looking at whether measles affected something called the antibody repertoire. You can think of it almost like a little library of antibodies that your immune system makes against the infections that you've had. And what they found is that unvaccinated kids who got measles... On average, they lost around 20% of their antibody library.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
But there was this huge range. In the worst case, it erased more than 70% of a kid's repertoire. What does this mean? So next time you get infected with the cold, the flu, COVID, what?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
You can kind of think about it like a computer virus that's getting into your hard drive and deleting all of these programs that help you fight off infections. Some papers even call this immune amnesia. This immune effect where measles is killing off your antibodies, this happens to... to some extent, to everyone who gets a measles infection. This is not just for complicated, serious cases.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Now, Peter told me that if you are unvaxxed and you do get measles, your immune system isn't screwed for life. But you'll probably need to get exposed to all of these viruses and bacteria, the colds, the flus again, to start building that antibody library back up.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
To go back to our hard drive analogy, it's like you've got to boot up the old computer, reinstall those missing programs, kind of one by one. And this could take months or even years to get back to where you were. Scientists are still trying to work all of this out. But still, this is what we know about a so-called mild measles infection. And then there's the more serious cases.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
In the current outbreak, around one in 10 people have been hospitalized. And so I asked Dr. Maru Sheel from the University of Sydney in Australia why exactly a measles infection might land you in the hospital. Like, what is it doing that's so bad? And she said that the most common complication is actually pneumonia.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And now there are infections all over the country. There's a whole rash of cases in more than 20 states. Some of those are just isolated cases. But in other states, the disease is spreading.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
In fact, one of the kids who died in Texas in the current outbreak, an eight-year-old girl, died from lung failure. And it is expected that roughly one in 500 children who get measles will die from it. In around one in a thousand cases, measles can cause encephalitis, which basically means that you get all of this inflammation in your brain and your brain swells up. This can lead to convulsions.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
It can lead to child death or with intellectual disability. And encephalitis is actually another reason that you can die from measles.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
I read that it's possible in rare cases, maybe less than one in 10,000, that the measles virus can get into the brain. The virus itself gets into the brain and can almost learn how to infect the brain.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
This is... I read this case report of a 16-year-old boy who came into a medical centre because he had been feeling weak, he was having some bladder problems. 16-year-old kid, lost his balance and then started having seizures. And the doctors worked out that it was this condition, it was from a measles infection, that he got when he was two months old. So it had been sitting in his body for...
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
in his brain for 16 years, and then he did end up dying from it. That is so terrifying. It's so terrifying.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who's the Health and Human Services Secretary, said it's very difficult for measles to kill a healthy person.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Now, if you are immunocompromised, you're sick, pregnant, or you're a little baby, thanks for listening to this podcast, you are at a greater risk of having a nastier measles infection. We also know that the measles death rate is higher in certain developing countries where you might have worse health care and some kids might be malnourished.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
In some cases, people who are in Texas have then spread the virus to other states, but not always. Grace said that the outbreak in Michigan started when someone got infected on a trip to Ontario, Canada, where they're currently experiencing a measles outbreak of their own. In the US, at least 800 people have had measles. That's according to the CDC.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
But Maru told us that even if that's not you, there's no guarantees here.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Yeah. The two children who died from measles in the U.S., I think they were healthy, had no known underlying conditions. Yeah.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So, is measles scary? Are we overreacting with this current outbreak in the US? You decide. In the US right now, we've got around one in 10 hospitalized, at least two out of 800 dead, and it's hitting kids particularly hard.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And even if you get measles and bounce back straight away, it could muck about with your immune system, making it weaker for a while and putting you at a higher risk of other nasty infections. Now, let's look at how contagious measles is. Because one thing that you hear over and over again is that it's extremely contagious. So what are we talking about here?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
And for this, I spoke to infectious disease researcher Dr. Catherine Gibney at the Doherty Institute in Melbourne, Australia. And she said that all the hype that you read about measles being infectious...
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
Another way to look at it is, do you remember the R0 number from COVID? It's basically the number that says if you are walking around infected with a disease, on average, how many other susceptible or unvaccinated people will you infect?
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So, yeah, compared to a lot of other diseases out there, measles is pretty R-naughty. Here's how Maru thinks about it.
Science Vs
Measles: How Worried Should We Be?
So why is measles on another scale? Why does it spread so easily? Well, researchers told me that one thing that's going on here is that you're actually very contagious in the days before you even know you have measles, like before you start getting obvious symptoms. But that's not all. Maru told me that this virus is also hardy as f**k. I mean, she didn't put it quite like that.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
Knowledge that is gained from one thing, like developing an atomic weapon, then has other uses, like civilian nuclear power. Or the Apollo space program is what Elon Musk's SpaceX and Blue Origins are riding on.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
Our experience with the COVID pandemic would have been so much worse without decades of investment in basic and applied science. I mean, millions and millions of people didn't die because we were able to develop mRNA vaccines in nine months. If you think of the economic costs of shutting down the U.S.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
economy early on during the COVID pandemic, if you can invest in public health and epidemiology to prevent that... The economic rate of return on that is astronomical.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
Oh, that's incredibly high. This is huge. It's crazy that we're not investing more. You're getting a really high rate of return on government R&D spending. It seems wild that Congress hasn't invested more in these areas.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
And this would be the argument that you could cut the NIH budget by 40 percent and then the pharmaceutical industry is going to pick up all of that. Our research finds the opposite.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
It's highly unlikely. I don't know why you would expect the private sector to invest an equivalent amount in basic research.
Science Vs
The War Keeps Raging Against Science
Yeah. Cutting NSF funding by 50%, cutting National Institutes of Health funding by 40%, if what's being proposed comes to pass, that's a really big hit.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Versus. This is the show that pits facts against feeling like you can read someone's thoughts. Today, we are talking about telepathy. And here with me is Science vs. Senior Producer, Rose Rimler. Hi, Rose.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
And so, do we know... Why the facilitator was doing that? Yeah.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Oh, okay. So it's almost like this subconscious response, the facilitators. I mean, if they're not actually doing it on purpose, I would have thought it was just really just trying to help, trying to communicate.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
The mom is looking at the pirate and also holding her kid's hand.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
And this, I mean, it doesn't need to be intentional, right? I mean, you could be doing this without even realizing it.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Yeah, I want to watch it. Yeah, yeah. Okay. So Kai shows the mom a picture of a crocodile.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
She's moving her hand and in a very deliberate way. Whether she is conscious of that deliberateness. But it's just not, it's not, yeah. Oh, yeah, for sure. Did you ask her why didn't she move them away from each other? Knowing what she clearly knew about facilitated communication.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
What's sort of, I guess, interesting is there is some lovely communication happening between the parent and the child. It's not telepathy, but clearly they have learned a language with each other that when... the parent touches the kid or makes this signal with their hand, they point to a letter. I mean, they have a language together. And that there is sort of something...
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
And so, Rose, as you were listening to this podcast, what were you thinking?
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
That's right. All of these repeatable studies over decades of research.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Coming up. Today's Ask Wendy anything, ask me anything, is brought to you by Amazon. Whether it's delivering medication to your door with Amazon Pharmacy or 24-7 virtual care with Amazon One Medical. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
So for our little ask me anything, senior producer Rose Rimler has come to me with some listener questions that have been gathered through social media. Hey, Rose. Hey, Wendy.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Oh, I love this question. Because I feel like we do so much homework on this show that no one gets to see. So when someone asks this kind of question, I'm like, yes! For me, when I'm making an episode, my first step is to go online and try and understand what is the misinformation, or at least what people are saying about a particular topic.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
A diet, for example, you'll start to see people are saying that it makes them smarter and gives them all this energy and makes their body look a certain way. And so I'll start to turn that into scientific questions. Does this diet affect your brain? How does it affect your body? And then I'll just dive into the scientific research and start chatting to scientists.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
And I won't stop until I feel like the answers have really started to coalesce. where I feel like I've got the scientific consensus or as close to it as possible, and now I can start to build an episode.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Thank you. So I actually did stand up a couple of times. Whoa. Yeah, when I was doing a job I didn't really like, and I wanted to put some fire up my a**. Yeah, just erred. Here is why I do not do stand-up comedy anymore, because Rose, would you like to hear the one joke that I remember? From your routine? Yeah. Yes, I do. It was something like this. It was something like this. Okay, so...
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Tuna are so amazing. Aren't they these amazing creatures? They're just so majestic in the ocean, just so beautiful. And it's amazing that evolution created this creature that swims in a little capsule with lemon and pepper all in there. So it's so convenient that we could just eat it all up.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Thanks, Rose. Thanks, Wendy. Today's Ask Wendy, Me Anything was brought to you by Amazon. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful. Welcome back. Rose just told us why we really can't believe the telepathy you might hear about on the telepathy tapes. But now we're going to broaden out to the land of how science has tested telepathy problems.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Mm-hmm. And at this point, someone sends... An image of a pirate crocodile. Yeah, exactly.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Bob wasn't really concentrating during the experiment. Yeah, I'm going to throw out his data.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Oh, so this was... You would try to, oh, predict what the computer would do. Yeah. An unknown, an unknown, basically.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Can I just ask, if you got it right, did the curtains open and then you got to see the willy?
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Okay, that's the suggestion being if we were to rigorously test telepathy, putting the skeptics and believers all together, perhaps we would see the same effect. But I guess we don't.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Can I ask, what is the mechanism, the purported mechanism of telepathy?
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
I mean, I think that the vibes when people say they're experiencing something like telepathy are... are like intuition and other human vibes that are not paranormal is what I would... Whether it is a parent who loves their child, their nonverbal child so much, and there is some communication there and there's something nice being shared, it's just not paranormal.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
And when two friends, you know, one calls the other and... one says, oh my God, I knew you were going to call.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Okay. Okay. So the first thing going through my head is what image would Rose have on her wall? But that's not... That's cheating. That's cheating. Okay, okay. Jellyfish, bird. Okay, but what image is... All right, I'm going to close my eyes. I don't have ping pong balls, but I'll close my eyes. Okay, what... Are you thinking about it really hard?
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
I don't think you're thinking about hot enough, Rose. You're thinking about other things.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
And if anyone wants to... Send us any curtains and let us try and guess what kind of erotic image is behind them.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
We're edited by Blythe Terrell. Mix and sound design by Bobby Lord. Fact-checking by Erica Akiko Howard. Music written by Peter Leonard, Emma Munger, So Wiley, Bumi Hidaka and Bobby Lord. Thanks to all of the researchers that we spoke to for this episode, including Dr Zoltan Kekec, Professor Stefan Schmidt and Janice Boynton.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Special thanks to Enrique Perez, Isabel Lura, Lindsay Cherner, Lily Kim and Lauren Silverman.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Welcome back. Rose is here to talk about telepathy, inspired by this hugely popular podcast, The Telepathy Tapes, which has really brought this topic back into the zeitgeist. So, Rose, where do we begin?
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Yes, I am hearing a lot about this podcast. Yes, yes, yes. And telepathy with it.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
So it's a bit faster than them having to do it all by themselves. Is that the idea? Yeah.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
This idea that they can't speak beautifully, but locked inside their brain is... this huge mastery over the English language that until now they were not able to express. It's sort of this idea.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
I mean, so hopeful if you're a parent to be looking at your child and thinking, wow, there's so much in there.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
I do have to say as... Uh, hopeful as this is, I am getting a Ouija board vibe here.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
Yeah, not meaning to necessarily, just wanting to move through it faster. And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. D-O, you probably mean dog.
Science Vs
Telepathy: Is It For Real?
No, that's right. We decided I wouldn't listen. So hopefully I can stand in for those of you who also haven't listened.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman and you're listening to Science Versus. Today on the show, we are pitting facts against bird flu. And to tell us all about it is editor of Science Versus, Blythe Terrell. Hey, Blythe. Yeah, hey, Wendy. So you've spent the last few months, I feel like, coming into meetings and saying, oh, my God, I just learned something crazy about bird flu. Oh, my God, Wendy.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Don't. Don't put the milk in the manure lagoons. Oh, my gosh. So it's like it's just in the environment. It's just out there. Okay, so there's all this potential for humans to now get infected, not just from the cow to human interface, but also the cat-human interface and the rodent-human interface and the raccoon-human interface and the opossum. I'm sure those opossums are also getting it.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Coming up. Welcome back. Today, I'm here with Blythe, our editor at Science Versus. who's about to tell us what bird flu is currently doing in humans. What's going on?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
And they're now getting that newish version, that H5N1 baby that you were talking about. Yeah.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Uh-huh. 70 known cases. And so what's happening now when people get it? Are they getting really sick?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
In Australia too, eggs, crazy expensive right now. Supermarkets empty, kind of like the pandemic where the toilet paper used to be. Just like, it's kind of like that, but for eggs.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
So these cases, they're kind of trickling out, but... The question obviously becomes, have we had a case where the virus has gone human to human?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Like, they're not agriculture workers. Right, okay. And we don't know if those people got it through wild birds, through another person. That's so difficult to know. When you look at the genetics of the virus, does it give us any clues about where this might go?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Right. So they can then infect seals and cows and other animals.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Hmm. Yeah, that's interesting. And that's not really a gamble we want to make.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Oh, where a human flu or a human adapted flu basically has virus sex with an animal flu. And then, because that's a, yeah, from a virus's perspective, that's a much more efficient way to just get all of these adaptive features that like, beep, beep, beep, beep, beep, I'll take this. And now we can infect humans much easier than having to completely develop all these
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
But extra toilet paper? Did you do that yet? No, still taking my chances on that one. So do we have anything to fight against bird flu? Are there vaccines? No.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
It's funny because I have to go get my flu vaccine now because it's an early human flu season in Australia. But it did make me think that is this something that you can do?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
And so then just finally, what is the U.S. government saying about all this?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
We're getting data on the cows. It's still clearly spreading.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Oh, gosh. What does this tell us? What does this tell us? Because it means they didn't even know they were sick. So asymptomatic infection is a thing. That also could suggest maybe this type of bird flu, if it goes pandemic on us, it's not going to be that deadly. And, you know... So that we don't have our scare hats on.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
We do know that from history, viruses tend to become less deadly as they go pandemic because it allows them to spread. But it also could be that... This bird flu isn't that deadly for everyone, but it still has a high case fatality rate. This is just where we're at. It's just like this tip of who knows what. And in the meantime, we can't trust that we're getting proper information about...
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Okay, so then, you know, we mentioned the boy who cried wolf at the start of the show. So...
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Welcome back. Today we're talking about bird flu. Blythe is about to tell us if this is going to be the next pandemic.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Yeah, I forget the ending of that. It's funny that, isn't it?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Watch this space. Blythe will be there on the top of the hill looking for the wolves.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Also, next week, you know, we did allude to the fact that there have been cuts to science funding, which we have talked about on the show before. But next week, we're going to do an update on what exactly is going on with U.S. science right now.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
This episode was produced by Blythe Terrell with help from me, Wendy Zuckerman, Michelle Dang, Rose Rimler, Meryl Horne, and Aketi Foster-Keys. We're edited by Blythe Terrell, mix and sound design by Bobby Lord and Sam Baer, fact-checking by Erica Akiko Howard, music written by Bumi Hidaka, Peter Leonard, Emma Munger, So Wiley, and Bobby Lord.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Thanks so much to all of the researchers that we spoke to for this episode, including Dr. Louise Moncler, Dr. Ted Alsasser, Dr. John Corsland, Victoria Rosado, and Lindsay Adams. A special thanks to Jeff Delvisio. Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original. Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. We are everywhere.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Whatever you listen to us on, give us a five-star review because it helps people find the show. And if you are listening on Spotify, follow us and tap the bell icon so you get notifications when new episodes come out. And if you would like to get in touch with us, we are on Instagram, science underscore VS. I'm on TikTok at Wendy Zuckerman. So come and say hello. I'm Wendy Zuckerman.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
And I have kept telling you to wait. for this conversation right here.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Okay, so but this 2, 3, 4, 4, B, that is what people are freaking out about right now.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
And so scientists are seeing all these awful deaths in birds, right?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
It's true. It's true. I mean, when I think about it, the alarm bells about bird flu, just in general, becoming a global pandemic, I feel like they've been going on... and off and on again for like 20 years? I mean, to be honest, it is feeling a little boy who cried wolf at this point. I mean, has something changed?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
poo, I thought it was the crab. Those birds crap so much, and so they're crapping out the virus.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Okay. She's, okay, not terrifying yet. Yet. Noting the yet. Interesting. It's just a sign that, huh, we don't like that. But a seal is not a human. That seems like that's her mindset.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Oh, I was so sure she was going to say humans. I mean, cows just feel like seals of the land.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
oh, because they were so short, you know, these cows don't have it.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
Mm-hmm. And the bird flu was giving the cat neurological symptoms and the cows mastitis.
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
We're not killing the cows in the same way we would the chickens?
Science Vs
Bird Flu: The Next Pandemic?
So then, okay, so we're seeing all of these animals get it. This was, we're up to last year with the cows.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Faces. This is the show that pits facts against the fire inside your body. Today on the show, inflammation. Everyone is talking about it.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Okay. Okay. So then... The question becomes, how do we fix this? Can we fix it?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
This surprised you? This has been around for ages. Like Gwyneth Paltrow was crapping on about how much she hated nightshades. But I guess I shouldn't say crapping on about it. Is there any science here? Why do people hate nightshades?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
That's such a thing that would happen to schoolboys in England.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Right, yeah. I mean, the bad batch of potatoes, that could have been anything that caused those illnesses, and then you've got some studies in mice, right?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
You're not cutting eggplants out of your diet anytime soon.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Okay, so nightshades back on the menu. Junk foods is still bad for us. What's up next?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Coming up. Welcome back. Today we're talking about inflammation. Meryl has scared the shit out of us, out of me at least, about our leaky brain barrier. How do you fix it? How do you lower your chronic inflammation? Avoiding processed foods might help. What else you got for us?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Turmeric is the one when it comes to fighting inflammation.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Seeing a lot on turmeric shots, turmeric in this, turmeric in that.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
So what do you make of that? I mean, are you adding more turmeric to things now?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Did you catch that? Tomatoes and nightshades are going to kill you. If you missed it, catch up. But curiously, it's not just health fluences that are obsessed with inflammation these days. Scientists are too. In fact, there has been this explosion of research in this space. In the past year, there were over 60,000 new scientific papers written about inflammation. 60,000!
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
So for years now, the Mediterranean diet has been in and out of headlines as this sort of magic diet in a way. Let's dive into it. What does it actually involve?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
So that is the Mediterranean diet. Then tell me about this amazing study.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Okay, all right. It's expensive, but okay. And then if you were not in this group, what was the control?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
That's awesome. So what's it doing? Why... Why is it helping?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And we read some of them to find out what is the groundbreaking research on inflammation? What is it doing to our bodies and our brains? And if this is a problem for you, how can you tamp down that inflammation? When it comes to our health, a lot of us have been wondering if we... Most likely have inflammation. But then there's science. Science vs. Inflammation is coming up just after the break.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Right. It's not the food on these lists. They don't have some magical anti-inflammatory power.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Is that an inflammation story as well? Is it because it's lowering inflammation?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Well, this is very exciting. So there is a thing you can do to lower your inflammation, and it's to go on this diet that allows you to eat pasta and fry it with beautiful tomatoes. I don't know about the frying part.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Oh, I'm not a cook. I don't know. You shove it on a pan. I don't understand the rest. So... This is amazing. And I guess what is slightly annoying is for anyone who's really looking for a quick fix, as in I'll just cut out eggplants from my diet or I'll just add this one thing and all of a sudden, boom, no more inflammation. That's really not how we should be thinking about it.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
It's really your whole diet. Wow. Which is a bit annoying. Yeah. So then speaking of other things that are annoying, exercise. So what's the story here? Because online, man, people have so many opinions about exercise and inflammation. Yeah. Do it. It lowers your inflammation. Don't do it. It actually ramps up your inflammation.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
This is excellent, Meryl, because I never want to do a marathon. And so any extra reason as to why I don't do that, this episode is just getting better and better for me personally.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
So when you do exercise, you do get this sort of sharp increase in inflammation. Does that go down? Or does that actually lead to chronic inflammation?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
I mean, that makes so much more sense. I mean, we know exercise is so good for us. Yeah. For so many different things. Okay, so Meryl. Wendy. What I have learned from this episode is that chronic inflammation... is a problem that a lot of us have to think about, unfortunately. One more thing, add it to the pile.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And don't listen to people try to sell you quick fixes, whether it's a turmeric shot or someone telling you not to eat that tomato. Instead, you know what? Take that tomato. put it in a pan with some olive oil, simmer it, whatever that is. No, simmer it. And enjoy. Meryl, what are you going to do differently as a result of this episode? Are you going to cook up a sofrito?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Oh, this is great. A prescription for Mario Kart from a scientist. Absolutely. Right. Thanks, Meryl. Thanks, Wendy. That's science versus. So Meryl, how many citations in this week's episode?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And if people want to find these citations, learn more about anything that we talked about on the show, where should they go?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Excellent. And on Instagram this week, which is science underscore VS, what do we have for people?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
I mean, I would love it if... You guys, as you look at this photo, tell me what you see in this. Do you see the eels? Yeah. Are they eels? What are they? It kind of looks like stars, you know, where you kind of find the pot and whatever else is up in the stars. Anyway, tell us what you think. Yeah. Thanks so much, Meryl. Thanks, Wendy.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Music written by Bobby Lord, Emma Munger, So Wiley, Bumi Hidaka and Peter Leonard. Thanks to all of the researchers that we spoke to for this episode, including Professor Susan Segerstrom, Professor Andre Nell, Dr. Hannah Mayer, Professor Xiaoping Li, Dr. Jennifer Felger, Professor Andreas Mikkelsen, Professor Charles Serhan, Professor Heather Zwicky, Dr. Jian Tan and Professor Philip Calder.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original. Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you are listening on Spotify, then follow us and tap the bell icon so you get notifications when new episodes come out. And if you like the show, you like what you've heard, whatever app you are listening on, give us a five-star review. Makes us feel happy. Thanks.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Welcome back. Today we are looking at inflammation. How big of a problem is this? What can we do to tamp it down? Beryl Horde, senior producer at Science Versus. Hi, Wendy. Are you worried about your inflammation?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
So, yeah, it's been a journey. Well, let's start that journey at... mental health, because I'm hearing a lot about how chronic inflammation is affecting our brain and our mental health. So what do we know here?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Reducing inflammation that we hear so much about these days. If you're feeling crappy in basically any way, people say that it is inflammation that's to blame.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And so how does all of this work? How exactly does inflammation affect our mental health?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Not only is it triggering bad things in your body, but people say that inflammation can ravage your mind. Yeah, struggling with your mental health? Apparently, it's inflammation.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
So what did she see here? I mean, was the blood-brain barrier doing its job?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Okay, great. Wait, what is this? It looks like two eels kissing on a thermal camera.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
That is a messed up blood-brain barrier there. I mean, the green lines, you can actually barely see them in some places.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Wow. So, I mean, of all the people who are struggling with their mental health right now, do we have any idea how... how many might be able to blame inflammation for this?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
It's funny because as you were explaining, the mechanism of how it all works. I have to say, it really does feel like that is what is happening in my brain. I don't suffer from depression, but when I am very stressed, I do feel as if my brain gets a bit cotton ball-y or brain foggy. I can almost feel those cytokines flooding in through my crappy blood-brain barrier.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And this only happened since I got COVID a couple of years ago. I never used to have this effect and I got a pretty nasty case of COVID.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Never fear, though. The internet also has solutions. There are all these tips online about what you have to do to rid your body of inflammation. Like you need to avoid certain kinds of exercise.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And so she thinks that part of the reason people are getting brain fog is because... This blood-brain barrier is leaky. It's allowing more inflammation in, which is then causing damage to the brain.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Do you know, like, I can almost feel brain fuck right now from the stress of what you have just told me there. Oh, no. Continue with your laundry list of the terrible things caused by chronic inflammation.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
You're almost like the big mouse just bullying me with facts about how terrible inflammation is right now. Just staring at me. I am not the bully mouse. Bullying me with facts. So why is it that some of us Where does this chronic inflammation come from? Stress, as you've talked about.
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
And the biggie is to change your diet. You can read countless books about anti-inflammatory diets. And it feels like everyone's got advice about what to eat or not to eat to lower your inflammation. Question, what are some good anti-inflammatory foods?
Science Vs
The Real Anti-inflammatory Diet
Wow, wow, wow. I mean, I wasn't sure... Just because there's so much talk about chronic inflammation, I really... I'm a bit surprised by this, that scientists really do believe that this rumbling of chronic inflammation is truly the cause of quite a lot of our illnesses.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman and you're listening to Science Versus. Today on the show, we are pitting facts against fluoride. Should we put it in the water? To tell us all about it, senior producer Meryl Horne. Hello. Hi.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Right, pregnant women, following pregnant women. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
And looking at places with, like, not huge amounts of fluoride in their water, but kind of relatively low levels, the amount you'd find in a city in Australia or the U.S. that fluoridates their water. Yeah.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Oh, that's so confusing. Suggesting what? That in Ashley's studies, in those prenatal studies, it's not from drinking the water that's the problem, but from swallowing toothpaste?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
So then what are you supposed to do if you're pregnant? Get a new water supply?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Yeah, and then you got to worry about the bloody microplastics with the hormone disruptors that we talked about last season. I know.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Okay. So where we're at with the brain stuff and fluoride is that there is some emerging evidence that if you're pregnant, this could... be doing something to the fetus. The science is still unclear, but based on where it's at, you think it's worth thinking about. Yeah. For us big kids, come out of the vagina, making podcasts, is there other stuff that we need to worry about?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
All right. Well, this episode has taken quite the turn. Yeah. I mean, clearly fluoride is not the devil or poison, as some people are claiming at the levels we put in our water. But it really is frustrating that... we don't have more science on this and the science that we have is muddy.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
I guess that's why you see these big fights online with people, some saying it's safe, some saying it's not, because you really can cherry pick the data on all these fronts. You can pick your it's bad for the thyroid study and you can pick it's bad for the brain study or you can pick a study that's saying the opposite. I guess this... But what it does tell us, though, the fact that...
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
for a lot of this stuff, it is muddy and that you do see studies showing both sides, tells us that whatever fluoride is doing in the water, it's not super dramatic because then you would see the same results in, you know, basically all studies.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Now we need to talk about the potential benefits. The reason that we have been doing this in the first place is to protect our teeth. So is fluoride still doing that? That's after the break.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Welcome back. Today we're talking about fluoride. Meryl, any benefits to putting it in the water?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
So are they right? I mean, does adding fluoride to the water, is it still preventing cavities or not?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
65% had cavities. All right, drum roll. What is it when fluoride is in the water?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Right. This new water in Arkansas had higher fluoride levels.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Okay. Okay, so one thing that we've been told about fluoride, still true, still good for our teeth.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Oh, it's tiny. Is that because we're better at brushing our teeth than kids?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Wow. Maximal hardness. Yeah. That's an odd way to describe anything to do with children.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
They listened to the teeth science. They cared about their teeth.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Sure does. Sure does. All right. But Lindsay's looking at the teeth. Was she also thinking about all of the other potential risks around brain development and thyroid stuff when she answered that question?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Hmm. Oh, messy. I mean, zooming out here, you did speak to a lot of scientists in this space. What are they telling you when they put the risks and the benefits together here? Where do they stand?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
So, Meryl, do you think we should keep Flora out of the water?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
That's science versus... Hey! 20 seconds of silence, is that about it? Yeah. Okay, so Meryl, how many citations are in this episode?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Whoa, 105. Wow. So before you send us angry emails, Instagram messages, please have a look at our transcript. How could people find these 105 citations?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
It's true. On Instagram, we are science underscore VS. My TikTok is at Wendy Zuckerman.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Come say hello. Let us know what you thought of the episode. All right. Thanks, Meryl. Thanks, Wendy.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
This episode was produced by Meryl Horne, with help from me, Wendy Zuckerman, Rose Rimler, Michelle Dang and Aketi Foster-Keys. We're edited by Blythe Terrell. Mix and sound design by Bobby Lord. Fact-checking by Erica Akiko Howard. Music written by Bumi Hidaka, Peter Leonard, Emma Munger, So Wiley and Bobby Lord.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Thanks to all of the researchers that we spoke to for this episode, including Professor Christine Till, Professor Jonathan Broadbent, Dr. John Morris, Professor Bruce Lanphier, Professor Loc Do, Dr. Maria Kipper, Professor Philippe Hajul, Professor Stephen Peckham, Dr. Tommaso Filippini, and Professor Stephen Levy. Besides Versus is a Spotify Studios original.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you are listening on Spotify, follow us and tap the bell icon so that you get notifications when new episodes come out. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Yeah, wow. That's big. That's in the biggies. But then, fast forward to 2025, and people are not... excited about drinking away tomorrow's tooth decay.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
So who's right? Is fluoride the hero that we thought it was or is it the nemesis that people now say it is?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
All right. The Science of Fluoride is coming up just after the break.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Welcome back. Today, we're looking at whether fluoride should be in our water or not. Is it safe or not? Meryl Horne, PhD, is here with us. Hi, Wendy.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Oh, God. How much fluoride did they dump in the water in that case?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
But there's a lot of things that if you have too much of them can kill you, including water that is not fluoridated. Uh-huh. The question obviously becomes, are the levels of fluoride that we're putting in the water safe?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Okay. What about the big thing I hear about now and I've seen headlines saying this and that and the other is around fluoride affecting our brains. Some saying it's damaging, others saying it's not. What's going on here?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
So at high doses, yes. But the question is, what about the low doses?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Oh, it's a real black line, thick line across their teeth. That is unsightly.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Uh-huh. And can you put some numbers around this? I mean, when you say more tantrums, more anxiety, I mean, by how much?
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
Yeah. Okay. It's intriguing. I'm not... It's not a huge study. 200... people.
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
I guess if I'm going to be honest about my biases here, I sort of wear Ashley, was before she did the study and she was drinking the water and her family member said, this causes brain damage. And she's like, absolutely not. And because I know the scientific status quo for so long has said, no, it's safe. So I can see myself looking for holes in this paper and
Science Vs
Fluoride: Is Your Water Safe?
It's not a randomized controlled trial. So we can't say that the fluoride caused these differences. There might have been other differences between the groups. But what other studies show here?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman and you're listening to Science Versus. So there are a lot of scientific papers out there that you will never read and that I will never read, and only nerds really know about them. But every now and then, there is a scientific paper that will break out of the ivory tower and go viral.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Right. And because you mentioned they're starting with these tiny tissue samples, they weren't analyzing the entire brain for plastics, right? They've got a tiny tissue sample.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
If you've got two tiny pieces of plastic contamination and then you multiply that out by a hundred, a thousand, whatever, now all of a sudden you have a plastic spoon in your brain. It could be.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
So then do we have any idea how much plastic is in our body and our brain and our testicles?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Welcome back. Today on the show, viral papers. Viral papers. We don't need to play the jiggle again.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
But there is still this question of how much plastics are in our body, right?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Yeah. If we're finding it in the poop, that's actually a potentially good sign, right? Because we know intuitively we are ingesting it if it's sloughing off food products. But if we're pooing out a bunch of it, that's great. The body's like, I don't want this. So where are you at? How much do you think we need to worry about microplastics in our body and our brain?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Yeah, this was everywhere. New York Times, CNN.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
All right, Rose, how many citations are in this week's episode?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
And if people want to read more about this paper and this technique, where should they go?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
And also, if you have a viral paper suggestion for us, let us know. You can find us on Instagram. We're science underscore VS. I'm on TikTok at Wendy Zuckerman. Thanks, Wendy. Thanks, Rose. This episode was produced by Rose Rimler, with help from me, Wendy Zuckerman, along with Aketi Foster-Keys, Meryl Horne and Michelle Dang. We're edited by Blythe Terrell. Mix and sound design by Bobby Lord.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Fact-checking by Sam Lemanick. Music written by Peter Leonard, Emma Munger, So Wiley, Bumi Hidaka and Bobby Lord. Thanks to all of the researchers that we spoke to for this episode, including Dr Roger Coleman, Professor Martin Wagner, Dr Elke Fischer, Dr Marie-France Diniac and Rachel Kozlowski. Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. We are everywhere. If you like what you're hearing, give us a five-star review on whatever podcast app you're using. And if you are listening on Spotify, then please follow us and also tap the bell icon so you get notifications when new episodes come out. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Yeah, I mean, the idea that a plastic spoon is sitting in our brains, yeah, very potentially scary. What's it doing in there? How is it affecting our behavior, our health?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
You see it all over the news, it's all over your feed, and sometimes these papers make these very extraordinary claims. that, I don't know, maybe sound a touch dodgy. It's hard to know what to make of them. And that is where our brand new segment, Viral Papers, comes in. And here with our very first viral paper is Science vs. Senior Producer, Rose Rimbler.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
So let's get into it. What is going on? Do we all have an entire spoon's worth of plastic lodged into our brain? Coming up after the break. Do you want to sing us out with the jingle, Rose?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Welcome back. Today on the show, Rose Rimler, senior producer, has been smelling something fishy in a scientific paper that claimed to find a lot of plastic swimming around in human brains. So where do we begin?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Pyrolysis, gas chromatography, mass spectrometry.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Uh-huh. So they're looking for the fingerprints of plastics within those brain samples that they just burnt up.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
It's kind of like if you had a bunch of baked goods, muffins, loaves, soufflés, I don't know. Anyway, and then you burnt them all up and put them through your pyrolysis spectrometer, whatever. And then on the line, it all just looked like flour or something.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Oh, this is a big deal because the brain is full of fat. Exactly.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
So what did the authors of that plastic spoon paper say about this general problem that you can't tell the difference between healthy fats and plastics?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Oh, that seems smart. So they thought they got rid of all the fat, so anything they're seeing is truly plastic.
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Oh, that was just a suggestion. I didn't think it was going to be the... A good idea is a good idea, you know?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
Okay. And in our microplastics episode, we talked about blood having microplastics in it. Are you now questioning that paper?
Science Vs
Is There Really a Plastic Spoon in Our Brains?
So even if you find actual plastic in your sample, you don't know if it was in people's brains while they were walking around in the world. It could have just gotten into the sample from the lab.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Versus. Today on the show, we're pitting facts against fitness buffs.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
This episode is brought to you by Roka. Roka makes performance eyewear built for people who get after it. It's Roka's obsessive engineering, design, and material science that keeps their eyewear fitting you perfectly, whatever you're doing. I am a very sweaty person and my glasses will be sliding off my face.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
It'll be so annoying. And this is what Roka's glasses are designed to solve. They are designed to stay on your face, even when it gets all wet.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Get Roka. Performance eyewear built to perform. Also available in prescription. Shop now at roka.com. That's R-O-K-A dot com. And use offer code SCIENCE20 for 20% off your order. Welcome back.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
We're looking at the supplement creatine and we're going to find out if it can help our brain, which I'm seeing a lot of buzz about right now that creatine is going to help with your cognition and memory, particularly when you're sleep deprived.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Yes, that's right. You have more fuel, then you have more energy, you can do more reps. Yes.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Like, quote, creatine may not build more muscle after all, study suggests. Another one, shocking new study challenges muscle-building hype. So what's going on here? Should you take creatine or not? Will it boost your brawn and your brain? That is on today's show. When it comes to creatine, there's a lot of... Girl, creatine made that booty grow, grow, grow, grow, grow, grow, grow.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Yes, I know. I've done this test actually while sleep deprived and you think it would be easy because you just see this damn green dot, but you're just, you know, missing the clicker at points. Yeah.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Oh my gosh, I couldn't imagine anything worse than having political discussions with someone at 3, 4, 5 in the morning where everyone's just going bonkers at that point.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Okay. It is time to find out, did they do better at the cognitive tests with creatine?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
But then there's science. Science versus creatine is coming up just after the break.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So if I took creatine, according to Fabian's study, would I do better?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
She's saying I'm not sure how easy it would be to notice.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So does this mean this claim about creatine? I mean, you have Ali's study that said yes, then Fabian's larger study that says no.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
I guess even though it's not going to turn you into a quantum physicist, just the fact that, you know, maybe if you're sleep deprived, it could help your brain. Or if you have depression, maybe it could help early research suggesting it's exciting. Plus, those... Small benefits that you say to your muscles. I mean, I'm not kicking this supplement out of bed just yet.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
But the last question is, what are the risks of taking it?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Oh, because people talk about taking a ton of this stuff when you first start, that loading phase.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So forget the loading phase. You're just going to pee it out. Pee out all this excess creatine. Your muscles don't need it.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
I mean, even though some of the benefits are definitely overstated, I will say, Michelle, it's probably the most optimistic conclusion we've had about a supplement in a long time. So thank you. Thanks, Wendy.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Welcome back today on the show, Creaton. Can it help you get that big booty, those big muscles and that big brain? That's what we're asking today. Producer Michelle Dang is here to tell us all about it. Hey, Michelle. Hey, Wendy.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
What is most funny to me is how... Things have changed a lot in the world and in the world of misinformation and in social media, blah, blah, blah, blah. But at the same time, the more things change, the more they stay the same. And I love that the very first pilot episode of Science Versus, which in the future, I reckon we should put it down the feed because it's so funny.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
It's about the paleo diet. And next week, our episode is about the carnivore diet. Oh, yeah.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Yeah, well, if you guys want to send us a message or... It feels weird. Do you want to send me a happy birthday message? No, but, you know, in a future episode, we're going to kind of be pulling together some fun birthday stuff. And we would love to hear from you about...
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
How you felt about listening to Science Versus over these years, if there was like an episode that changed what you do or a pun that still makes you laugh. That seems unlikely. But we would just love to hear from you.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Bye. This episode was produced by Michelle Dang, with help from me, Wendy Zuckerman, Meryl Horn, Rose Rimler, and Aketi Foster-Keys. We're edited by Blythe Terrell. Fact-checking by Marlo Starling. Mix and sound design by Bobby Lord. Music written by Emma Munger, So Wiley, Peter Leonard, Bumi Hidaka, and Bobby Lord.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
A special thanks to all of the researchers that we reached out to, including Dr. Imtiaz Desai and Professor Phil Chillebeck. Thanks to Larry Lee and Lee Physical Therapy and Wellness. Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original. Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. We are everywhere.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So what got you so excited about Creaton? Learning all the facts on creatine.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
But if you are listening on Spotify, you can follow us and tap the bell icon so you get notifications when new episodes come out. And on whatever app you are listening on, please give us a five-star review if you like what we're doing because it helps people find the show. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Love it. Okay. So first up, just very basic question. What exactly is creatine?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So let's jump into the claims. And I want to start with the muscles.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Because online, you see these folks with these huge muscles.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
And you know how we're going to get that greatness from our workouts? With one supplement that everyone is talking about.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
He's huge. I mean, he looks like those classic images of Arnold Schwarzenegger. All right.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So when he got the muscle biopsies, did he see a difference between the people who were taking creatine and those who weren't?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
A wonderful, wonderful supplement. It's the best thing ever. Creatine. It's huge if you want to get huge. People are saying that if you want to build muscles, you have to take this.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
So how is creatine actually doing this? Is it building the muscle for you?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Oh, okay. But Darren's study showed, no, it's not just that. Actual muscle. was growing, right?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
But then there's been these headlines lately saying that creatine might not help build muscle. So what is going on here?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Creatine. Creatine. Girl, creatine made that booty grow. But it's not just about your booty and muscles. More and more, we're hearing that creatine can also boost your brain power, too.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
A tenth of a centimeter more muscle. That's like a tenth of a belly button?
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Yes, which you would think if it's building muscle, it obviously has the potential to enhance your sport performance. Yes, yes.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Mmm, that is very interesting because if Kreaton did, what the internet really makes it sound like it does, which is you take it and you become the Hulk in a few months, there's no way the Olympics would allow it. But the fact that they're saying not sufficiently performance enhancing, right, so maybe it helps a little, but we don't care.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
But then, I mean, just one more question on this muscle thing. What do you make of these videos where people...
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
Over and over again, influencers, podcasters are saying that the studies on creatine are amazing. You'll hear things like, there's 50 years of data to show that it works and it's safe. And some folks on our team actually got so excited about the hype here that they have started to give it a go. But then, more recently, there's been some not-so-exciting headlines about this supplement.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
All right, so here's where we're at with creatine and building muscle. It does have the potential to help you build muscle through either giving you more energy to do more reps because you have more ATP to play with or because it's working on your mind of...
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
And even if you do respond, for most of us, it's not going to make us shredded.
Science Vs
Creatine: A Hack To Get Jacked?
After the break, forget brawn. It's time to look at the brain. People are saying that creatine can do remarkable things to boost your brain power. Could they be right?
Science Vs
When Vaginas Attack!
Corkscrews. Vaginal folds. Yes. Yes. Genital shields. No shade to my vagina or anyone else listening, but it's pretty cut and dry as far as I'm concerned. And the alpaca, not throwing it under the bridge, but like also just kind of looks like a tube. Yeah.
Science Vs
When Vaginas Attack!
The array of vaginas in front of me. The story is clear that both males and females were allowed to participate in the evolutionary arms race.
Science Vs
When Vaginas Attack!
You made them happier that they had a vagina? That's huge. You are changing lives, Tiana.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Versus. Today, we're pitting facts against focus as we look at ADHD. Lately, it seems like more and more people are saying, I've got ADHD. And if you're pondering your ADHD status, there are plenty of TikTok listicles out there to help you out.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
And so what's the concern here? I guess the problem would be that if you're putting all of these new symptoms into an ADHD bucket, emotional dysregularity, trouble with rejection, and you start saying, oh, everything's ADHD, and then you could miss... a diagnosis of depression or anxiety. Is that the fear?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
So what do you think? Do you think emotional dysregulation is part of ADHD?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Rose, while we're on this topic of... how vaginas and penises experience ADHD. I have seen stuff about how periods can affect ADHD. Have you looked into this?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
So today we're asking, when it comes to ADHD, what's real and what's just hype? We'll also find out what is going on in the ADHD brain. There's all these videos online saying that if you've got ADHD, you can blame your dopamine levels. But is that really true? The cutting edge neuroscience on ADHD, we'll give it to you.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Okay, so that's really news you can use. If you menstruate and you have ADHD, something to be aware of, your symptoms really might be fluctuating.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Okay, so 20 years ago, 4.4% had ADHD. Fast forward to 2023, that number had gone up to...
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
After the break, what is an ADHD brain? Yep, it's your brain on ADHD and what you can do about it.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Plus, for people who have this condition, we'll find out some tips and tricks that can help you out. When it comes to ADHD, there's a lot of... No, you're late, mate. But then there's science. Science versus ADHD is coming up just after the break.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Yes, it's the part of your brain when you are sort of daydreaming, when you're not particularly thinking about a thing, but it's just like what's going on in there on the default. Exactly. Exactly.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Oh, that's so interesting. And that could totally help explain why it's hard to focus, right? Yeah.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
And so how do all of these different ideas, the dopamine, brain looping, default mode network, are they all happening at once in an ADHD brain?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Okay, so now can we look at treatments? What can people do if they're really struggling?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Yeah. There's also side effects, right? They can mess with your sleep.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Procrastivity. Procrastivity, yeah. Okay, so how does Russell get... his patients to read the science report.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
So that's interesting. Get that cake baker into the studio. Let's ask her how she feels.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Welcome back. Today on the show, ADHD. Tell us all about it is Rose Rimler, Senior Producer here at Science Versus. Hi, Rose. Hi, Wendy. Do you think you have ADHD?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Therapy, medication, some things that can help. What else we got?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
All right, on to diets and supplements. People love to offer these.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
All right, Rose, we've come to the end of our ADHD episode. Yeah.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
When it comes to the symptoms of ADHD, while perhaps ADHD might manifest in emotional stuff or hyper-focused, we're still kind of working that out. But based on those two symptoms alone, do not be diagnosing yourself with ADHD. The main symptoms are still having difficulty focusing and also being a little bit hyperactive. Yeah. The ADHD brain is complicated.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
It's not just dopamine, but it is also a little bit dopamine. And if you are looking for treatments, there's no magic diet or supplement you can go on, but medication and therapy might help. Yeah. How'd I do?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
And if people want to see them in all of their glory, where should they go?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
That's right. So if you want to read more about any of the studies that Rose told us about, just head to the show notes. Also, if you want to come say hello and let us know what you thought about this episode, we are on Instagram, science underscore VS. I am on TikTok. at Wendy Zuckerman.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Yeah. Thank you so much. We do love, love, love, love hearing from you. Also, as a little thing, Emma Munger, who used to sound engineer our show, has a new album out. Did you know this, Rose? No, I didn't know that. She doesn't just score podcasts. She also makes beautiful, beautiful music. And I was listening to the album last night. It's really lovely. So you can find her on Spotify.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
The album is called Pattern. Her name is Emma Munger. It's M-U-N-G-E-R. Because not M-U-N-G-A.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
This episode was produced by Rose Rimmler, with help from me, Wendy Zuckerman, along with Meryl Horne, Michelle Dang and Kenny Foster-Keys. We're edited by Blythe Terrell, mix and sound design by Bobby Lord, fact-checking by Erica Akiko Howard and Marlo Starling, music written by Peter Leonard, Emma Munger, So Wiley, Bumi Hidaka and Bobby Lord.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Thanks to all of the researchers that we spoke to for this episode, including Dr Robert Rosenthal, Dr Miguel Garcia Pimenta, Professor Michelle Martel, Dr Maeve King, Dr Edward Modestino, Professor Edmund Sanaga-Bark and Dr Ashley Hawkins. Again, a huge thanks to all of our listeners who called in and told us about your ADHD experience. Thank you. Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you want to know when new episodes come out, if you're listening on Spotify, you can follow us and tap the bell icon. I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Yes. I've totally seen, I've seen so many of these quizzes and been tempted to To do them, but haven't. So what are the symptoms for sure of ADHD?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
All right. So how often do you have trouble wrapping up the final details of a project once the challenging parts have been done? Um, sometimes.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
I'm going to say never. Almost to the point where I don't understand the question. How often do you have problems remembering appointments or obligations?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Rarely. I will often forget that I've arranged to meet with my mom.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
How often do you have difficulty concentrating on what people say to you even when they are speaking to you directly?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
When you're in a conversation, how often do you find yourself finishing the... Sentences of the people you're talking to?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Six signs? Ten signs? According to the internet, ADHD goes way beyond those classic symptoms of having trouble paying attention or being fidgety. We're hearing that it includes stuff like
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
I don't like waiting in line, that's for sure. So, Rose, how'd you do? How'd you do? All right, okay, I'm ready. What'd you get, Wendy? Okay, I got five. Okay. What'd you get? I got two. Uh-huh. So what does this mean?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
So then those are the kind of classic symptoms of ADHD still around. But then more and more we're hearing people saying that their experience of ADHD, it's manifesting in all of these different ways. Yeah. Like that they experience hyperfocus or that they can't control their emotions. So what's going on here?
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
It's sort of funny because it feels so counterintuitive to the other symptoms of ADHD. You're fidgety and you can't pay attention, but then you can pay attention on one.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
But some aren't so sure about all these new so-called ADHD symptoms. They're worried that this ballooning definition of ADHD is making a bunch of people think that they have this condition when they don't. There are all these headlines screaming that we're over-diagnosing ADHD, medicating people for ADHD when we shouldn't be.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Yeah. I just really wanted to finish it. And it was the upstairs library. Like you had to go down a bunch of stairs to get to the toilet. And I was like, I just really want to finish it. And I peed myself.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
Right. So what do you make of it? That's not the strongest evidence that this is definitely part of ADHD.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
All right. So the next one can we look at is the emotional stuff that people were talking about. That it's like really hard to control your emotions when you have ADHD. This is something I had never really associated with ADHD before.
Science Vs
ADHD: Do We All Have It?
One British politician called it a fashionable disorder and said a lot of people who have it aren't actually sick at all. You hear this kind of thing a lot.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Hi, I'm Wendy Zuckerman, and you're listening to Science Versus. Today on the show, methamphetamine. More and more people in the US are trying it, and it's got this reputation as being one of the scariest and most addictive drugs out there. Is that true? I feel like basically every message that we get about meth is that it's this uniquely dangerous drug, almost in a category of its own.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And so studies find that quite a lot of people who use meth, we're talking maybe one in three, one in two, will get meth-associated psychosis. But this is an experience they'll have while they're high. Those thoughts should go away pretty soon after meth is out of their system. So Tina, she only saw shadow people while she was taking meth.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And I should say that not all meth PSAs went for the scare the hell out of you approach.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And Theo only got paranoid like that when he was using heavily. It is worth pointing out, though, that there are some unlucky folks who still get psychotic episodes even after they've stopped using meth. and they can actually end up with a diagnosis of schizophrenia. What's frustrating is that we don't know the chance that this will happen to you.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Researchers told me that it's rare, but your risk goes up the more meth that you use. Now, if you are worried about getting schizophrenia, some research suggests that cannabis might be even riskier than meth. So where does this leave us? Will meth break your brain? Well, while you're using it, it can give you psychosis and make you go a little bonkers.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
But for a lot of users, if they can stay off meth, then their brain should actually get better. But that is if you stop using meth. So what's the chance that if you start, you can stop? That is, how addictive is meth really? That's after the break. Plus, a short pit stop at Meth Mouth.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Coming up... Today's Ask Me Anything is brought to you by Amazon. Whether it's delivering medication to your door with Amazon Pharmacy or 24-7 virtual care with Amazon One Medical. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful. So we are here with our little segment of Ask Me Anything with senior producer Rose Rimbler. Hi, Wendy.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And you've come to me with some questions from our lovely, lovely listeners.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Um, no, I have not done any casting for my voice. And in fact, early in my career, I was told that my voice is too low for radio.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
I think it was explicitly told to me not feminine enough. And I was in fact given tips to speak, I'll do it now, higher up here. In my voice. up here and that that would be better for my career if I would speak like this.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
These days? I think about the microplastics episode the most. Really? Yeah. Rose, this was your episode because it really has changed what I do day to day. It's annoying to not put plastics in the dishwasher. Yeah.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
But even this busy bee, who's frantically cleaning her house with a toothbrush, ends up in bad shape. And if all that wasn't bad enough, watching the news, it seems like we're in a meth epidemic with this super addictive drug only getting more powerful. This month, the New York Times wrote that meth is more dangerous than ever.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Thanks, Rose. Thanks, Wendy. Today's Ask Me Anything was brought to you by Amazon. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful. Welcome back. Today on the show, methamphetamine. Next up, meth mouth. There's this idea that meth is so bad for your teeth that it'll make them fall out and your gums will turn black.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And for one of our listeners, we'll call them Fallon, they said that after smoking meth for just a couple of years, a few of their back teeth were pretty messed up.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And a study of more than 500 heavy meth users found that just under a third of them had six or more missing teeth, which is quite a bit higher than the general population. Meth users also have higher rates of holes in their teeth and gum disease. And this all makes sense based on everything we've heard about meth, right?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And then just tell us how many times you've tried math. So I asked Kate... Does meth eat away at your gums and teeth?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
There's this idea that the smoke from smoking meth is acidic and eats away at your teeth, which is why you lose them. But a study of 300 folks who were dependent on meth found that IV users were actually way more likely to be missing teeth than those who smoked meth... which the researchers said belies the common notions about the corrosive effects of meth. So what is going on here?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Well, Kate told me that meth can make you grind your teeth and also some people get a really dry mouth from using meth, which could be bad because saliva helps protect your teeth from tooth decay. But Kate, as well as some other researchers, have suggested that there could be a much simpler explanation for what's happening here.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Which is that when you get high a lot, you just might not take good care of your teeth. And research has found that chronic meth users tend to drink a lot of sugary drinks and sometimes aren't so great at dental care.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Looking at the research, it just doesn't seem like meth is uniquely bad for your teeth. Like a study of almost 60 drug users found that the teeth of heroin users was just as bad as the teeth of meth users. And researchers found that when meth users do brush their teeth, they're less likely to have crappy teeth.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Quite a few of the folks that I spoke to who had used meth were actually so paranoid about getting so-called meth mouth that they made sure that they took care of their teeth. Like Tina.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And so were you brushing your teeth? Is that why you think you were fine?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
A little more alliteration than science. But as I was researching about meth and its effects on the body, I realized that there are some other less well-known things that I really wanted people to know about. And one of them is the toll that meth can take on your heart. Meth can increase inflammation in your blood vessels, increasing your risk of getting a serious heart disease.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And in fact, in the US, more and more people are dying from meth overdoses. It's actually the second most common kind of drug to die from after opioids. People who die with meth in their system aren't just dying from heart attacks, but also things like suicide and car accidents. Okay, our next question. Is meth the most addictive drug in the world?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
You know, remember those ads from the start of the show? Oh, not that one. The other ones that were like, I went to a party, I tried it once, and now my life is ruined. Well, is that true? Is that how addictive meth really is? And, you know, because meth has those powerful effects on our brain, it does make sense that it would be super, super addictive.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And so I talked to our Breaking Bad fan and neuroscientist Martin Paulus about this. Can you just try meth once and walk away?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
But something here doesn't quite add up. Because, as scientists kept telling me, meth is an FDA-approved drug. Did you know this? In the US, it's used to treat ADHD, and it can be given to people six years and older. Children, we're giving meth to children. So today on the show, is meth really this horrendously bad drug where one hit will get you so addicted it'll ruin your life?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
This huge survey on the drug use of millions of folks in the US found that in 2023, over 16 million people said that they had used meth at least once in their lifetime. And around 11% of those were classified as having a meth use disorder. So based on that metric, roughly 1 in 10 people who tried meth are currently classified as having a meth addiction or meth use disorder.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And when you compare meth to other drugs, it actually doesn't stand out. So based on that huge survey, slightly more people who'd ever used pot ended up with a pot use disorder. More people who had tried alcohol ended up with an alcohol use disorder. Another study from the 90s found basically the same thing.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
I mean, in that study, they included tobacco, and you were three times more likely to become dependent on tobacco versus stimulants like meth. And I don't know if you're surprised about this. I definitely was when I first read about it. But the researchers I spoke to were not.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Because they told me, well, yeah, you know, the reason that you get addicted to a substance, it's driven by the chemicals in the drug, but also a whole bunch of other things, like what your friends are doing, what you have easy access to, what society says is kind of acceptable.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
So I think based on the research, meth does not deserve its reputation as this drug that's going to get everyone hooked. But there is something about meth's reputation that's right.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Mutton means that the speed that you can go from feeling in control of your drug use to being addicted to meth can be pretty fast. There was this one survey of almost 300 meth-dependent users, and it found that on average, the time it took them to go from trying it once to then having a meth use disorder was around three months.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
which is quite a bit faster, according to other research, than for alcohol, cocaine or cannabis. So while the majority of people who try meth will actually never get addicted to it.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And this is where that stereotype or even the people that you see using meth in the news, this is where it really comes from. It's the minority of users who fall far. And for most of the people that I spoke to about their meth use, the ones that you're hearing from, Their meth use, it actually did get pretty bad.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
So that listener from the start of the show who at first felt really twinkly, like she was from Twilight when she started using meth, she ended up getting arrested twice. Others lost jobs, got kicked out of their home, found themselves in really dangerous situations. Theo, who started using meth in his late teens, remembers when his addiction had well and truly set in.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
What exactly does meth do to our brain and our body? When it comes to meth, there's a lot of... Oh, meth. Mmm, meth. And then there's science. Science vs. Meth is coming up just after the break.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Theo knew the day he had to quit. He was in his room. He could hear his sister on the phone with his mom, who lives in Mexico. He's got a really good relationship with them both, loves them a lot. And Theo could hear them talking about him and how bad he was doing.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And once you are addicted like this, it can be hard to quit. The stats are a little all over the place depending on stuff like how long the studies follow people for. But as an example, there was this one US study of more than 300 meth users who went to an LA treatment center and they found that around 40% stayed off meth for the first year. Five years later, only 13% were abstinent.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Another survey, slightly better results, 25% were abstinent. So one in four, five years later. Theo ended up going to AA and Narcotics Anonymous meetings. He's relapsed a few times, which according to one study, happens to about half of those who try NA. But he told me that it's never gotten as bad as it was that first time. And he's doing much better now. Theo has gone back to college.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
For Tina, when her boyfriend at the time got a job overseas, she saw it as this opportunity to stop using. And actually, when Tina told her mom, I'm leaving, they had this big fight.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
She's been off meth for almost 10 years. And in fact, a few of our listeners that you heard from stopped using by basically walking away. Researchers like Dr. Krista Seyfried at the University of New South Wales in Sydney are now looking into new ways to help folks with meth dependence. And some are pretty surprising.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Like there's therapy, CBT for meth, where you teach people coping strategies around cravings.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
There's also these pretty cool programs out there that will give people a bit of money when they can show that they haven't been using meth. And that has been found to help. And researchers are also looking into medications that we could use here. Like, you know how we use methadone to help people with opioid addiction or nicotine patches for nicotine addiction?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Well, one of the things that Krista is currently researching is ADHD medication, right? Not meth, but a drug called Lisdex amphetamine. And their early research is showing that it really could help some people use less meth. As we were wrapping up, I asked Krista, do you think that meth has earned its reputation as one of the scariest drugs out there?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Do you know current working title for this episode is Meth, the Most Misunderstood Drug? Oh, well done. Love getting an A plus from a scientist. So when it comes to science versus math... Is it the most misunderstood drug? Well, I had thought that meth was this uniquely hyper addictive drug that was terrible for your brain and even rotted your teeth.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
You know, it can be fun, but also, particularly if you take a lot of it, it can have some pretty nasty consequences. You want to be careful here. I don't know if I'd try it. Probably not.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
This episode has 114 citations in it. So if you want to read more about anything that I've said on the show or you're curious, then you can find these citations by looking in the show notes and then there's a link to a transcript. And you click on that transcript and then you'll see where we basically get our information from.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
If you want to let me know what you thought of the episode, I would love to hear from you. I'm on TikTok at Wendy Zuckerman is how you can find me. Science Versus is on Instagram, science underscore VS. So come and say hello. And for all of you folks who saw that call out on Instagram saying that I was looking for people to talk to about their meth use and you were up for a chat.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
I just want to say thank you so much. It was so lovely chatting with all of you and I just really appreciate that you took the time to talk to me. Thank you. And if you are struggling with your drug use and maybe you want to change your relationship with the drugs that you're using, we're going to put some resources in our show notes. Thank you.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Thanks to all of the researchers that I spoke to for this episode, including Dr. Heather Barkholz, Professor Nadine Ezzard, Dr. Nicole Lee, Dr. Samantha Brooks, Dr. Steph Kershaw, Professor Stephen Shoptor, Dr. Susan Calcaterra, Professor Harriet DeWitt, and Professor Edith London. A special thanks to the Zuckerman family and Joseph LaBelle Wilson. Science Versus is a Spotify Studios original.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
You can listen to us for free on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. And wherever you are listening, if you like the show, we'd love if you gave us a five-star review because it helps other people find the show, hear more about science, which is great. If you are listening on Spotify, though, you can follow us and tap the bell icon so you get notifications when new episodes come out.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Welcome back. Today on the show, meth. So right off the bat here, there's this idea that the new meth on the street is like meth on steroids. It's sometimes called super meth and headlines are screaming that it's a monster. It's actually not a new drug. Meth is still meth. But for a while now, it's been produced in a different way. And a big thing is that it's cut with less crap.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
I'm Wendy Zuckerman. Back to you next time.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
An analysis of meth samples in the US done by the Drug Enforcement Administration found that in the late 90s, the purity of meth that you'd buy on the street was about 20%. Fast forward more than 20 years. On average, it's almost 97% pure. That is Walter White-level pure. So now let's find out what meth, just meth, is doing to our brain.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And I really wanted to understand just what it felt like to take meth. So I reached out to our listeners who had tried it and had these awesome conversations about the highs and the lows of using meth. So here's how they described what meth can feel like.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Like in this government PSA, you see a normal teenager whose life is ruined by it.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
So how can meth make you feel this way? Turn on the happy in your head. I talked about this with Professor Martin Paulus, scientific director at the Laureate Institute for Brain Research. And he loves studying meth. He loves watching TV shows about meth.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
So Mun told me that meth releases a bunch of chemicals into our brain, like adrenaline and serotonin. But a biggie is dopamine, which is kind of like the feel-good chemical. And meth does this pretty cool stuff to get dopamine really working in your brain.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Normally, what happens when you do nice things that bump up your dopamine, not meth, but let's say you have a little sex, you eat a little chocolate, you get a little dopamine hit.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
What methamphetamine does... Is it floods parts of your brain with dopamine, but then... It stops that sucking up. And the fact that then it stops it getting sucked back, so the dopamine will hang around for longer as well?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Studies in rats have found that meth increases dopamine in a part of their brain by more than 1,000%. Compare that to cocaine, which bumped up dopamine by a measly 350%. Meth also crosses the blood-brain barrier really quickly, so if you're snorting, injecting or smoking it, it means you can get high super fast. Plus, that high can last for hours, some eight times longer than coke.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
So that is part of the reason that meth can give you this incredible high, because it's flooding your brain with dopamine. Dopamine also helps you focus and pay attention to things, which is why a little bit of meth can work as a medication for ADHD. But feeling that huge happy in your head, it doesn't last forever, because like other drugs, your brain builds up a tolerance.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Dopamine works by binding to all these little receptors on your brain cells. But as you keep using meth, your brain takes some of those receptors away. So here's Martin, our neuroscientist again.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
So that is why you might not keep twinkling as bright as a teen heartthrob when you keep using meth. But then our next question is, what are the risks here? Because people say that meth can break your brain in all kinds of ways. And one thing that a lot of our listeners were worried about who had used meth was how the drug had affected their memory.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And that's the idea, right? That meth is so addictive that if you try it just once at a party, you won't be able to stop. And in the meantime, it'll destroy your life. We hear that meth will rot your gums, make your teeth fall out. I mean, ever heard of meth mouth? And even worse, apparently after using meth, your brain will never be the same again.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And it is true that when you're using a lot of meth or soon after you stop, it can screw with your cognition and memory. One paper said it was similar to what you might see in folks with alcohol use disorder. You can even see abnormalities popping up in brain scans of heavy meth users.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Now, it's not that noticeable or bad for everyone, but one guy I spoke to who asked us to call him enough, he's used meth pretty much every day for the last four years. He told me that these days his memory is shot.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
But what a lot of the scary meth news articles out there don't tell you is that if you stop using meth, your brain can at least partly recover. Studies show that even after long-term heavy use, once users stay off meth for, let's say, six months, a year, their scores on cognitive tests improve, including their memory. Over time, some areas of the brain itself even start to look more normal.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Martin told me that this is good news here.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
In the longer term, there are some other things to worry about, though, like meth might put you at an increased risk of Parkinson's disease, which is a disease related to dopamine. But the big thing that you hear a lot about when it comes to meth is that it'll make you go basically psycho, where you start seeing things and hearing things.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
One of our listeners, she asked me to call her Tina, started off just taking meth with friends to go dancing on the weekend. She'd party all weekend on this big binge, and on her way home, sometimes she'd start to see things.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
For another listener, we'll call him Theo. After he was using meth for a couple of years, when he was high, he would get into this really creepy headspace.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Collectively, all of these symptoms, hallucinating, getting paranoid, this is all called meth-associated psychosis. And researchers say that it can look indistinguishable from schizophrenia. And I called up Jennifer Scheer, a neuroscientist who did her PhD on this at the University of Cape Town in South Africa, to find out why it happens.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
And she told me something that most scientists studying meth don't. didn't tell me. I love meth.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Jen used to go to these dance parties in South Africa, and she tried meth a handful of times. How much were you thinking about your own experience as you were writing these studies?
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
She was actually never that worried that taking a bit of meth a handful of times would stop her from finishing her thesis, largely because of that research that shows the brain can recover. Anyway, we got to talking about why meth can cause psychosis. And she told me that some of what's going on here is probably from sleep deprivation.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
Meth can keep you up for days if you take enough of it, and that can make you go loopy in all kinds of ways. But something else is happening here too. So right now, you are probably not on meth, and your brain cells are communicating, sending signals to each other in this orchestrated dance that allows you to listen to this podcast and not to think about other stuff swirling around your brain.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
But because meth has these powerful effects on different chemicals in our brain... Jen says that it can scramble that dance.
Science Vs
Methamphetamine: The Most Misunderstood Drug?
For example, a really important thing that your brain does is that it inhibits or shushes certain signals. But meth stops some of that from happening. So all of a sudden, you're seeing things and thinking things that you wouldn't normally be.