Author Archives: Calley Means

Note: I am writing a book and starting a company to put food and lifestyle habits (not band-aids like pills and surgical interventions) at the center of how we think about healthcare. This article is from an email I sent analyzing one fact from this work per day. If this resonates, sign up here:

Early in my career, I consulted for Coke to fight back against sugar taxes in Pennsylvania. We first identified the most influential African American pastors in the state. Coke then (confidentially) donated millions of dollars to them. The pastors then held press conferences, saying sugar taxes were racist. The media covered it, racial tensions flared, and Coke defeated the taxes.

This is emblematic of the playbook that pharma and food companies use daily to protect that status quo.

“Personal choice” arguments on food and health used to carry a lot of resonance with me: 

• “People like to drink Coke and eat fast food. We can’t infringe on their freedom.” 
• “Curbing sugar attacks personal choice.” 
• “Patients are going to make bad choices. The Medical system stands ready to clean up the mess.” 
• “People getting fat is a matter of personal responsibility.” 

But a crucial fact altered my thinking: You can’t have a free market when the current market is rigged. Healthcare and food companies have co-opted free market thinking. They have lobbied more than any other industry to rig the system and then cry that anyone who questions that system is “anti-free market.” Sadly, even some of the most intelligent conservatives I know fall into this trap. 

25% of teenagers having pre-diabetes is not a result of “personal choice” – it is because of a rigged system that is decimating human capital. The undermining of our brains and bodies on a systemic scale is a first-order issue to almost any other public policy challenge.

The science is clear: if we want to keep people healthy and improve our human capital in America – we need to do three things: 

1. Limit sugar
2. Limit omega-6 fats (seed oils) 
3. Limit processed grains 

We don’t need to consider bans or taxes. We can start by repealing two of the most destructive crony capitalism policies in America: 

1. The fact that these items are subsidized tens of billions of dollars
2. The fact that these items can be bought with SNAP benefits, a government nutrition program 15% of the country relies on. As my TrueMed co-founder Justin Mares points out, revenue from taxpayer-funded SNAP made up close to 20% Coke’s annual US revenue that year. This is evil. 

Again, I think a revolution in health will happen and policies will change – but it will happen from the bottom-up: from the hundreds of microdecisions we all make every day. 

If this resonates, sing up for my daily email here:

NOTE: This is the first edition of a daily email outlining tangible health ideas from my work launching True Medicine and writing a book on metabolic health. If this resonates, sign up here:

In a recent podcast interview, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson gave his reason for not trying psychedelics: “I have always valued objective reality. I don’t want anything interfering with my understanding of what is actually happening in front of me.“

This statement shows a blind spot that is relevant for everyone: We are all on drugs that are highly interfering with our brain’s ability to process objective reality. We should not be outsourcing our analysis of what is a “good” or “bad” drug – or our definition of what constitutes a drug in the first place. 

Is a drug an addictive substance that causes damage to society? 

• Alcohol, caffeine, sugar, porn, social media: these produce dopamine triggers in the brain and dependency that are almost indistinguishable from drugs like cocaine and heroin – and can lead to bad societal outcomes. These substances are neurodegenerative and unquestionably “interfering with our brains” – unlike psychedelics which nearly all available science points to being brain regenerative.

Is a drug something that reverses or prevents disease? 

• By this measure, statins and antidepressants (the two most prescribed drugs in America) should not count. We spend $1 trillion worldwide on statins a year, and they have been shown to increase life expectancy 5 days. 25% of adult Americans take an antidepressant medication, but the FDA’s own studies show that SSRI’s are no more effective than a placebo and the underlying science backing the medication has been called into question. 

Is a drug a substance that has a physiological impact on our body? 

• If this is true, then the environmental toxins (in our home, air and water), pesticides in our food, and lack of sleep should be considered some of the most destructive drugs in society. These factors are wrecking our microbiome – the trillions of bacteria cells in our gut that regulate 95% of our serotonin (and thus mood). 

The institutions that are defining what is a “good” or “bad” drug – or what a drug even is – are not worthy of our trust. And these institutions have continually, repeatedly been wrong: 

• Adderall, a drug 10% of high school seniors take, was created by Germans during World War II to make Nazi soldiers more effective (it was discontinued for spurring mass psychosis among the troops).  
• We were told that prescription opioids were not addictive, but 80% of fentanyl/heroin addicts today became addicted from a legal prescription. 
• Heroin was created by Bayer (the aspirin people) and was a top-selling drug for American babies (to cure fussiness) in the late 1800s. 
• Also in the late 1800s, the U.S. Surgeon General recommended cocaine to cure depression. 
• Psychedelics – long stigmatized – have been shown to produce longer remissions of depression (with lower side effects) than any other treatment studied. 

The more I have dug into this, the more I am convinced we think about drugs completely backwards: 

• We have convinced younger Americans that rampant fatigue, obesity, anxiety, depression and infertility is a normal part of daily life that can be cured with drugs – instead of warning signs of larger cellular dysfunction that can only be cured by root cause solutions. 
• 95% of medical spending goes to drugs and interventions after people get sick but nutritional/lifestyle interventions (which can actually prevent and reverse disease) are put into a niche lifestyle buckets. 
• Psychiatry has been completely taken over by pharmaceutical treatments that numb patients, instead of tools to help get to the root cause of trauma and increase our sense of awe for the world. 
• We spent 40 times more on pharmaceutical cures to cancer versus ways to prevent cancer – even though cancer is a preventable disease. 
• Alcohol was considered so destructive to American society that we passed a Constitutional amendment banning it. But now leading scientific figures like deGrasse Tyson don’t even consider it a brain-altering drug. 

Our brains and bodies are what perceives reality, and they are under threat like never before. Understanding and optimizing the “drugs” (substances or ideas that produce a physiological change) that enter our bodies is the highest-leverage thing we can do. 

I am writing a book and starting a company to put food and lifestyle habits (not band-aids like pills and surgical interventions) at the center of how we think about healthcare. 

During this journey, I have been exposed to research, people, companies, and ideas that have changed my life and how I think about the health and development of my new son. This email shares one of these insights each morning:

Recently, we announced that Anomalie has been acquired by David’s Bridal (the industry leader which sells 30% of US wedding dresses) –  there’s an article about this in Forbes here. I am so grateful to everyone I worked with and supported us on this journey. My co-founder (and wife) Leslie will be joining the company as an executive – and for the first time in 5+ years, we won’t be working together. I am excited to report that our marriage made it through this experience intact! 🙂  

Looking to the future, I wanted to share about a topic I have become very passionate about. I am planning to write a book about and start a company focussed on this space.

If these ideas resonate with you, sign up for my daily email sharing actionable health ideas:

The Root Cause

In the past several years, I have become convinced this is the largest problem facing society: 

11 out of the 12 leading killers of Americans are caused by or worsened by processed food. 

Healthcare is the only industry where “innovation” (more drugs and procedures) equals higher costs and worse outcomes – spending is outpacing inflation and yet outcomes are getting worse every year. This is because we’re addressing downstream, separate symptoms rather than addressing the connected root causes of disease. These trends are causing violence to our bodies and brains to a degree I don’t think we fully appreciate.

Four experiences led me to this conclusion: 

1. Last year, my mom abruptly died of pancreatic cancer. I always thought cancer was largely random, but I was surprised to learn pancreatic cancer is essentially a food-borne illness — heavily tied to my mom’s challenges with blood sugar (which was preventable and caused by food). We know food is directly tied to conditions like heart disease (#1 cause of death), many leading forms of cancer (#2 cause of death), stroke (#5 cause of death), Type 2 Diabetes (#8 cause of death), kidney disease (#9 cause of death) and liver disease (#10 cause of death). I was also surprised to learn Alzheimer’s (#7 cause of death) is now called Type 3 diabetes – and is in large part preventable (and even reversible) through food. Simply eliminating sugar and seed oils from your diet dramatically reduces your chance of dying from nearly every other leading disease – and will almost certainly improve mental health along the way. It’s not just life-threatening illnesses: PCOS, the leading cause of infertility, literally is insulin resistance (metabolic  disease) of the ovaries largely caused by food and can often be quickly reversed through a targeted diet/lifestyle intervention; depression is highly tied to diet and exercise (95% of our serotonin is produced in our gut, not our brains). In fact, 150 minutes of exercise a day for 3 months was equally effective as antidepressants, which are currently the most prescribed class of drugs in America (and which have serious side effects).
2. As a new parent, I’m concerned about the world my son, Roark, is going into. The status quo for children right now is scary, and getting worse: 25% of young adults have prediabetes (formerly called adult-onset diabetes), 14% of teenagers have fatty liver disease, 40% of children are obese or overweight, 25% of teenagers report they contemplated suicide, and 18% of kids have a developmental disability. These statistics are obviously just the tip of the iceberg of what is happening to our kids’ brains and bodies, and food and other environmental factors are a key root cause. Kids are eating 150 times more sugar than they did 100 years ago. The simple action of reducing sugar and inflammatory foods in our kids’ diets would save trillions in health costs and dramatically improve the physical and mental health of kids. 
3. Several years ago, my sister abruptly quit her job as a surgeon after thirteen years of higher education and training. I thought she was crazy at the time, but she told me that the system is broken – that most surgeries she and other surgeons perform could have been avoided by dietary and lifestyle interventions – but she was not offered a single dedicated nutrition class at Stanford Medical School. She went on to start Levels, which provides people data on how food impacts their health, and now is impacting millions of people through her product and content creation. Casey’s story and Levels (both their mission and how they run their company) has had a huge impact on me. I’m actually very optimistic – there are thousands of leaders pushing for change to become more focussed on the root causes, and I want to join those efforts.
4. My experience in startups has led me to see how healthcare is the most dysfunctional industry that exists. Companies that add a digital layer to the current system (like startups enabling Viagra or Adderall to be sold online, or helping patients more easily schedule doctors appointments) are sometimes confused for innovation, but those are marginal efficiencies to the same broken system. They are part of the problem. It seems that millions of people are profiting from the medical system, but nobody is taking responsibility for questioning the system itself.

We all know the statistics about mental health, obesity, and chronic disease aren’t good and are getting worse — but I think we gloss over the implications.

Our brains and bodies are breaking due to the modern industrialized food system and the $4T healthcare system has virtually no incentive to fix it. 88% of American adults now have metabolic issues, which means a fundamental problem in how our brains and bodies are powered. Metabolic issues show up as the rising rates of Alzheimer’s, depression, attention disorders, heart disease, infertility, and more, and this has been the defining feature of poor COVID outcomes. 

It is impossible to overstate how evolutionarily unprecedented our modern diet is – some 70% of our calories now come from ultra processed nutrient-depleted products that are known to damage our brains and bodies. I used to think nutrition was a “wimpy” subject, but I am now convinced this connection between the healthcare industry, food, environmental factors, physical health and mental health is at the root of most other issues we face. With our brains and bodies becoming increasingly dysfunctional due to our food system – starting in utero – I believe it will be impossible for us to overcome the global challenges facing us today with focusing on the connections between food and our physical + mental health.

Our sick-care system is unsustainable, and must eventually change by definition. I think this change – from a reactionary approach where money is spent on  “band aid”  interventions  after people are sick – to a root-cause approach that incentivizes food and habits to build a fundamentally healthy body to prevent/reverse disease, will happen sooner than people think. It will have trillions of dollars in ramifications, in addition to unleashing an astounding amount of pent up human capital that is currently stifled by chronic illness that now spans the lifetime. 

Here is what I am planning to spend my time in order to be a small part of this change:

Book

Over the past several months, I have been writing a book with my sister to describe the above thesis and provide tactical steps to feel better energy today and eliminate your chance of chronic disease. The book will use my sister’s story, interviews with experts, and the latest research to provide actionable tips on everything from what to eat / not eat, when to eat, how to most effectively use bio-wearables, sleep optimization techniques, how to review your blood tests, microbiome optimization, psychedelic use, cold exposure, misinformation about exercise and sunlight, and reducing environmental toxins. 

We developed a proposal with the help of an incredible agent who has represented paradigm shifting thinkers including Adam Grant, Simon Sinek, Sal Khan, Dr. Mark Hyman, Dr. Michael Greger, Sal Khan, Angela Duckworth, Arianna Huffington, and many others. 

We’re pitching the book to publishers soon and hope to release it next year! 

New Company

I plan to devote the next 10 years of my life to building a company around the problem statement of incentivizing root cause solutions (healthy food, exercise, stress management) over band-aid symptom management solutions (pills and procedures that only mask the symptoms and don’t cure anything- which is there the bulk of spending now goes).

Americans are sick and tired of being lectured about food and exercise – especially when the incentives of the $6 trillion food system and $4 trillion food system are stacked against them.

It is gaslighting to say patients are “making bad health decisions” with their nutrition and habits. They are actually just following the incentives of our current systems. Right now, the ingredients of processed food (sugar, corn, vegetable oils) are subsidized, making unhealthy food the cheapest option. If you are lower income, this is often the only food an American can afford given these billions in government subsidies. Meanwhile, preventative care isn’t subsidized at all – but end-of-the-line care is.

For example, there are no incentives to eat organic vegetables and exercise (which prevents heart disease and diabetes), but statins, insulin and a triple-bypass surgery once you’re sick will be covered (once you are already sick). When it comes to mental health, meditation and therapy often aren’t incentivized and psilocybin (a safe and natural compound that research shows is also more effective than antidepressants by helping patients get to the root cause of their trauma) is still stigmatized. Meanwhile, ineffective and costly antidepressant pills are considered “serious” medicine and subsidized.

We won’t improve the problem until we incentivize healthy food and good habits. If we don’t focus on incentives, we will never solve the problem of our processed-food illness epidemic. 

Again, if these ideas resonate with you or someone you know, would be great to chat!

Other Recent Articles:

Free Market?

You can’t have a free market when the current market is rigged. Healthcare and food companies have co-opted free market thinking. They have lobbied more than any other industry to rig the system and then cry that anyone who questions that system is “anti-free market.” Sadly, even some of the most intelligent conservatives I know fall…

by Calley Means December 29, 2022December 29, 2022

We Are All on Drugs

NOTE: This is the first edition of a daily email outlining tangible health ideas from my work launching True Medicine and writing a book on metabolic health. If this resonates, sign up here: In a recent podcast interview, astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson gave his reason for not trying psychedelics: “I have always valued objective reality. I don’t…

by Calley Means December 19, 2022December 19, 2022

Is the Proliferation of Antidepressants Good?

This proliferation of antidepressants (SSRI’s) represents so much of what is wrong with healthcare today. Antidepressants are a way for the medical system to earn recurring revenue without solving the root causes of what is actually making people depressed. This article contains 6 surprising facts.

by Calley Means September 14, 2021May 29, 2022

Antidepressants are the most prescribed drug in America. 

Almost 20% of adult women, and 10% of men, are currently taking an antidepressant pill.

I can’t get the thought out of my head that we spend inordinate time debating whatever social or political controversy Twitter or cable news tells us to think about, but we spend so little time as a society discussing what is happening in our brains.

Antidepressants have brought positive, sometimes life-saving, benefits to many patients. But the fact that such a large proportion of Americans are taking a dependency-inducing, mood-altering drug daily seems to be a big deal. I actually couldn’t think of something more important because reality and perception itself is nothing more than what our brains perceive.

This proliferation of antidepressants (SSRI’s) represents so much of what is wrong with healthcare today. Antidepressants are a way for the medical system to earn recurring revenue without solving the root causes of what is actually making people depressed. 

Right of Passage?

Mental health is an urgent national priority. Suicide is the second leading cause of death for people under 34, 25% of young adults said they contemplated suicide last year. These suicide stats are the canary in the coal mine of widespread struggles people are having navigating their brains.  88% of Americans said we are on the wrong track – a record. By my own experience, it is clear that far more than 20% of women and 10% of men are struggling with anxiety and their life’s purpose.

Taking an antidepressant is marketed today as almost an American right of passage. Pharmaceutical companies communicate that taking a daily antidepressant pill is a brave act. D2C websites target ads at millennials urging them to “take control of their mental health” by ordering daily antidepressants to their door with a couple clicks.  

Clearly, patients are in need of help and dedicated psychologists are trying to help. And antidepressant pills have helped many people regain control of their lives.

But do these pills help cure the underlying causes of depression? Do they even effectively manage the symptoms on a population scale? Is the fact that such a large percentage of adults take these pills a good thing for those patients?

In recent weeks, I have dug into research on the subject and discovered some fact I found surprising. 

6 Facts About Antidepressants

1. Antidepressants barely work better than a placebo. 
   • A review of studies that led to FDA approval of leading antidepressants showed that the pills “do not produce clinically significant improvements in depression in patients who initially have moderate or even very severe depression” versus a placebo. This data was repressed by pharmaceutical companies and only recently uncovered.  (2018: Initial severity and antidepressant benefits: A meta-analysis of data submitted to the Food and Drug Administration)
   • Studies have shown depressed patients can benefit as much by exercising as by taking antidepressants – with far less side effects. (Psychology Today)

2. Drugmakers exert significant financial influence on the psychology profession. 
   • When The New England Journal of Medicine, one of the nation’s leading medical journals, was looking for psychiatrists to write a review of antidepressants, they had trouble finding one who was not conflicted. (Selling Sickness by Ray Moynihan, page 25)
   • Former Harvard psychiatrist Dr. Loren Mosher said “psychiatry has been almost completely bought and paid for by the drug companies.”  (Selling Sickness by Ray Moynihan, page 27)
   • Alan F. Schatzberg, Stanford psychologist and former head of the American Psychological Association, was forced to step down from leading an NIH panel to create guidelines on antidepressants because he failed to report more than $6 million of ownership in an antidepressant drugmaker. (Chronicle of Higher Education) 

3. The vast majority of antidepressant advertising it spent targeting women.  
   • Prozac spent more money on advertising than Apple during many of the years its patent was active. (AdWeek)
   • Antidepressant ads feature women about 90% of the time, usually in leisure activities, parenting, or sleeping – almost never in processional settings. (Psychiatric News)
   • Drug companies have launched campaigns on college campuses to “educate” students about depression and prescribe pills. (The Truth About the Drug Companies by Marcia Angell, page 152)
   • The marketing strategy for Valium, one of the earliest drugs to treat depression, instructed doctors to use it as a cure for the “unstable emotional equilibrium” and “panic states” of women. While Valium is a different and more addictive compound than SSRI’s (the primary antidepressants today), these marketing tactics that play on insecurity persist.  (Pharma by Gerald Posner, page 205) 
   • Valium ran advertisements in the 1960’s and 1970’s saying the drug could help women who become “unpredictable grouch[es]” and alleviate the “neurotic sense of failure” for 35-year-old single women. 71 percent of prescriptions for Valium went to women, a trend that extends to SSRI’s today. (Pharma by Gerald Posner, page 207) 

4. Antidepressants increase suicidal thoughts. 
   • The evidence is so great that antidepressant pills increase the risk of suicidal behavior (especially in young adults), that pill bottles are now required to carry a label. (FDA)
   • In fact, increased prescriptions of antidepressants over the past four decades is correlated with increased rates of suicide. Today, the second leading cause of death for kids and teenagers is suicide. (CDC)

5. Antidepressants numb symptoms of depression, but don’t address root causes or cure anything. 
   • Antidepressants can reduce feelings of depression by allowing more serotonin to pass between nerve cells, but studies show depression comes back at the same rate once a patient stops using antidepressants. Antidepressants do nothing to help patients identify the root cause of what is making them depressed. 
   • Antidepressants help patients manage depression, and generate recurring (sometimes lifelong) revenue for pharmaceutical companies and hospitals (where patients are required to schedule appointments to re-subscribe). 
   • Pharmaceutical companies have not invested in areas to “cure” depression, because that would turn off revenue. 

6. Antidepressants can lead to physical dependency and can result in withdrawal symptoms if not tapered properly.
   • Patients who stop taking SSRI’s experience  withdrawal symptoms such as insomnia, headaches, nausea, electric-shock sensation, and return of depression symptoms. (Mayo Clinic)

What is Causing Depression? 

The proliferation of antidepressants represent so much of what is wrong with the medical system. They serve an important purpose at times, but represent an easy way for the medical system to earn recurring revenue without addressing the root causes of what is making people depressed. 

The truth is, there are many underlying things that can lead to depression including thyroid hormone deficiency, vitamin D deficiency, chronic inflammation, underlying illness or infection, omega 3 deficiency, or chronic stress or sleep deprivation and the impact these have on underlying physiology. Antidepressants do nothing to identify or treat these things, many of which can be mitigated with dietary and lifestyle strategies and interpersonal support strategies.

We need to start looking at root causes.

I’m writing these articles to share facts that impacted me on healthcare, stress test my thinking, and connect with people who resonate with these ideas (particularly people building or thinking about building companies to address these issues). Reach out to me on Instagram, Twitter or email (calleymeans@gmail.com)

Other Recent Posts:

More Money on Healthy Food, Less Money on Pharmaceuticals

11 out of the 12 leading killers of Americans are caused by or worsened by processed food.  Healthcare is the only industry where “innovation” (more drugs and procedures) equals higher costs and worse outcomes – spending is outpacing inflation and yet outcomes are getting worse every year. This is because we’re addressing downstream, separate symptoms…

by Calley Means May 19, 2022December 31, 2022

Our Ovaries and Penises Are Breaking Down. Could This be a Sign of Larger Problems?

For the first time in American history, life expectancy is in consistent decline. We are experiencing record rates preventable chronic diseases that kill 70 percent of Americans. We need to start demanding explanations for the root causes of diseases. 

by Calley Means September 7, 2021May 29, 2022

Skeptical About Psychedelics? Read This.

A guide to why psychedelic (psilocybin, MDMA, LSD) research is important, written particularly for people who are skeptical.

by Calley Means June 14, 2021May 29, 2022

I weighed 11 pounds, 9 ounces when I was born. 

My mom’s doctors treated this as an amusing outlier statistic. 

While many parents brag about having large babies, my high birth weight meant that my mom had a baby with fetal macrosomia, a condition where babies are born above the “healthy” weight of 8 pounds, 13 ounces. Fetal macrosomia (literally meaning “big body”) can lead to increased risk of many complications for the baby, including childhood obesity and metabolic syndrome. Studies show that having babies who far exceed the criteria for large birthweight is a clear sign of insulin resistance (i.e., poor glucose management). While she wasn’t diagnosed at the time, I suspect she may have had gestational diabetes, where higher than normal blood sugar and insulin levels during pregnancy often results in babies gaining excess weight in utero.

It is perplexing to me why my mom’s physicians didn’t explain to her that fetal macrosomia is related to impaired glucose management for the mother, particularly since she went on to die prematurely from a disease directly linked to blood sugar dysregulation that was preventable with early intervention. When glucose (sugar) enters in the blood, insulin is released to let the sugar into cells where they are powered for energy. High-sugar diets overwhelm the body with glucose, leading cells to become insulin resistant and causing excess glucose to build up in the bloodstream.

My extreme birthweight could have been one of the first signs in her life that she needed to control her insulin, but nobody told her.  As cells become resistant to insulin, they do not behave properly. This metabolic dysfunction is what causes disease. 

My mother’s metabolic dysfunction showed up in my excess birthweight, her difficulty losing weight after her pregnancy, her rising weight throughout her 40s, and blood sugar problems and prediabetes that started in her 50s. 

Her metabolic dysfunction was also a link to the pancreatic cancer that ended her life – more than 80% of people who contract pancreatic cancer have some degree of insulin insensitivity. This could have been prevented if my high birthweight was seen as a warning sign instead of an amusing, isolated health situation. 

Canary in the Coal Mine

My mom’s experience is just the tip of the iceberg in the relationship between fertility and larger root causes of our health issues. Is there anything more evolutionarily vital than our reproductive organs? How could skyrocketing fertility issues, for both men and women, not be related to wider health problems?

Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), which is interconnected to gestational diabetes, is the most common form of female infertility. Friends I have spoken to who have struggled with PCOS have also said the condition is treated as an isolated incident, with them leaving the OBGYN with a pile of prescriptions but little understanding of the underlying causes.  A woman diagnosed with PCOS today will most likely be prescribed an assortment of pills to artificially induce egg production, lower cholesterol, and/or regulate insulin levels. If fertility issues persist, procedures like IVF are often recommended. 

But insulin resistance is a causal link to PCOS: excess insulin stimulates the ovaries to produce “masculine” hormones, including testosterone – causing fertility issues. And insulin resistance is preventable and reversible.

Ignoring the root causes isn’t working. Today, up to 26% of women have PCOS and gestational diabetes rates have doubled between 2006 and 2016. This is directly tied to our diet, which has seen a 150x increase in sugar intake in the past 100 years. Often, these fertility issues are the first visible signs of metabolic dysfunction that will severely limit the quality and duration of life. 

Between 1973 and 2011, male sperm count has reduced more than 50%. In the past 10 years, the case of miscarriages has gone up 10%.

What about erectile dysfunction? We all know about Viagra. There is certainly a place for it. But have you ever heard a medical professional ask why an exponentially growing number of penises aren’t working? Could this possibly be related to wider health issues? 

The penis is not a siloed part of the body. Viagra might reduce inflammation in the arteries leading the penis, but shouldn’t we be asking why those blood vessels are inflamed in the first place? 

It turns out erectile dysfunction is one of the best indicators we have of metabolic dysfunction. In fact, 79% of men with ED are overweight, up to 75% of men with diabetes will experience ED, and there is almost no relation between the aging process and ED – it is all about lifestyle and diet factors.

Most importantly, ED is one of the strongest warning signs of larger health issues. In fact, ED is highly correlated with diseases such as diabetes, heart disease, and hypertension. This shouldn’t be a surprise – ED is constrained blood flow between capillaries which is the same thing as hypertension. Having ED also increases the risk of depression by 192%.

ED should be a big flashing warning light that you have other health problems. But you will rarely hear this. 

It is hard to turn on the television without seeing advertisements for online services like Hims or Ro that offer Viagra mailed to you in a few clicks. My venture capitalist friends tell me these companies are “innovative,” but I increasingly see them as part of a dysfunctional system that generates recurring revenue by selling pills and procedures that ameliorate symptoms of disease – while ignoring the root causes of why we are sick.

I think patients want to know why they are infertile, why their penises are not working, why they are unable to lose weight when they are desperately trying, why 25% of adult women are on an antidepressant, why 30% of adults over 40 are on a statin, and why 12% of adults in the United States need to carry an insulin pen. 

What we are currently doing isn’t working. 

For the first time in American history, life expectancy is in consistent decline. We are experiencing record rates of diabetes, obesity, heart disease, chronic liver disease, stroke, and Alzheimer’s. These preventable chronic diseases kill 70 percent of Americans and make up 80% of healthcare costs. 

Millions of lives are being shortened by not seeing early signs of metabolic dysfunction for the warning signs they are. 

We need to start demanding explanations for the root causes of diseases. 

I’m publishing ideas on healthcare to hopefully spark ideas among friends, stress-test my thinking, and engage with other people who are passionate about these issues. You can contact me via Email, Instagram, or Twitter.

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