#1261 - Peter Hotez

Joe Rogan (0:07)

And we're live. How are you, sir?

Peter Hotez (0:10)

How are you?

Joe Rogan (0:10)

Good to see you again.

Peter Hotez (0:11)

I'm thrilled to be here.

Joe Rogan (0:12)

Thanks for doing this, man.

Peter Hotez (0:13)

Thanks for having me.

Joe Rogan (0:14)

I, no, I should tell you before we get started, I did not know when I asked you to come back on that you were heavily involved in this whole vaccine debate. What I wanted to have you on to talk about is tropical diseases.

Because I remember when we did that sci-fi show, you explained to me that some ungodly percentage of people that live in tropical climates are infected by parasites.

Peter Hotez (0:36)

That's right. Well, my day job is developing vaccines for tropical diseases. We develop the vaccines no one else will make because they're for the world's poorest people. So we call them tropical diseases, but they really are diseases of poverty.

The vaccine issue, the advocacy issue around vaccines and autism is a new thing that I got drawn into just because I'm a parent of an adult daughter with autism and I make vaccines. So it was a natural that I'd get drawn into it.

Joe Rogan (1:03)

Yeah, so when I said that you were going to come on, then I got inundated by people that are, the vaccine thing is such a polarizing issue.

Peter Hotez (1:15)

Yeah, it's awful.

Joe Rogan (1:15)

And so many people seem to think they absolutely know what causes what, especially when it comes to something like autism, which is a huge issue in this country. It's a huge issue around the world. And it didn't used to seem to be. The question is, was that because it was undiagnosed?

Was that because it's more prevalent today? What do you think? What is your take on this?

Peter Hotez (1:41)

Well, I don't think we really know. One of the things for sure, we're diagnosing people with autism who we diagnosed as something else in the past, whether it was really horrible diagnosis, we'd use pejorative terms like mental retardation.

Joe Rogan (1:56)

What's the matter, Jamie?

Just telling you, the clock was off. Oh, okay, sorry.

Peter Hotez (2:03)

Should we start again?

Joe Rogan (2:04)

No, no, no, it's okay. He was just saying, he was just telling me that our clock is screwed up because of the daylight savings time.

Peter Hotez (2:09)

Oh, right.

Joe Rogan (2:09)

Sorry. Totally unrelated to what you were saying.

Peter Hotez (2:12)

The whole country's clock is screwed up because of the daylight savings time.

Joe Rogan (2:16)

So we don't know.

Peter Hotez (2:18)

Well, one thing is clear, the number of diagnoses is going up, but part of that is because what we used to call pejorative, things like mental retardation now get thrown into the autism category. The other thing now-

Joe Rogan (2:31)

They do.

Peter Hotez (2:32)

Absolutely.

Joe Rogan (2:33)

How so?

Peter Hotez (2:34)

Well, now we call it as part of the autism spectrum.

We also, because autism often has a lot of associated intellectual disabilities, not always, but sometimes. The other is that-

Joe Rogan (2:47)

Can I pause for a second? Is that based on aptitude tests? How do they decide?

Peter Hotez (2:53)

How do they decide what's autism?

Yes. They have a list of diagnostic category.

Joe Rogan (2:58)

But it's not like you could test someone if they test positive for a disease.

Peter Hotez (3:01)

That's right. Well, although one of the interesting side pieces to this is, there's a group of people out there who self-identify themselves as the autistics, and they get very resentful or hurt when they're called a disease or a disorder. Because they say, well, we're not an epidemic, we're a person, and it's part of this whole neurodiversity movement, which is quite interesting.

Joe Rogan (3:29)

Neurodiversity movement.

Peter Hotez (3:30)

Right. They say they're neurodiverse, that they maybe think differently from others, and they respond differently than others, but they're not, quote, abnormal, and I think they have a good argument.

Joe Rogan (3:41)

I heard a crazy argument once with someone that was-

Peter Hotez (3:44)

So the point is that the impairment, like Rachel, my daughter, it's not so much her autism that thwarts her ability to have partners or to have a meaningful career. It's the fact that she has profound, in her case, profound intellectual disability that goes along with it.

Joe Rogan (4:08)

So when they say that people have- there's a spectrum, right? And some people who are autistic have incredible abilities.

Peter Hotez (4:18)

That's right.

Joe Rogan (4:19)