On the surface, what the wellness industry is offering feels like an antidote to our fragmented and fast-paced lives. Influencers and companies use words like "mindfulness" or “whole foods” or “self care” to get our stressed out, burnt out buy in. But, somewhere along the line those promises start to morph into luxury services, expensive memberships and supplements you never knew you needed. In her book “How to Be Well” former fashion journalist Amy Larocca explores the blurred line between healing and branding in a $6 trillion dollar industry.

We discuss:

• Why our current wellness craze mirrors 1930s pre-Nazi Germany
• How Abraham Flexner completely changed how we teach medicine in the US for better – and for worse
• Why the spiritual and community void left by declining religious participation leads people to look to the wellness industry for both

Amy says what attracts people to the modern fitness class has parallels to religious practices:

“So if you look at what happens in ritual religious gatherings… You see a lot of that replicated in a lot of these boutique fitness settings. You have ritual, you have music, you have ecstatic movement, you have charismatic leaders, you have a sermon. And these sermons have increasingly moved away from talk of muffin tops and bikini bodies and losing that whatever it is, to kindness, community, thinking about your place in the world, thinking about taking the energy that you are building up in that room and spreading it forward. ”

Relevant Links

• Buy Amy’s book “How to Be Well: Navigating Our Self-Care Epidemic, One Dubious Cure at a Time”
• Read this Wikipedia page on Martine Rothblatt’s robot replica of her wife Bina
• Check out this article on the impact of the Flexner report on US medicine
• Read the book “McMindfulness” Amy mentions in the episode
• Sign up for Lamar’s SoulCycle class

About Our Guest

Amy Larocca is an award-winning American journalist. She spent 20 years working at New York Magazine as both Fashion Director and Editor at Large. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, Vogue, Town & Country, and the London Review of Books, among others. She lives with her family in New York and North London.

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For more information on The Other 80 please visit our website - www.theother80.com. To connect with our team, please email claudia@theother80.com and follow us on twitter...

Loneliness isn’t just a feeling - it’s a public health crisis. The number of hours we spend with friends is rapidly decreasing, more and more Americans report feeling lonely, and loneliness is linked to bad health outcomes like risk of premature death, heart disease, stroke, depression and anxiety. Kasley Killam, author of “The Art and Science and Connection”, joins us to talk about why social health should be the third pillar of wellness alongside physical and mental health.

We discuss:

• The surprising finding that connected communities were more resilient during the COVID pandemic
• Kasley’s 100+ day experiment with acts of kindness
• How small investments in social health have big ripple effects
• Her nuanced views on AI companions

Kasley talks about how vulnerability is key to building trust and human connection:

“When you share something a little vulnerable that goes beyond… surface level and small talk, that is like this magical way of deepening connections, right? It builds trust, it builds intimacy, it makes us relatable, it helps us get to know each other better. And so … there I am with a complete stranger who… I've maybe shared something on stage or in conversation, they're now sharing something really intimate and vulnerable about their life and that just creates this beautiful moment. ”

Relevant Links

• Grab Kasley’s book “The Art and Science of Connection”
• See Kasley’s TED talk: Why Social Health is Key to Happiness and Longevity
• Get more info on the APA poll on social connection
• Read an Article on Kasley’s 108-day experiment with acts of kindness
• Read the Surgeon General’s advisory on loneliness as a pandemic
• See this Article on Scan Health Plan’s “Togetherness” program

About Our Guest

Kasley Killam is a leading expert in social health and author of The Art and Science of Connection: Why Social Health is the Missing Key to Living Longer, Healthier, and Happier. As a Harvard-trained social scientist, 2X TED speaker, sought-after advisor, and award-winning founder, Killam has been dedicated to improving well-being through human connection for nearly 15 years. Globally recognized for her thought leadership on social health, Killam’s collaborations with top organizations like Google, the US Department of Health and Human Services, and the World Economic Forum contribute to building more socially healthy products, workplaces, and communities. Discover her insights in outlets like The New York Times, Forbes, NPR, CNBC, and The Washington Post and join her newsletter community at www.kasleykillam.com.

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What if instead of treating illness we also confronted the reasons Americans get sick in the first place? That’s the origin of this podcast and also the four billion dollar question Dr. Bechara Choucair is tackling at Kaiser Permanente as Chief Community Health Officer. He joins Claudia to talk about the organization’s focus on climate change and health, workforce pipelines and addressing unmet social needs.

We discuss:

• The surprising fact that two-thirds of KP’s members (who are mostly covered by employer insurance) have at least one unmet social need
• How the Common Health Coalition is building bridges between healthcare and public health
• What KP is doing to tackle a big problem limiting the mental health workforce: only 57% of masters trained therapists get licensed
• What it took for KP to achieve carbon neutrality

Bechara reminds us that bridge-building is a crucial part of this community health work:

“We need more and more bridges between public health and healthcare... [They have] operated as two separate disciplines operating in their own silos... [When] there is a public health emergency we build more bridges, we strengthen those bridges that already exist. And then when that public health emergency subsides, we all retreat into our own disciplines and we continue that siloed journey.”

Relevant Links

• Read about the NAM initiative on climate change and health
• Explore why the US needs more community health workers from this article
• Learn more about the Common Health Coalition
• Dive into details on KP’s sustainability journey

About Our Guest

Dr. Bechara Choucair, MD, is executive vice president and chief community health officer for Kaiser Foundation Health Plan, Inc. and Hospitals — known as Kaiser Permanente, one of America’s leading integrated health care providers and not-for-profit health plans. Dr. Choucair oversees the organization’s national community health efforts and philanthropic giving activities aimed at improving the health of its 12.2 million members and the 68 million people within the communities it serves.

Previously, Dr. Choucair served as senior vice president, Safety Net and Community Health, at Trinity Health, and was the commissioner of the Chicago Department of Public Health.

Dr. Choucair, a family physician by training, completed his Family Practice Residency at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. He holds an MD from the American University of Beirut and a master’s degree in health care management from the University of Texas at Dallas.

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For more information on The Other 80 please visit our website - www.theother80.com. To connect with our team, please email claudia@theother80.com and follow us on twitter...