[Steven Bartlett]: This may be the most controversial thing we have on this table. This is a peptide that absolutely torches belly fat at a disproportionate rate. And what we found is not only do patients lose an incredible amount of weight, but they also get the best improvements we've ever seen in their liver health. It's absolutely wild. And I think this is going to be a trillion dollar drug when it comes out. And I brought you here because you're an expert on this subject matter. And it's worth saying that there was some significant news about this.

[Alex Tatem]: Correct. from the FDA saying that in July they are going to consider legalizing seven peptides and by pharma's estimate it might be the most dangerous thing to their entire business model.

[Steven Bartlett]: So do you think it is plausible that big farmer didn't want these in the hands of regular people because they can't patent this and it's powerful

[Alex Tatem]: 110%. Because the question isn't what can peptides do, it's what can't they do and we've got several peptides here in front of us and I want to go through all of them.

[Alex Tatem]: Let's do it. So, this is probably the most well-known peptide for skin complexion and it improves quality of hair and nails. And then epialon is maybe maybe not going to be the fountain of youth, but I'm very skeptical as far as that goes. Next, we've got this. And if you injected that at night, it would improve your quality of your sleep. Next, melan too. And this will actually end up giving you a deep tan in response to just a little bit of UV sun exposure. It'll also give you some of the most impressive erections you've ever had in your life. So, be warned. And what else have we got? Oh my gosh. There's methyline blue where people take it and they think it's going to make them live forever. Don't take this. It literally will stain your nails blue and your hair blue. These two here stimulates building muscle. This one can aid with healing after an injury. And then is this this? This this. It's crazy. It's wild.

[Steven Bartlett]: Dr. Alex. What the hell is a peptide?

[Alex Tatem]: Peptides are a structural class of medications. The best way to think about peptides is that just like we have small molecules which are drugs that are very small taken in a pill and have a wide ranging effect throughout the body. Peptides are derived from little pieces of amino acids which think of them as the Legos that make up the human body. The Legos that make up proteins. These are fragments of proteins that are designed to specifically target certain receptors and affect cells in a very targeted fashion. Or a best way to think about it is a very specific targeted key to unlock a very specific lock. So instead of a small molecule that may have a wide ranging effect throughout the body, peptides are much much more focused.

[Alex Tatem]: The best way to think about it is my son loves Legos, which is why I'm glad that we have these here. But he can take the same set of Legos and he can build a rocket ship and then just a few minutes later he can build a pirate ship and then he builds a race car. And he's using the same Legos, but he's creating very, very different things that all do very, very different things. And so peptides have become incredibly popular because yes, we have some really fascinating peptides that can help with anti-aging, with healing, and with tissue repair. The first peptide that was actually isolated and used in medicine, was insulin back in 1921.

[Steven Bartlett]: But there's a bigger question here which is why now why have the subject of peptides suddenly exploded into society's consciousness? What's going on? What's the big picture?

[Alex Tatem]: So this is really interesting. In 2013 there was actually a court case in the United States. It was the Myriad Genetics case. This was the company that actually patented the BRCA 1 and BRCA 2 genes. The Supreme Court actually sided with that argument saying that if something is natural, it's found within us. I can't patent you know your muscle cells. But the unintentional byproduct of that is all of a sudden pharma had no incentive whatsoever to pursue really promising compounds that they could not monetize. because drug development is so expensive, there is no incentive for commercial pharmaceutical companies to pursue the development of these compounds.

[Alex Tatem]: And then on the other side of that, well, we have compoundingies that, you know, for them it makes sense. What if we could just make these compounds and then sell them directly to patients? Well, they could do that starting in about 2014. But then in 2023, the FDA at that time switched all of those peptides, 19 of them that were popular to category 2. And then they were banned. Overnight, we got notifications in our email inboxes from our compounding pharmacy partners saying, "Hey, we can't make this anymore. We're sorry."

[Steven Bartlett]: Why?

[Alex Tatem]: Officially what happened is there was a meeting where they brought together the experts at the time and they said there is insufficient data for us to say that these are safe. Now there wasn't any evidence of any of that in the population. These were widely used at the time. potentially we had commercial pharmaceutical companies saying well hey this is people spending money on a compound on something that isn't coming to us. And that's something that's been iterated by our current administration from RFK himself. You know, he himself has characterized that move done in 2023 as being illegal.

[Alex Tatem]: So I think what we're seeing is the forbidden fruit effect because this was banned and all of a sudden, oh well, why'd they ban it? Well, they wouldn't have been banned it if it weren't working, right? And we're also seeing the effect of Tik Tok and short form content being spread very rapidly, very virally.

[Steven Bartlett]: And of all the things we've talked about today, if you had to just pick one thing that excites you the most that's either coming down the pipe or here already. What is the thing you're most excited about?

[Alex Tatem]: Hands down it's that one over there, Redat True Tide, because the changes in body composition that we have seen both in clinical trials, okay, and in anecdotal reports from users who have obtained on their own are wild. We're talking losing 20 to 25% of total body weight within a relatively short period of time. And I think that this is going to be basically the Ferrari of GLP1 medications when it comes out. I think this is going to be a trillion dollar drug when it comes out.

[Steven Bartlett]: I've got these three vials in my hand. Do you know what those are?

[Alex Tatem]: This unfortunately is actually representing the fertility trajectory for young men because what we're seeing is that back in 1973 total modal sperm count is exponentially higher and more dense than what we're seeing today. And so what we're seeing is a progressive decline in male fertility over time. The leading culprits are going to be yes microplastics and environmental toxins. But again, the biggest modifiable risk factor is insulin resistance and metabolic disease, obesity. And so a downstream effect that we may see from peptides like we discussed before is we may be able to help reverse this for the first time in history.

[Steven Bartlett]: Well, thank you for caring because it matters and uh a lot of this stuff is quite opaque and confusing to an average person like me, but it's glad I'm so glad that we have people out there in the world like you that are demystifying all of this for us and explaining it in simple terms.

[Alex Tatem]: health is for everyone, not just for the fortunate. I want my patients to have every tool physically possible to live their best quality of life so that they can be whole and they can be happy and so that they can be the best version of themselves for their loved ones.