Biophysics Professor Trump’s Traveling Medicine Show

It would normally be entertaining to listen to a science-skeptic expound on his own personal, untrained and uneducated theories on complex scientific theories. But not from someone who can convince people to take severe medical risks. Not from the President of the United States, making it up on the spot. Shooting from the hip is the stuff of TV talk and game show hosts, kids vamping when the teacher asks a question where the student does not know the answer and Donald Trump. 

Watching Dr. Deborah Birx’s face at Donald Trump’s April 23^rd press briefing, where he seriously (watch the playback if you think he was joking) suggested that some internal use of a disinfectant (injected or swallowed) be considered to treat CV-19, said it all. Simply, she was horrified. Trump’s claim a day later that he was joking and just being sarcastic was incredibly obviously false. He meant it when he said it. See also my Dr. Trump’s Traveling Medicine Show blog (April’s 24^th) for more details.

But in addition to Trump’s oft-repeated claim that hydroxychloroquine and chloroquine, used as anti-malarials and to treat lupus but which also carry the risk of serious and potentially fatal side-effects, are effective treatments for COVID-19 (there are plenty of medical studies that reach the opposite conclusion) and thus should be the focus of a significant new billion dollar federal research effort, Donald Trump had yet another “brilliant” treatment for COVID-19. Light.

The April 25^th FastCompany.com tackled the realities of that theory: “[U]pon hearing that ultraviolet waves of light, which are projected by the sun, could kill the virus behind COVID-19, President Trump began speculating as to how it might purify our bodies at his press conference on Thursday [4/23]… ‘So supposing we hit the body with a tremendous—whether it’s ultraviolet or just a very powerful light—and I think you said that hasn’t been checked because of the testing…And then I said, supposing you brought the light inside the body, which you can do either through the skin or some other way.’

“This was the latest in a wave of impossible-to-follow, pseudo-scientific claims by Trump. Attempting to unpack and scrutinize its logic is an exercise in futility. But it does serve as an important moment to clarify what ultraviolet (UV) light, as both a natural resource from the sun and a technology harnessed by new bulbs, can provide to us during the COVID-19 crisis and what it cannot.

“For clarity, we spoke to Andrea Martin Armani, the Ray Irani Chair in Engineering and Materials Science and Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at the USC Viterbi School of Engineering, an expert on light and biology, who has developed several new biosensor technologies with lasers and UV light…

“Thanks to UV, sunlight has been proven to kill the virus behind COVID-19, though not effectively enough to wipe it out entirely. The purifying power of UV light has also been harnessed in specialized lightbulbs used to purify hospital rooms and water sources, but that’s a different type of UV— [UVC: the most effective part of the UV spectrum for killing pathogens like COVID-19]…

“‘UVC disrupts the pyrimidines [nucleic acids contained in RNA and DNA],’ Armani explains, because the specific frequency of UVC resonates with the nucleic acids [in the virus’ or bacteria’s RNA/DNA], destroying them (with more effectiveness than UVA or UVB). ‘Since it’s able to go in and destroy half of RNA or DNA, it’s able to destroy replication of viruses and bacteria. They can’t reproduce and so they die.’…

“‘UVC has been used in water and air purification since the late 1990s,’ says Armani. ‘The idea that UVC could actually disrupt DNA and RNA was discovered in the late 1880s. The concept has been known for a very long time!’ It’s used in sealed tanks at water treatment facilities, sealed ducts in HVAC systems, and even some personal air purifiers. More recently, UVC light has been adopted in surgical rooms to blast the entire room with light and purify it within minutes. [Pictured above in a hospital room devoid of any people]

“Armani has even built a UVC box in her home, which isn’t much more than a closable box with a UVC light inside. She uses to sterilize deliveries as they come in. It’s the same sort of technology that’s currently sterilizing N95 masks for reuse…

“Why not add UVC lights to my house then?... Well, the catch is that UVC light, like UVA and UVB, is an indiscriminate killer. Enough UVC light—the level of power used to sterilize surgical rooms—would burn you and potentially give you skin cancer. That’s why it’s only being used in controlled environments. Humans don’t enter the sealed water purification tanks that are being blasted with UVC light. Motion sensors ensure no one is in a surgical room when the UVC light goes on…

“‘Technically… there are ways to bring light (in general) into the body. There are actually medical treatments based on bringing {non-UV} into the body at very very precise locations. For example, one approach for breaking up kidney stones is ‘blasting’ them with a high power laser,’ she says. ‘However, that is typically a green laser—not a UVC laser. And the laser only hits the kidney stone. So, no, there isn’t a way to bring UVC light into your body and hit everywhere at once.’

“And if you did manage to hit every cell in your body with enough UVC, you’d break down the DNA and kill them, too. So, yes, that makes Trump’s UV light cure every bit as sound as drinking bleach.” We are light years’ (pun intended) from figuring out how to harness UVC in generic light bulbs that we could have around us that are strong enough to kill germs while not destroying human cells. Still Trump expounds. His CV-19 leadership rating continues to soar, even as his own followers are beginning to dismiss his medical claims.

There are rumors that Republican leaders are making progress to reduce the time that Donald Trump speaks at this daily press briefing, still a presidential favorite venue in which to excoriate his “enemies” (usually Democrats and the press) and present his “expertise” to his constituency.

These Republicans higher-ups know, however, that on a more objective level, Trump rather consistently demonstrates his ignorance and lack of understanding of what this nation actually faces. On April 25^th, Trump eschewed his daily briefing, after having embarrassed himself with his disinfectant recommendation two days earlier, claiming the briefings were “not worth my time or effort.” Is this a permanent change? The GOP sure hopes so.

Look at the New York Times map (April 25^th) above and see how much of the United States is reopening now, even as CV-19 infection and death rates remain at critically high levels. I can feel that second wave rippling and getting ready to pounce. Too many Americans, especially red state governors, are following Trump’s suggestion to be liberated and resume the economy. We ain’t seen nuffin’ yet.

            I’m Peter Dekom, and watching the litany of human beings dying from this disease, gasping for air as their lungs fail, makes having a non-empathetic, science-skeptic “know it all” President truly horrifying to me.