Dr. David Agus and Lance Armstrong question the science and art of defining your health.
In a recent speech to the University of California, Santa Barbara Arts & Lecture series, leading cancer specialist, Dr. David Agus surprised and delighted his audiences with startling opinions and data-backed statistics. For example, Dr. Agus believes that sitting at one’s desk for a 5½-hour stretch is equivalent, on a health basis, to smoking a pack-and-a-half of cigarettes. “Walking works,” he said.
Following classic presentation style, Dr. Agus began with a story and filled his discussion with candor and humor. “My body didn’t come with an instruction book, I don’t know about yours.”
From READY FOR MEDIA, Dr. Agus has learned an important lesson to “brand” his book by title, instead of the phrase, “in my book.” i.e. The End of Illness is about … Illness will end when… and, Practices like … will help us end illness. The biggest mistake executives and spokespeople make in public speaking is not branding their companies (we) or their product (it) by name.
Dr. Agus believes that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Specifically, that a low-dose aspirin a day changes a body’s chemistry, making it less hospitable to cancer.
Credited as an “empowering piece of the puzzle” by Lance Armstrong, Dr. Agus was one of the cancer doctors to Steve Jobs, who retitled Agus’ book, The End of Illness.
Dr. Agus was originally recruited by philanthropic leaders in Los Angeles to Cedars Sinai Hospital, who commissioned READY FOR MEDIA to work with their leading doctors. Industrialist Eli Broad then convinced Dr. Agus to stay in Los Angeles at the University of Southern California, where he is currently a Professor at the Keck School of Medicine and the Viterbi School of Engineering. He directs both USC’s Westside Cancer Center and the Center for Applied Molecular Medicine.
Dr. Agus believes that we hold the keys to ending our illnesses before they begin.