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Alone on the Cancer Boat: A Vlogbrothers Reunion

2023-06-27 · collab / interview · John, Hank · 10:48 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Personal life (also: Health, Projects) · mode: Q&A & conversation · tags: guest or collab, heavy topic, on location, self promotion

In a reunion at the DFTBA warehouse, John says that beneath the jokes Hank's chemotherapy simply sucks; Hank likens it to being alone and seasick on a boat; they discuss why cancer is hard to cure, unequal access to treatment, Carole Mitnick's idea of treating illness to extend lives rather than maximize value, and Hank's new ocular migraines, and John closes that many people are trying to right Hank's ship.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — Greeting at the DFTBA warehouse; John packed socks and praises the for-charity company

00:00:46 — 'This sucks': Hank's chemo as being alone and seasick on a boat; Dad saving a tree

  • ★★ Hank says he is feeling okay right now but expects to feel worse in about four days. — 00:00:46 · chemotherapy
  • ★★ John says both brothers have the instinct in hard times to put a positive spin on things, saying 'it sucks, but'. — 00:00:46
  • ★★★ John says that although Hank is tolerating treatment brilliantly, without the 'but': this sucks, and Hank gets really sick. — 00:01:36 · Hank Green
  • ★★ Hank agrees: chemo has a reputation that it has earned. — 00:01:36 · chemotherapy
  • ★ John says he can count on two hands the times he has seen Hank take a nap, and many of them were when Hank was very seasick on a boat. — 00:01:36 · Hank Green

  • ★★★ Hank likens chemo to being seasick on a boat you don't want to be on, with nobody else aboard: you are alone on the boat. — 00:01:36

    “you're alone on the boat”

  • ★★ John says many people ask Hank if he needs anything, but the one thing he wants, to be off the boat, is the one thing they can't do. — 00:01:36

  • ★★ Their dad is outside trying to save a tree that doesn't look well, but it is alive and worth his efforts. — 00:02:54 · Mike Green
  • ★★ Hank says the tree is on its own boat but not alone, since Dad is there; Hank has Dad too, though Dad can't stake him upright: that is Dr. Carl's job. — 00:02:54 · Mike Green

00:03:38 — Why cancer is hard to cure, cancer as many diseases, unequal access and drug prices

  • ★★★ Hank says it's easy to forget that a hundred years ago people did not expect to be cured of a disease; doctors mainly told them which direction they were headed. — 00:04:06
  • ★★ Hank says treatment often feels vaguely medieval: chemotherapy that destroys your immune system doesn't feel very 21st-century. — 00:04:06 · chemotherapy
  • ★★★ John says that when people figured out how antibiotics worked, life expectancy increased by 30 years over the course of 30 years. — 00:04:39
  • ★★★ John says it was hard to tell which diseases would turn out easy to cure: after antibiotics, people tried the same with cancer and viruses and found they couldn't. — 00:04:39 · cancer
  • ★★ John says the failure to cure cancer feels like a conspiracy, but it isn't; it is just hard. — 00:04:39 · cancer
  • ★★★ Hank says cancer is not one disease like strep throat but many; calling it one disease is like calling viruses one disease. — 00:05:07 · cancer
  • ★★ John says a family member was just diagnosed with basal cell carcinoma, a cancer whose survival rate is 100%, so nobody says they have cancer. — 00:05:07 · cancer
  • ★★★ John says a big thing both learned about cancer is how unequal access to treatment is, in the US and rich countries and especially between rich and poorer countries. — 00:05:44 · health equity, United States
  • ★★ John says the drugs for even very treatable diseases are known and not that expensive, Hodgkin's drugs included. — 00:06:13 · Hodgkin lymphoma
  • ★★ Hank says his chemo is the cheapest part of his treatment, cheaper than the scans; switching to a newer drug over a lung problem would raise it from $300 to, he thinks, $15,000. (hedged) — 00:06:13 · chemotherapy

00:06:35 — Carole Mitnick's idea of health care for lives not value, Wikipedia, micromorts

  • ★★ John responds sarcastically that this is a good system. (satire) — 00:06:35
  • ★★★ John says Dr. Carole Mitnick gave him an idea new to him in 45 years: treating illness not as an opportunity to maximize value but to extend the quality and length of human lives. — 00:06:35
  • ★★ Carole Mitnick (quoted): Mitnick's example that it has been done before: Wikipedia is an effort to extend the quality and length of human lives in a not-for-profit way. — 00:07:04 · Wikipedia
  • ★★ John says Wikipedia taught him the concept of micromorts, which he describes as how many minutes of life each activity takes away. — 00:07:04 · Wikipedia
  • ★★ At VidCon John's children jumped into a deep Squishmallow pit; told he had to jump too to get one for their cousin Orin, John did. (playful) — 00:07:34 · VidCon, Orin Green

00:08:19 — John jumps into the VidCon Squishmallow pit

00:09:05 — Hank's new chemo symptom, ocular migraines, and Wipeout

  • ★★★ Hank reports a new chemo symptom: for the first time in his life, two ocular migraines, with auras and no pain while they were happening; it felt like hallucinating, in both eyes, so a brain problem. — 00:09:05 · chemotherapy
  • ★★ John says many things he used to think sucked, Wipeout for example, turn out to be a gift of a different kind. — 00:09:37
  • ★★ John says such shows are not bad, just a show for a different person at a different time. — 00:09:37
  • ★ John watched a 19-minute video of every person who completed Wipeout over 25 years, probably because Hank is messing with his algorithm. (playful, hedged) — 00:09:37 · YouTube

00:10:25 — Dad still at the tree; many people trying to right Hank's ship; sign-off

  • ★★★ Closing on Dad still at work on the tree, John tells Hank he may be alone on the boat, but many people are trying to right that ship. — 00:10:25 · Mike Green, Hank Green

    “you may be alone on the boat, but look how many people are trying to right that ship”

In the description and comments

Humor (significant)

  • Hank welcomes John to the warehouse; John, temporary CEO, corrects him. — 00:00:00

    “You don't have to say welcome, actually, because I am the CEO.”

  • Riffing on the boat metaphor, they imagine YouTube's recommendations noticing Hank's interest in boats. — 00:02:25

    “i see how much you're enjoying these boat disaster videos”

  • Hank's chemo would go from $300 to $15,000 if he switched drugs. — 00:06:35

    “What a good system.”

  • Free solo climbing has many micromorts even if you're good at it, which John isn't. — 00:07:34

    “So for me, it would be like a million micromorts. Yeah, which adds up to one mort.”

  • John describes leaping gracefully like an eagle into the 15-foot Squishmallow pit at VidCon. — 00:09:05

    “well that was thrilling”

  • John stretches the boat metaphor to people righting Hank's ship. — 00:10:25

    “Have I extended the metaphor too far?”

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: cancer · chemotherapy

Also: People: Carole Mitnick · Dr. Carl · Mike Green · Orin Green

Projects: Awesome Socks Club · VidCon

Works: Wipeout

Organizations: Wikipedia · YouTube

Concepts: Antibiotic · Basal-cell carcinoma · Chronic condition · Free solo climbing · health care prices in the United States · health equity · Hodgkin lymphoma · immune system · life expectancy · Micromort · Migraine · Streptococcal pharyngitis · Virus

Places: United States

Products: Squishmallows

Only in the description or credits: Awesome Coffee Club · DFTBA Records · Reunion video

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