mark siegel, professor of medicine at nyu. also author of "the inner pulse, unlocking the secret code of sickness and health." >> and dr. david samadi, professor of urology at lennox hill and chief of robotic surgery. good to see you, doctors. happy new year. >> happy new year. >> happy new year. >> it is, but it could be sadly maybe a sick one for people. that's because of the flu. the flu virus is at one of the worst points ever. it's now become an epidemic, according to the centers for disease control. they say the virus has caused the deaths of at least 60 people. it spread to 36 states. how can you prevent getting the flu? does the flu shot work? what can we do to protect our family? this scares me. the one year i didn't get the shot, man, oh, man, i was out of it with the influenza. it's bad. >> this is a particularly severe, nasty strain this year. the predominant strain in 90% of cases is something called an h3n2. that's the proteins on the surface of the flu. the flu molecule, the virus itself is a little package of r

mark siegel, professor of medicine at nyu.f "the inner pulse, unlocking the secret code of sickness and health." >> and dr. david samadi, professor of urology at lennox hill and chief of robotic surgery. good to see you, doctors. happy new year. >> happy new year. >> happy new year. >> it is, but it could be sadly maybe a sick one for people. that's because of the flu. the flu virus is at one of the worst points ever. it's now become an epidemic, according to the centers for disease control. they say the virus has caused

mark siegel professor of medicine at nyu.ner pulse unlocking the secret code of sickness and health. >> and professor of urology at lennox hill and chief of robotic surgery. >> happy new year. >> happy new year. >> it is but it could be sadly maybe a sick one for people. that's because of the flu. the flu virus is at one of the worst points ever. it's now become an epidemic, according to the centers for disease control. they say the virus has caused the deaths of at least 60 people. it spread to 36 states. how can you prevent getting the flu? does the flu shot work? what can we do to protect our family? this scares me. the one year i didn't get the shot , man, oh man i was out of it with the influenza. it's bad. >> this is a particularly severe nasty strain this year. the predominant strain in 90% of cases is something called an h3n2. that's the protein s on the surface of the flu. the flu molecule, the virus itself is a little package of rna, genetic material. it hops cell to cell and this flu can get you very sick. the last

mark siegel is a fox news correspondent and an epidemic it sounds bad and children are dying from fluticular strain, h3n2 hits the very young and the very old. it's a big enabler meaning it causes other diseases to parade in. people with hart disease are more likely to have a heart attack if they get this flu, it knocks down your immune system and you get very fatigued. you get muscle aches. if you get pneumonia or bronchitis or a heart issue, you end up in the hospital. over 100,000 hospitalizations a year with this kind of strain. people aren't expecting flu this late because the last couple of years it's been another strain that peaks earlier. this is an unusual case of flu but bad case of it. >> how did it get to epidemic levels? especially with your kid. you can't take your kid to the doctor without him saying get the flu vaccination. you can do it up the nose or the shot for the babies. why is everybody getting it? >> 43 states widespread, the time of year that you get it because it spreads by droplets, people coughing and sneezing on one another, not watching it touching surfac

mark siegel. like a real breakthrough. >> i love this story from a business point of view this is terrific. we have a problem where we don't make enough antibiotics, haven't made a new one in decades, and we don't use from all this time. we don't use them every day. plus oversusing the antibiotics we have and don't clean hospitals in the city end up with a lot of resistant bacteria, superbugs. this antibiotic works. stuart: where does it come from? >> the soil. most of the antibiotics we have to come from soil but can't get them out because we don't know how to grow them in a petrie dish. talk about a new technology, something called and i checked they developed in northeast university in boston where they literally put into these alleles this ship where you grow the bacteria that makes the antibiotic between two layers and put the bad guys on the outside. the stuff that we really got to see if it kills and they are finding it kills it. stuart: resisting antibiotics, not that great because germs w

bill siegel, thank you very much. "bottom line" with markcoming up at the bottom of the hour. ♪ >> i'm cory johnson. this is "bloomberg west hookah -- west." david karp has no regrets selling this platform to yahoo. he told my partner, emily chang, the marissa mayer has helped tumblr amass more than two million blogs. what are your who's future plans for tumblr -- yahoo's future plans for tumblr? >> marissa mayer's acquisition strategy has been criticized. critics have said tumblr wasn't making money. how do you respond to those criticisms? >> we are growing fast. if she wanted to go out and buy a profitable company at the time of acquisition, there were and still are plenty to choose from. she saw a real path forward in something that she thought could be not just a really big business, but a business with a lot of alignment with yahoo!. we are a year in. we are starting to prove that. we are about to have a lot to brag about very soon. >> what is tumblr's ad strategy for growing the business now that you are within this bigger company? >>

bill siegel, thank you very much. "bottom line" with markming up at the bottom of the hour. what have you got? >> today's move on the swiss national bank to end its minimum exchange rates stunt the global currency markets. what are the implications for the u.s. federal reserve and the european central bank, and how will investors respond going forward? a colleague scarlet fu and lisa abramowicz will have analysis of the action. the academy award nominations are out. the senior media analyst will look at who is in and who was passed over in this yours oscar race. -- year's oscar race. >> they make more than pocket knives and cuckoo clocks in switzerland. >> oh, geez. matt miller, our friend. >> he keeps things interesting. i can't wait for this story. >> thank you, cory. >> it has been almost two years since tumblr was sold. ♪ >> i'm cory johnson. this is "bloomberg west." the ceo to $1.1 billion for the deal in 2013. he told emily chang that russ meyer's has helped tumblr amass more than 2 million -- marissa mayers has helped tumblr amass mo

marc siegel, professor of medicine nyu langone medical center. fox news medical a-team. what did you find out, markg, bill. young people plugged into headphones. baby boomers are aging. hearing loss reached epidemic proportions in u.s. there is new frontier in curing deafness for millions of americans. bill, a harmless virus carries genetic treatment to regrow tiny hair cells inside of the inner ear. >> virus injects dna into the cell. it takes over the cell's own machinery to make the new protein. of and that new protein now will then cause the non-hair cell to become a hair cell. >> hering is an intricate process. sound travis down the ear canal vibrates the ear drum makes its way to the coke leah and tiny hair cells which vibrate and send signals to the brain. hearing cells die off from medication noise side-effects and aging. other species can regenerate them but we can't. novartis has begun to test a revolutionary treatment in humans though problems still exist. >> the inner ear is encased almost completely in solid bone and getting the gene therapy to the right cells was one of our biggest ch

marc siegel is professor of medicine nyu langone medical center. member fox news medical a-team. how are you doing markng. bill: e-cigs more popular? >> they're mushrooming, own 10% of high schools using it. some states over 20% of high schools. bill: what is it exactly? >> it is exactly not smoking. it is vaping. you inhale a vapor with nicotine in it. makes it highly a ad checking. it has polypropylene glycol. if you use it at high-intensity it lets out formaldehyde. it scares everyone. you will not let out formaldehyde the way most people use these. what are we using instead of cigarettes which are extremely toxic. bill: there is nicotine but no tobacco. >> and no tar. bill: when somebody exhales what do they exhale the puff of smoke. >> it is a vapor. not smoke. it's a vapor with chemicals in it. a suspension that goes into the air but not smoke. it is not smoke. bill: do you agree with what california is doing yes or no. >> no. bill: why not? >> because i think we're swinging too far in a cerp direction. i think we have to target the problem which is that teens are overusing these things. you know