also, the only man who can turn a four-letter word into an international smash hit. ♪ see you driving around town with the girl i love and i'm like, forget you ♪ >> yo, p, what's up, man? i'm so anxious to talk to you, the anticipation is killing me. >> my exclusive with cee lo green. you have got probably more money in those diamonds in your teeth than i've earned in a lifetime. how many have you got? >> would you stop being modest, please? plus, only in america. a lesson for all those new facebook billionaires on the right way to spend their money. this is "piers morgan tonight." very few television programs could actually improve your health. well, i'm hoping that this one will. because dr. oz is the kind of guy that makes you feel better and not just in that kind of cozy, convivial sense. dr. oz, welcome. >> thank you very much, piers. >> originally said heart surgeon, author, research, philanthropist, tv star. >> oh, please. >> i can't read all that guff to you. >> to me it's celia ward's husband. i had the best time. >> it was brilliant, you interviewed my wife for a british newspaper. she is a journalist. and she came back bubbling with enthusiasm because you had actively instructed her to improve her health by drinking more wine and having more sex. >> yes, i did that as a favor to you, piers. >> thank you. >> you're more than welcome. it helps a lot. the fascinating thing, and you know, i talked to celia. we were doing a free clinic in los angeles. i gained a lot of insight into how she thought about health in this country, and, of course, when you are talking to someone who is a foreign national about where we stand in america today, you see there are huge opportunities to maybe nudge ourselves in a better direction. which fundamentally is what my whole life has been about. >> a fascinating exercise, you just had thousands of people turning up who are from the lowest elements of society, in terms of ability to pay for health care or anything like that and some of them suffering appalling, long-term tumors and so on. what do you do that for? what is the motivation for you when you have those kind of open, free clinics? >> piers, i get letters in the mail daily from folks who say you are my doctor, not just figuratively because i watch you on television but literally i don't have a doctor. when you have 50 million people without health care coverage, many of them are going to seek out whatever resources exist. the tv show happens to be one of those resources. so we began running these free clinics. in part because i could hear the shame in the voices of people who were writing. they felt like they didn't matter. they didn't have a voice. they were invisible in society. we have a covenant we make with each other as part of society that i think allows us to feel like we're a member of that community. whether we have insurance or not we should at least be counted on those regards. so we run these large free clinics to embrace folks who cannot get care otherwise and there's some tragic elements to this. >> what is the simple answer for the tens of millions of people in america who simply will never be able to afford health care? how does america look after its most needy people with a system that often doesn't allow them to have anything? >> everyone has to be in the system. you cannot drive a system that is going to be aiming at preventing illness if everyone is not in it. the whole gaming of health insurance and health care in america is based upon that fundamental principle. insure people who aren't sick and you don't have to spend more money on them. if everybody is in the system it pays all of us to pay attention. that remarkable number, 80 million people are diabetic or prediabetic. seeing a similar number who are prehypertensive >> 80 million people? >> 80 million people. diabetes is like broken glass shards scraping the delicate lining of your arteries. giving you that dysfunction we called on earlier the number one cause, which i will measure on you, is blood pressure. a simple cuff like this which i hope everybody could hear my voice tonight -- >> normally my blood pressure is okay, but even talking to you about this, you're probably sending it racing. >> you kindly -- i don't know if it's a prop. this is the supply i had in the green room. i had carrots and celery sticks. >> listen. that's quite a healthy green room. >> all i know is i had to swipe away the doughnut remnants and croissants left behind. but, you know, these simple decisions impact us dramatically. so if we're going to have a true preventive health care approach to taking care of people, which is basically about making it easy to do the right thing, everybody has to be in the system. the tough decisions shouldn't be that, piers. the tough decisions should be how are we going to be able to give affordable care to people and get our value back? >> what's the simple answer? >> the simple answer is the most expensive thing we do in medicine is provide bad care. when i get a patient who is being cared for poorly or if i make a mistake, without being wise about what i'm doing, prescribing this harmful, that costs us all a lot of money. i'm of turkish origin as you may know, you throw a coin into a well, right? one foolish person can do that. but it takes 1,000 wise men to get it back out again. we are spending most of our time in american health care fixing the mistakes that either we in the profession are causing or our patients are, without recognizing it, causing to themselves. >> how limiting and how much more complicated is the system in america because of the massive overreliance on bureaucracy and threat of litigation which leads to more bureaucracy and so on? how restrictive is that to you as a practitioner? >> it's hugely restrictive. we estimate that between 20% to 25% of the health care expenses, which is a huge amount of money, is driven by the bureaucracy, fear of making mistakes. might be more than that because it's hard to measure these things. piers, the big idea, here's the big message i think everyone in the world is getting, you cannot be a wealthy country if you're not a healthy country. ultimately what china is worried about is the health of their citizens. it's going to strip away vitality. >> very true. >> what our corporate leaders worry about, they are spending so much on health care, they can't keep up with the expenses required to make simple production. a serious issue you at its root lies the challenges that we all face. we can fight about how to move around those deck seats on the "titanic." but at the end of the day we're going to have to get away from that and start making some serious choices. >> if you were analyzing and summing up the state of america's health, 1 to 100, how bad is it with the higher number being bad, lower number being good? comparative to, say, other main countries, major countries in the world? >> you know, again, using your scaling system, i would probably give us an 80. it's not where it should be. and there are a couple of reasons for that. first off, i don't think we're very efficient in how we informs and invest our resources in health. but mostly, we have made our society into a perfect storm for making mistakes in your health. if you're making it hard to do the right thing, the right thing is not going to happen. if there are no sidewalks in neighborhoods, people aren't going to go out there and walk. let me ask you a question. you didn't grow up in this country. did you walk to school when you were a kid? >> yeah. >> 60%, 70% of folks watching this show right now who are our age, walked to school when they were kids. >> i read if you just do a brisk half an hour walk a day, whoever you are, that would maintain a pretty high level of fitness over time. >> absolutely right. and let me just accentuate that for a second. you go around the world and look at people that live the longest. that is the one secret they all share. >> movement. >> movement. daily, vigorous physical activity. >> people in america and the same applies to britain, are just very sedentary in their lives. >> every hour you sit at work increases your mortality 11%. think about that and let me go to that statistic about how far we walk to school. the average number, adults today, generally walk to school more than half the time. today's children walk to school about 10% of the time. so we've created a society where it's acceptable to be sedentary. similar examples exist for many, the decisions we make, what foods are readily available. junk food, fast food, et cetera. >> hold that thought. i want to talk specifically about american health, how people are getting it wrong, what they should do to get it right and be healthy. >> in the meantime, i'm going to check your blood pressure on the break. >> let's do it. come on. let's do it. 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[siri] if you say so. on my journey across america, i found new ways to tell people about saving money. this is bobby. say hello bobby. hello bobby. do you know you could save hundreds on car insurance over the phone, online or at your local geico office? tell us bobby, what would you do with all those savings? hire a better ventriloquist. your lips are moving. geico®. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. so this is a bit of tv history for me. i've just had my blood pressure taken by dr. oz. i have no idea about the results. so you're about to find out on this show whether i'm going to be alive next week or possibly dead. dr. oz? >> or pre-op. your number is 134/82. >> so how good is that? >> 134/82 is average for america. but let me take this off you and talk about what is average in america. >> yeah. >> so when you're average, in most things, that's okay. but when you are average with your blood pressure, it doesn't mean you're optimal. >> right. >> so the goal should be -- >> what should i be looking for? >> 115/75 is the optimal number. the hypertensive number, the number that means you're too high is 140/90. if you're 134/82, which is what you were, and that means you're average, what that translates to is your life expectancy is going to be several years shorter than if your number was the optimal number. that's a big deal for folks. they don't realize the number one driver of all, aging is high blood pressure. it's like a fire hydrant rubbing off the lining of your arteries. by doing that forces your arteries to have to repair themselves continuously. so if i punch a hole in this table right here, how do i fix that hole? i fix the hole by putting plaster in it. the body's plaster is called cholesterol. the more holes i have the more i have to use my cholesterol to fix it, if i have the wrong kind of cholesterol which bad food will give me, now i'm really stuck making the plaque which causes all the things from erectile dysfunction that you and celia were talking about -- >> i'm not talking about that with my wife. >> >> i was just quoting -- what an error, i'm sorry. >> what are the hell are you talking about we're talking about your problems, not mine. >> the wine and the intimacy issues we were talking about earlier all drive back to that insight. but, again that, blood pressure problem is a much bigger issue for your heart and your brain. >> coming from europe, i was stunned by how much food americans consume. i mean it's probably -- not an exaggeration to say probably twice as much physical food being consumed on a daily basis just on the size of the portions. that i've seen. >> no question that portion control is a big part of it. piers, i spend every single day on my show talking to people about portion control, the right kinds of fats, how to cheat the system and get what you need out of it. people know what to do oftentimes and they can't do it emotionally. and you have to ask yourself, why is that? what is that deep empty hole inside they are trying to fill? i think a lot of it comes down to the fact that a lot of people in america feel out of control. so if i can't control my job or my spouse or the people in my life, the only thing i can control is my arm and the fork that it's holding. so i use it. so i think when we talk about why we have obesity in america, part of it's the system. the environment we've crafted around us. portion control is a good example. part of it is the fact we don't treat food like it's sacred. the brain is smart, piers. it's not looking for calories. it's looking for nutrients. so if i'm giving myself junk food, there's a lot of calories in it, my brain is going to say, that's fantastic. but where's my goodies? >> it's the american diet, the main american diet, the masses for want of a better phrase would eat on a regular basis, is that worse as a diet than a country like britain, like india, like china? give me some comparison to play with here about the quality of the diet. >> well, the united kingdom has the highest incidence of atherosclerotic disease, harden of the arteries of any of the countries i'm aware of. i'm sure there are a couple higher, this is the major countries, near the top, many of the studies are done there, because of that. the british diet, i don't think is much better than the u.s. diet but i think generally speaking talking about china, india and many parts of europe, people eat real food. they -- the foods they eat came out of the ground looking the way it looks when they eat it and it's not processed. don't go for the head fakes. if someone says this is a low fat food, that means we took real food and adulterated it to take the fat out. what do you add back? add sugar back. one example. skim milk. is that good for you or bad for you if you want to lose weight? >> i'm sure you're about to tell me it's not good for you. >> exactly. >> why? >> if i take the fat out of milk what is left? sugar. crazily. >> what is the best milk to drink. >> drink regular milk, just drink less of it because it's real food. your body knows what to do with real milk. if i give you a low-sugar alternative, i muck something up. that is why artificial sweeteners don't look. >> american food compared to british food, it lasts longer. in the fridge or sitting outside, it lasts days longer. a loaf of bread here will survive two weeks before it starts to mold. in britain it will go in two or three days. what does that mean? because it made me think, this is odd. how many preservatives are in this food? >> many of the preservatives are good for shelf life but bad for human life. many of these products, trans fat, for example, insects won't eat them. a lot were designed not for human use but industrial use. you know, when there was a problem with reading the right kinds of fats for candles, started using transfats, took vegetable oils and manipulated them. the scientists did the right thing to make candles, you extrapolate that into human consumption, it raises major red flags for tt. but, again, piers, a part of it is the biology of blubber. understanding how your body responds. >> biology of blubber. >> yes, the biology of blubber. >> what a great phrase. >> it's yours. use it. part of it's the biology of blubber. just understanding what naturally happens in your body when you do these things. part of it's the emotional burdens that drive us to do things we shouldn't do. let me give you one good met metaphor. a thousand years ago since you asked about stress, a thousand years ago, what was stress? wasn't a deadline for a tv show, wasn't a ratings point, wasn't someone criticizing you, it was famine. not having enough food. so, when we feel chronic stress, we think we are in a famine. what happens in a famine? we release chemicals in our brain that force us to eat more of things we don't like. voila. french word. that's what -- that's what happens in america and many other societies when we feel chronic stress. we see this especially in parts of the country where people are under chronic stress. socioeconomic stress is one in particular drives obesity levels. that mortgages our nation's future. if you don't deal with obesity when people are young, they will carry it to disease much earlier. i have started operating, piers, on 25-year-old people, 25-year-olds with hardening of the arteries. unheard of a generation ago. >> unbelievable. >> why? because they grew up as 10 and 12-year-old diabetics with high cholesterol. and so now they're using medications to get treated. by the time we are done with all this, you and i and everybody else are paying to take care of people not going to get a high-quality return to that investment one. >> one of the biggest problems the average american faces with health they can easily fix? what are the most common mistakes people make with their health? >> there are five major themes that drive 70% of how long and how well we age. five themes. one is blood pressure. we checked yours. again, you're the average blood pressure. but the average isn't good enough. you need to be the optimal blood pressure. two, daily physical activity. which we've talked about. number three, a diet you love. i'm not saying it's more important than one that's good for you. you can find foods that you love that are good for you. if you do that, you'll eat those foods. >> tell me about the mythology of diet. what is the best way to lose weight without having to just eat carrots? >> well, first off, about carb bow hydrates, i do think we've got a problem with simple carbohydrates. simple sugars, the white foods, white rice, white pasta. the whites that we bake with. these are all problems for us. but carbohydrates in general stimulate your thyroid gland. if you take out all the carbohydrates, you drop your metabolism. people trying to diet hard, they don't succeed. the body is too smart for the biology of blubber will catch you and pull you back to reality. in order keep your metabolism high to burn off the calories you are eating, you want carbohydrates, you want to diet hard, you want to diet smart. the key to long-term established weight is going to blow your mind, it is all about losing 100 calories from your diet every day, not more. if you try to cut off 400 calories, your metabolism will slow down. >> too dramatic? >> your body is geared a dozen systems to keep you eating. if i told you, piers, hold your breath underwater indefinitely, you can't do that. you can't hold your breath forever. everyone knows that. the same goes for dieting. you can't diet forever. there are a lot of reasons your body would not want you to do that never in our history ever would you need that. >> if you focus primarily on losing 100 calories a day from the way you would normally lead your life, what kind of results would you see over what kind of time span? >> just give you an idea of 100 calorie, half a doughnut, half a soft drink. a small move like that will take off 12 or 13 pounds a year. >> what is your regimen like in terms of diet and fitness. because you look absurdly fit. how old are you? >> 51. >> you don't look 51. you look better than me and i'm 46 so we have an issue here but