Candace Owens talks to Dr. Drew about the panic surrounding the pandemic

Known throughout the United States, and the world, for his medical expertise and popular television shows, Dr. Pinsky had plenty of thoughts to share on Tuesday's episode of Candace. Owens began her conversation with Dr. Pinsky by asking him about COVID-19. "I'm convinced it's more of a psychiatric disorder," she said. "Is it more of a virus or more of a psychiatric disorder?"

"It is both," he replied during the interview. "When this thing came on, the mental health component is what scared me the most. I was telling the press just to shut up because I could tell that they were going to create a panic. It's panic porn out there. That's how they attract eyes now."

"They're clearly going for the same phenomenon with the Delta virus," Dr. Pinsky continued, "which is a serious issue. Pandemics suck. It means excess death, they are terrible, but we've been through many of them, and we didn't close the whole world down because of them. I saw this coming and I just thought, 'Oh my God, we cannot fashion what we're doing after the Chinese Communist Party.'"

Dr. Pinsky lamented the number of challenges people around the world have had to endure alongside the pandemic itself. "They locked us down. Isolation. Mental health. Depression. Anxiety. 93,000 overdose deaths. Alcohol up. It's all bad."

He went on to state that many doctors he knew had become "scared to death" that they would lose their jobs for making the wrong care prescription, choosing instead to cede "their decision making to bureaucrats; to the FDA, to the CDC."

Owens described a personal case wherein she had gone to an asthma clinic to remedy an asthma attack and was given a nebulizer outside by paramedics after the doctor said he couldn't do it inside out of fear of violating CDC guidance.

"That is ceding our responsibility to bureaucrats," replied Dr. Pinsky. "It's stunning. It's disgusting." Dr. Pinsky called on the FDA to give full authorization to the vaccines, suggesting that it would give those who are skeptical more confidence. Owens added that an "honest debate" would also be beneficial.

"Here's the deal," he said. "We as physicians do bad s**t to people to prevent worse s**t. Our first ethical responsibility is to give you informed consent, to tell you all the data. If we don’t have access to all the data, we’ve got to tell you that."

The conversation shifted to social media. Owens lamented the fact that young people these days are so preoccupied with their online presence that they have essentially lost their childhoods. "If you're defining yourself by what other people are saying and seeing it's very empty inside," said Dr. Pinsky.

"Humans can be very happy with what they have until they have to compare against somebody else, and then unhappiness starts to go up," he added.

Owens and Dr. Pinsky then discussed the conservatorship of pop icon Britney Spears. He suggested that the singer's father and her psychiatrist should be credited for the work they did at the beginning, but that she should be given a chance to live outside the conservatorship. "You have a right to destroy your life if that’s what you want to do," he said, adding that the fact the family won't let her leave "is a hint that things aren't good for [Spears] psychiatrically."

At the end of the interview, Dr. Pinsky spoke about a new book he has coming out called It Doesn't Have to be Awkward. The main premise of the book, he told Owens, is teaching people that we can use "trust, compassion, and boundaries ... to understand relationships and consent."