Yahoo News Last words from Dr Michael Mosley's final interview move listeners in posthumous BBC Radio 4 tribute
Dr Michael Mosley's poignant final interview was broadcast today on Radio 4, moving listeners to tears as his colleague prefaced the show with the words: "I didn't know it would be the last time I would see him."
The esteemed TV presenter and nutrition expert, aged 67, met with a tragic end while vacationing with his spouse Dr Clare Bailey on the idyllic Greek island of Symi earlier in the month. His disappearance came after he embarked on a walk at 1.30pm on Wednesday June 5, only to be discovered days later on Sunday near Agia Marina beach.
Listeners tuned in to hear Dr Mosley one last time in a programme titled There's Only One Michael Mosley on BBC Radio 4 and BBC Sounds at 11am on Friday June 14, which formed part of the BBC's homage to him. He had previously recorded a special instalment of Just One Thing at the Hay Festival on May 25, featuring Professor Paul Bloom, where he imparted his usual health-enhancing advice.
This particular episode was introduced by Dr Chris van Tulleken, a fellow television doctor who had collaborated with Mosley on the BBC's Trust Me, I'm A Doctor series.
The BBC framed the broadcast as a heartfelt dedication to their "friend" Dr Michael Mosley, followed by Chris's personal reflection on Michael in his introduction. "What you're about to hear was recorded a few minutes before I met up with Michael at the Hay Festival and what I didn't know was that it would be the last time I ever saw him. Because two weeks later he died on holiday with his wife in Greece.", reports the Mirror.
"As you're listening to Michael, I want you to reflect on his style - dryly witty, modest, humble. This style disguises that he is one of the most important broadcasters of recent decades. Before Michael, doctors in white coats told you how to live from their ivory towers. Michael's genius was to make himself the patient and the guinea pig in a way that's utterly relatable.
"Off-camera and off-mic he was the same - humble, kind and above all, generous. And that generosity set the tone in the BBC science unit in a way that meant everyone that worked there became friends and collaborators rather than competitors. For me, these friendships have endured for more than a decade.
"Michael's death has moved so many of us, so really I'm speaking for lots of television and audio presenters and producers. His legacy is going to live on in our memories - any time we brush our teeth standing on one leg or fast a little longer in between meals, we build up our strength doing squats or do any one of the hundreds of tricks that he taught us. I'll miss him as a friend and as a mentor - but perhaps most of all, I'll miss him as a broadcaster. So I hope you enjoy this - his final interview."
He added: "I hope you enjoy it - along with all the hints and tips Michael has left us on how to live a good life. Something that he most certainly did."
Dr Mosley's last interview
Michael, the show's host, began by expressing his anticipation for the conversation with Professor Bloom about living a good life. "I've been obsessed with the question on how to live a good life for a long time," he shared.
"I come from a long line of missionaries on my mother's side and a long line of bankers on my father's side, so I'm torn in two different directions and in some way that has dictated the course of my life."
He then asked Professor Bloom to define what constitutes a good life. The professor responded: "A lot of [my] colleagues would say it's 'pleasure, period, and avoid pain'. But there's more to a good life than that - we want to not only have pleasure but be good people. We want to make the world better - we want to do things that give meaning. Some of us want to have some sort of spiritual connection, many of us want an interesting and rich life, even if it's a bit less pleasurable."
Professor Bloom, who has conducted experiments on the concept of pleasure and living a good life, offered his first tip for leading a fulfilling life: seek progress. He explained that humans often seek out pain because it enhances the subsequent pleasure.
His next piece of advice was to engage in meaningful and mindful activities and not to chase happiness. "Happiness is an accidental by-product of other things you're doing," he concluded.
Professor Bloom proposed that "chosen suffering is part of the recipe for a good life". He explained, "I mean suffering in the good sense - it could be training for a marathon, it could be raising a child," adding that "There's a lot of psychological research suggesting effort if often the secret sauce that makes us enjoy things more."
Sharing his personal experience with chosen suffering, Dr Mosley revealed: "I do press-ups and squats every morning. It was one of the 'just one things' we looked into and I know that press-ups and squats are really good for my health and my brain and they never become enjoyable. At no point while I'm doing press-ups and squats do I think, 'Wow, that feels good.' The same is true for a run - I go out for a run and at no point do I think anything other than 'I wish this was over.'".
In conclusion, Professor Bloom suggested that self-awareness and choosing your career path can contribute to a happy life. However, Dr Mosley mentioned one of the "scarier experiments" he had undertaken involved him completing a personality test.
"It turned out with my own self-reporting that I'm a kind, warm, engaging person - but as part of it they also stuck me in a brain scanner and they showed me images of someone being hit by a ruler and then they hit me with a ruler," he explained. "And what they said is that there's a bit of a mis-match and I asked , 'What were the ruler results? ' And the psychologist said, 'I'd send your wife out of the room at this point because according to this test I'm a bit of a psychopath! ".
The professor highlighted that if he was worrying about being a psychopath, it was highly likely that he wasn't one.
Dr Mosley confessed that he was surprised that Professor Bloom hadn't emphasised the importance of relationships between you and friends and family in leading a happy life. Referring to Harvard's longitudinal study - which included John F Kennedy and followed Harvard undergrad students and others from the 'wrong side of the tracks' from the 30s through their lives, Dr Mosley stated that the single most important factor was the strength in their relationships.
Professor Bloom agreed that friendships and family relationships lead to meaning, as does having children.
In his concluding remarks during the interview, Dr Mosley reflected: "When it comes to living a good life, Paul, you've given us five great things to chew on. First of all, find a contrast - something sweet followed by something sour, something which is pleasurable, something which is perhaps a little bit painful. Lose yourself - get into the flow, get out of your head. Look for satisfaction rather than happiness. Accept suffering, embrace suffering even. And finally, last but for you most important of all is to know yourself."
Moreover, a TV special titled 'Michael Mosley: The Doctor Who Changed Britain' is set to be broadcast on BBC One at 8pm in tribute to his legacy. The programme will celebrate Mosley's remarkable career in broadcasting and his significant influence on public health through science.
His daring experiments, such as self-inflicting a tapeworm infection or undergoing an endoscopic procedure live on air, will remain etched in our memories. His unique approach has inspired countless radio and television programmes, including my own work.
It has been confirmed that the father-of-four Dr Mosley passed away due to natural causes, with heat exhaustion and dehydration being the most likely culprits. An expert involved in the case has indicated that Dr Mosley's remains are expected to be returned to the UK within the next 24 hours.
Dr Grigoris Leon, who leads the Hellenic society of forensic medicine, told the Guardian: "Usually it's only a matter of time once a postmortem is conducted for a body to be released. It means in this case it's a question of days before repatriation takes place."
After an extensive search lasting nearly four days, Dr Mosley was found deceased behind a wall close to a resort on Agia Marina beach. A subsequent post-mortem examination determined that Michael died from natural causes around 4pm on Wednesday, with no apparent injuries.
Further investigations including toxicology and histology reports have been commissioned.
Chris Byrne, a physio and lecturer at Exeter University specialising in sports and health sciences, commented on the nature of Michael's death, suggesting it was indicative of fatal heatstroke. He highlighted the incident as a stark reminder of the risks associated with exercising in extreme heat.
Last week, as temperatures on the Dodecanese island were forecasted to soar to 40C, extreme weather warnings were issued. Byrne also noted Dr Mosley's age as a contributing factor to the tragedy, pointing out that our ability to regulate body temperature diminishes with age.
Byrne shared with the Daily Express that "the tragic story of Michael Mosley illustrates the rare but potentially lethal effect of combining physical activity in high environmental heat."
He added that any sports event on the island that day would have been cancelled as too "high risk" due to the intense heat.
Michael Mosley first trained as a doctor before he transitioned into broadcasting. He has presented numerous science programmes and films for the BBC, including Trust Me, I'm A Doctor, which delves into British healthcare.
In 2002, Mosley earned an Emmy nomination for his executive producer role in the BBC's science documentary 'The Human Face'. His boldness was put to test in 2014 when he swallowed tapeworms for six weeks for a series named 'Infested!
He is largely attributed for making the 5:2 diet, a type of intermittent fasting, widely known through his book, 'The Fast Diet'. Following this, he promoted 'The Fast 800' diet, advocating a "moderately low-carb, Mediterranean-style diet".
