TikTok Deal, Gen Z Credit Scores, and Tooth-in-Eye Surgery Explained

[Music] What's up superstars? What's up Wolf Blitzer? I'm here with your news for

Wednesday, September 17th. What's up Sanjay Gupta? Today is your word Wednesday. That means one of you helped

us write today's show. Lot to get to, not a lot of time to do it. So let's get to it. We begin with a big development

for one of the world's biggest social media apps, Tik Tok. A deal has been reached with China to keep it

operational in the United States. Officials in US President Donald Trump's administration say the deal will be

finalized Friday. Our Omar Jimenez examines what this might mean for Tik Tok's Chinese parent company, Bite

Dance, and Tik Tok's prized algorithm. There's a deal for Tik Tok, so let's talk about it. The Trump administration

says they've reached an agreement with China to keep the social media platform operational in the United States.

Remember, even if you've probably been using it the whole time, Tik Tok has technically been in limbo for more than

a year after then President Joe Biden signed legislation mandating the platform be sold to a US company over

national security concerns. Now with this announcement, US Treasury Secretary Scott Besson spoke from Madrid where

he's been meeting with Chinese counterparts to discuss trade and social media platforms. US diplomats say

they've come to an agreement that includes concerns over national security. We're very focused on Tik Tok

and making sure that uh it was a deal that is is fair from the Chinese and completely respects US national security

concerns and and that's the deal we reached. But a big question you might be asking, will the algorithm change? That

remains to be seen. A formal announcement from President Trump is expected Friday. In personal finance

news, a concerning trend regarding one of the most important parts of your finances, credit scores. Credit scores

are the three-digit number used to predict how likely you are to pay back money on time when you borrow it.

They're a crucial step in getting approved for anything from a car loan, student loans, a new credit card, even a

mortgage. New data shows that Gen Z folks ages 13 to 28 are notching some really low scores, falling at the

fastest pace since the Great Recession nearly 20 years ago. Here to help us ameliorate any potential concerns is our

Matt Eaggan with tips. Hey Matt. Hey Coy. I wish I were here with better news to share, but unfortunately we're

learning that credit scores are falling and that's never a good sign. And credit scores are super important for everyone

who eventually wants to buy a house or borrow money to purchase a car. These credit scores, they're three-digit

numbers that measure how reliable you are at paying back money that you owe. It's kind of like a report card, but for

borrowers. And there's realworld consequences here because the higher the credit score, the cheaper it is to

borrow. and vice versa. Lower credit scores make it more expensive to borrow. Now, unfortunately, credit scores have

been coming down because more and more Americans, they're falling behind on their bills. Some people are struggling

with high prices and others are dealing with too much student debt. Now, this is a particular problem for younger

Americans. Gen Z borrowers have had their credit scores fall this year by more than any age group since 2020. And

not only are they dealing with student debt, but some of them are struggling to find a job even after graduating from

college. Now, the good news is experts say there are ways to boost your credit score and to keep debt under control.

First, and this is most important, always make your payments on time because missed payments will ding your

credit score. Second, don't borrow too much money. That's always a red flag. That's also going to hurt your credit

score. And lastly, check your credit reports. If there's any inaccuracies, you can fight to fix them. Bottom line,

Koi, it is extremely important to build a track record as a reliable borrower. It's going to help you later in life

when you want to buy a car or even a house. All right, for our next story of the day, we're going to go

pop quiz, hot shot. I knew that was you. Got a pop quiz. What is the most active muscle in the human body? Heart, tongue,

eye muscles, or jaw. [Music] Heart.

Ah, sorry. If you said eye muscles, though, I see you. You are focused pupils. The muscles that control your

eyes move an estimated 100,000 times per day, even when you're sleeping. I actually thought it was going to be jaw

for you, Coy. Sorry, got to go perform some brain surgery. Smartest man at CNN. That actually does

remind me of our top story from the world of medicine today. It's quite literally an eyeopener. A man who was

pushed to the brink of blindness by a rare disease has been saved by an incredibly unusual procedure.

Brent Chapman is able to see clearly for the first time in 20 years with the help of his tooth,

seeing the skyline. Um yeah differentiating the billings. He's one of just a few patients in the

world to undergo a procedure known as tooth in eye surgery. Tooth and eye is probably the simplest

way to describe it but the the full name is an osteoonto keratto prostthesis or OKP.

It's a procedure for when people have damage to the front of their eye or the cornea. And you may never have heard of

it because it's only used in very rare circumstances when other options have failed. much like replacing a a broken

windscreen on a car. That's is just to restore a clear view into the back of the eye.

Here's how it works. The patient's own tooth, the canine or eye tooth coincidentally, is extracted. It's then

formed into a rectangular shape and a plastic lens is fitted into it. The tooth is then sewn into the patient's

cheek for long enough that connective tissue grows around it, which is then used to help fix the tooth over the eye,

holding the new lens in place. The result is this pink looking eye with a small black circle in the middle. So why

a tooth? As it turns out, the tooth is a really ideal structure for holding a focusing

element in place. Um, it's hard, it's rigid, it survives in poor environments and the body accepts it because it's

part of its own because it's part of you. I think at first I'm like like most people it seems kind of

uh science fictiony and out there. It may have sounded out there, but after losing most of his sight when he was 13

years old and going through almost 50 surgeries trying to regain it, Chapman was willing to give it a try.

This sort of opened a new new door for me and a new chapter in my life. And the results, well, seeing it is believing

it. For Chapman, little things like eye contact are just uh I think things that people take for

granted. It's very very powerful and you have that human connection again visually and you're like, "Wow, we we

actually pulled this off." From civil rights icon to runway model, at 71 years old, Ruby Bridges made her

runway debut in New York in a show called Actively Black, honoring those who fought for equality. At just 6 years

old, Miss Bridges was the first black child to integrate at an all-white elementary school in New Orleans on

November 14th of 1960. Her first day at William France Elementary School came four years after black parents in New

Orleans filed a lawsuit against the Orleans Parish School Board for not desegregating the school system in the

wake of the Brown versus Board of Education decision, which determined in 1954 that state laws establishing

segregation in public schools were unconstitutional. Once Bridges entered the school and arrived at her classroom,

all the other students had withdrawn. The rest of the school year, it was just her and her teacher. But Bridges stayed

at the school despite retaliation against her family. Eventually though, Bridges made it to second grade. And

when she did, the school's incoming first grade class had eight black students. Ruby Bridges, a true

trailblazer for equality. [Applause] Today's story getting a 10 out of 10.

From rise up sunshine to rise up sunflower. New Jersey farmer Brian Moore just broke the Guinness World Record for

tallest sunflower ever. An unbudievable 35 feet 9 in tall, smashing the previous record set in 2014 by 5 ft. This

behemoth was grown in Fort Wayne, Indiana. A typical sunflower grows to about 6 feet tall. Moore has spent 30

years perfecting his work. The secret to his perennial source of joy, he cross-pollinated large sunflowers from

the United Kingdom with some from a roadside ditch in Nebraska. Turns out single-headed sunflowers combined with

wild multi-headed ones create a genetic freak of a sunflower. All right, congrats to Meadowbridge Regional

School, Meadowbridge, West Virginia. We see you, Principal Reddit and Mr. Woodrum. You submitted our your word

Wednesday winner. Amelia, a verb meaning to make better or more tolerable. Thank you to everyone who submitted some

respplendant words on my Koiwire social accounts and our brand new and improved CNN10 on Instagram. You rock. And our

shout out of the day goes to Mr. Hatcher at Rogers Herur Middle School in Durham, North Carolina, home of the Durham

Bulls. Giddy up. Yee-haw. And you Howdy Duty. You rock, too. Thank you for this sensible yet um subtle headwear. Perfect

size for my big old head. Make it a great one, everyone. I'll see you tomorrow right back here on Cowboy Koi.

Then we are CNN 10.