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Tag: Medicine

  • Lawmakers urge Education Department to add nursing to ‘professional’ programs list

    STUDENT. THAT’S RIGHT. AND THE STUDENT WORRIES ABOUT LOANS AND PAYING FOR HER EDUCATION. UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND, BALTIMORE ADMINISTRATORS SAY TO THE STUDENTS, CONTINUE TO PURSUE YOUR DREAMS. HE HAS NO ALLERGIES TO THIS MEDICATION. IN THIS CLINICAL SITUATION, LAB STUDENTS AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND NURSING SCHOOL IN BALTIMORE ARE PRACTICING AND GAINING CONFIDENCE IN THEIR SKILLS TO CARE FOR PATIENTS. OTHER STUDENTS ARE GIVING THEIR END OF SEMESTER PRESENTATIONS. SOME NURSES WHO HAVE COME BACK TO SCHOOL FOR MORE PROFESSIONAL TRAINING ARE WORRIED ABOUT NEWS. THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION IS CONSIDERING EXCLUDING NURSING FROM ITS DEFINITION OF PROFESSIONAL DEGREE PROGRAMS. IT’S PRETTY UPSETTING FOR, I THINK, A LOT OF US. JAMIE CUTLER HAS BEEN A NURSE FOR FOUR AND A HALF YEARS. SHE IS NOW STUDYING TO GET HER DOCTORATE DEGREE IN NURSING. THEY SAW US AS FRONTLINE WORKERS ABOUT FIVE YEARS AGO. WE WERE ESSENTIAL IN THE COVID PANDEMIC, AND NOW THEY’RE SAYING THAT WE’RE NOT ESSENTIAL AND THAT THEY DON’T WANT TO LOAN US MONEY TO GET OUR DEGREES AND ENHANCE OURSELVES. UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND. BALTIMORE’S TAKE ON THE PROPOSAL. IT WAS SHOCKING, BUT IT WASN’T COMPLETELY UNEXPECTED BECAUSE WE HAVE BEEN TRACKING THIS ISSUE. THE PROVOST SAYS THIS WILL IMPACT STUDENTS AND HEALTH CARE. WE WANT TO ATTRACT STUDENTS FROM A VARIETY OF SOCIOECONOMIC BACKGROUNDS SO THAT THEY COULD GO OUT AND BE PRACTITIONERS IN THEIR COMMUNITIES, INCLUDING IN RURAL COMMUNITIES. AND SO THE DIRECT IMPACT OF THIS, IT MAKES THESE PROGRAMS LESS, LESS ACCESSIBLE. WHAT ARE ADMINISTRATORS TELLING STUDENTS? WE’VE GOT YOU AND WILL CONTINUE TO WORK HARD TO MAKE SURE THAT, NOTWITHSTANDING THE POLICY AND THE CHALLENGES THAT WE CONTINUE TO WORK TOWARDS OUR MISSION, WHICH IS TO IMPROVE THE HUMAN CONDITION. THE FINAL DECISION IS SET FOR JULY 2026. UNIVERSITY’S NURSING AND OTHER ORGANIZATIONS ARE NOT GIVING UP. THEY ARE TRYING TO GET THE DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION TO RECONSIDER. REPORTING LIVE FROM DOWNTOWN

    Lawmakers urge Education Department to add nursing to ‘professional’ programs list amid uproar

    Updated: 1:17 AM EST Dec 12, 2025

    Editorial Standards ⓘ

    A bipartisan group in Congress is urging the Education Department to add nursing to a list of college programs that are considered “professional,” adding to public outcry after nurses were omitted from a new agency definition.The Trump administration’s list of professional programs includes medicine, law and theology but leaves out nursing and some other fields that industry groups had asked to be included. The “professional” label would allow students to borrow larger amounts of federal loans to pursue graduate degrees in those fields.Video above: Nursing students concerned over possible loss of federal student loan accessUnder new rules proposed by the Trump administration, students in graduate programs deemed professional could borrow up to $200,000 for their degrees in total, and up to $50,000 a year. Loans for other graduate programs would be capped at $100,000 in total and $20,500 per year.In the past, graduate students had been able to borrow federal loans up to the full cost of their programs.In a Friday letter, lawmakers argue that a $100,000 cap on nursing graduate programs would make it harder for students to pay for expensive but high-demand programs, like those for nurse anesthetists. The annual cap would also pinch students in year-round nurse practitioner programs, which charge for three terms a year rather than just two and often cost more than $20,500 a year, they wrote.The letter challenges the Education Department’s claim that few nursing students would be affected by the caps.Programs for certified nurse anesthetists can cost more than $200,000, lawmakers said, but the programs typically pay off and supply a workforce that “overwhelmingly provides anesthesia to rural and underserved communities where higher cost physicians do not practice.”Video below: Massachusetts hospitals cut vacancies but critical staffing gaps persist, report saysThe letter was signed by more than 140 lawmakers, including 12 Republicans. It was sent by Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., and Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Va., leaders of the Senate and House nursing caucuses.Another Democrat, Rep. Ritchie Torres of New York, sent a similar letter this week. Excluding nurses would require students to take out riskier private loans or put tuition out of reach entirely, said Torres, who represents the South Bronx.”A restrictive interpretation would undermine our healthcare and education systems, weaken our workforce, and close doors for low-income, first-generation, and immigrant students who make up much of my district,” Torres said.The Trump administration has said new loan caps are needed to pressure colleges to reduce tuition prices.In deciding what would count as a professional degree, the department relied on a 1965 law governing student financial aid. The law lays out several examples of professional programs but says it is not an exhaustive list. The Trump administration adopted those examples as the only fields in its definition.Those deemed professional are: pharmacy, dentistry, veterinary medicine, chiropractic, law, medicine, optometry, osteopathic medicine, podiatry, theology and clinical psychology.The definition drew blowback from nursing organizations and other industry groups that were left out, including physical therapists and social workers. Department officials have said the new proposal may change as it’s finalized in a federal rulemaking process.

    WASHINGTON —

    A bipartisan group in Congress is urging the Education Department to add nursing to a list of college programs that are considered “professional,” adding to public outcry after nurses were omitted from a new agency definition.

    The Trump administration’s list of professional programs includes medicine, law and theology but leaves out nursing and some other fields that industry groups had asked to be included. The “professional” label would allow students to borrow larger amounts of federal loans to pursue graduate degrees in those fields.

    Video above: Nursing students concerned over possible loss of federal student loan access

    Under new rules proposed by the Trump administration, students in graduate programs deemed professional could borrow up to $200,000 for their degrees in total, and up to $50,000 a year. Loans for other graduate programs would be capped at $100,000 in total and $20,500 per year.

    In the past, graduate students had been able to borrow federal loans up to the full cost of their programs.

    In a Friday letter, lawmakers argue that a $100,000 cap on nursing graduate programs would make it harder for students to pay for expensive but high-demand programs, like those for nurse anesthetists. The annual cap would also pinch students in year-round nurse practitioner programs, which charge for three terms a year rather than just two and often cost more than $20,500 a year, they wrote.

    The letter challenges the Education Department’s claim that few nursing students would be affected by the caps.

    Programs for certified nurse anesthetists can cost more than $200,000, lawmakers said, but the programs typically pay off and supply a workforce that “overwhelmingly provides anesthesia to rural and underserved communities where higher cost physicians do not practice.”

    Video below: Massachusetts hospitals cut vacancies but critical staffing gaps persist, report says

    The letter was signed by more than 140 lawmakers, including 12 Republicans. It was sent by Sen. Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., Rep. Suzanne Bonamici, D-Ore., and Rep. Jen Kiggans, R-Va., leaders of the Senate and House nursing caucuses.

    Another Democrat, Rep. Ritchie Torres of New York, sent a similar letter this week. Excluding nurses would require students to take out riskier private loans or put tuition out of reach entirely, said Torres, who represents the South Bronx.

    “A restrictive interpretation would undermine our healthcare and education systems, weaken our workforce, and close doors for low-income, first-generation, and immigrant students who make up much of my district,” Torres said.

    The Trump administration has said new loan caps are needed to pressure colleges to reduce tuition prices.

    In deciding what would count as a professional degree, the department relied on a 1965 law governing student financial aid. The law lays out several examples of professional programs but says it is not an exhaustive list. The Trump administration adopted those examples as the only fields in its definition.

    Those deemed professional are: pharmacy, dentistry, veterinary medicine, chiropractic, law, medicine, optometry, osteopathic medicine, podiatry, theology and clinical psychology.

    The definition drew blowback from nursing organizations and other industry groups that were left out, including physical therapists and social workers. Department officials have said the new proposal may change as it’s finalized in a federal rulemaking process.

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  • Lifelong Drugs for Autoimmune Diseases Don’t Work Well. Now Scientists are Trying Something New

    Scientists are trying a revolutionary new approach to treat rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, lupus and other devastating autoimmune diseases — by reprogramming patients’ out-of-whack immune systems.

    When your body’s immune cells attack you instead of protecting you, today’s treatments tamp down the friendly fire but they don’t fix what’s causing it. Patients face a lifetime of pricey pills, shots or infusions with some serious side effects — and too often the drugs aren’t enough to keep their disease in check.

    “We’re entering a new era,” said Dr. Maximilian Konig, a rheumatologist at Johns Hopkins University who’s studying some of the possible new treatments. They offer “the chance to control disease in a way we’ve never seen before.”

    How? Researchers are altering dysfunctional immune systems, not just suppressing them, in a variety of ways that aim to be more potent and more precise than current therapies.

    They’re highly experimental and, because of potential side effects, so far largely restricted to patients who’ve exhausted today’s treatments. But people entering early-stage studies are grasping for hope.

    “What the heck is wrong with my body?” Mileydy Gonzalez, 35, of New York remembers crying, frustrated that nothing was helping her daily lupus pain.

    Diagnosed at 24, her disease was worsening, attacking her lungs and kidneys. Gonzalez had trouble breathing, needed help to stand and walk and couldn’t pick up her 3-year-old son when last July, her doctor at NYU Langone Health suggested the hospital’s study using a treatment adapted from cancer.

    Gonzalez had never heard of that CAR-T therapy but decided, “I’m going to trust you.” Over several months, she slowly regained energy and strength.

    “I can actually run, I can chase my kid,” said Gonzalez, who now is pain- and pill-free. “I had forgotten what it was to be me.”

    ‘Living drugs’ reset rogue immune systems

    CAR-T was developed to wipe out hard-to-treat blood cancers. But the cells that go bad in leukemias and lymphomas — immune cells called B cells — go awry in a different way in many autoimmune diseases.

    Some U.S. studies in mice suggested CAR-T therapy might help those diseases. Then in Germany, Dr. Georg Schett at the University of Erlangen-Nuremberg tried it with a severely ill young woman who had failed other lupus treatment. After one infusion, she’s been in remission — with no other medicine — since March 2021.

    Last month, Schett told a meeting of the American College of Rheumatology how his team gradually treated a few dozen more patients, with additional diseases such as myositis and scleroderma — and few relapses so far.

    Those early results were “shocking,” Hopkins’ Konig recalled.

    They led to an explosion of clinical trials testing CAR-T therapy in the U.S. and abroad for a growing list of autoimmune diseases.

    How it works: Immune soldiers called T cells are filtered out of a patient’s blood and sent to a lab, where they’re programmed to destroy their B cell relatives. After some chemotherapy to wipe out additional immune cells, millions of copies of those “living drugs” are infused back into the patient.

    While autoimmune drugs can target certain B cells, experts say they can’t get rid of those hidden deep in the body. CAR-T therapy targets both the problem B cells and healthy ones that might eventually run amok. Schett theorizes that the deep depletion reboots the immune system so when new B cells eventually form, they’re healthy.

    Other ways to reprogram rogue cells

    CAR-T is grueling, time consuming and costly, in part because it is customized. A CAR-T cancer treatment can cost $500,000. Now some companies are testing off-the-shelf versions, made in advance using cells from healthy donors.

    Another approach uses “peacekeeper” cells at the center of this year’s Nobel Prize. Regulatory T cells are a rare subset of T cells that tamp down inflammation and help hold back other cells that mistakenly attack healthy tissue. Some biotech companies are engineering cells from patients with rheumatoid arthritis and other diseases not to attack, like CAR-T does, but to calm autoimmune reactions.

    Scientists also are repurposing another cancer treatment, drugs called T cell engagers, that don’t require custom engineering. These lab-made antibodies act like a matchmaker. They redirect the body’s existing T cells to target antibody-producing B cells, said Erlangen’s Dr. Ricardo Grieshaber-Bouyer, who works with Schett and also studies possible alternatives to CAR-T.

    Last month, Grieshaber-Bouyer reported giving a course of one such drug, teclistamab, to 10 patients with a variety of diseases including Sjögren’s, myositis and systemic sclerosis. All but one improved significantly and six went into drug-free remission.

    Next-generation precision options

    Rather than wiping out swaths of the immune system, Hopkins’ Konig aims to get more precise, targeting “only that very small population of rogue cells that really causes the damage.”

    B cells have identifiers, like biological barcodes, showing they can produce faulty antibodies, Konig said. Researchers in his lab are trying to engineer T cell engagers that would only mark “bad” B cells for destruction, leaving healthy ones in place to fight infection.

    Nearby in another Hopkins lab, biomedical engineer Jordan Green is crafting a way for the immune system to reprogram itself with the help of instructions delivered by messenger RNA, or mRNA, the genetic code used in Covid-19 vaccines.

    In Green’s lab, a computer screen shines with brightly colored dots that resemble a galaxy. It’s a biological map that shows insulin-producing cells in the pancreas of a mouse. Red marks rogue T cells that destroy insulin production. Yellow indicates those peacemaker regulatory T cells — and they’re outnumbered.

    Green’s team aims to use that mRNA to instruct certain immune “generals” to curb the bad T cells and send in more peacemakers. They package the mRNA in biodegradable nanoparticles that can be injected like a drug. When the right immune cells get the messages, the hope is they’d “divide, divide, divide and make a whole army of healthy cells that then help treat the disease,” Green said.

    The researchers will know it’s working if that galaxy-like map shows less red and more yellow. Studies in people are still a few years away.

    Could you predict autoimmune diseases – and delay or prevent them?

    A drug for Type 1 diabetes “is forging the path,” said Dr. Kevin Deane at the University of Colorado Anschutz.

    Type 1 diabetes develops gradually, and blood tests can spot people who are brewing it. A course of the drug teplizumab is approved to delay the first symptoms, modulating rogue T cells and prolonging insulin production.

    Deane studies rheumatoid arthritis and hopes to find a similar way to block the joint-destroying disease.

    About 30 percent of people with a certain self-reactive antibody in their blood will eventually develop RA. A new study tracked some of those people for seven years, mapping immune changes leading to the disease long before joints become swollen or painful.

    Those changes are potential drug targets, Deane said. While researchers hunt possible compounds to test, he’s leading another study called StopRA: National to find and learn from more at-risk people.

    On all these fronts, there’s a tremendous amount of research left to do — and no guarantees. There are questions about CAR-T’s safety and how long its effects last, but it is furthest along in testing.

    Allie Rubin, 60, of Boca Raton, Florida, spent three decades battling lupus, including scary hospitalizations when it attacked her spinal cord. But she qualified for CAR-T when she also developed lymphoma — and while a serious side effect delayed her recovery, next month will mark two years without a sign of either cancer or lupus.

    “I just remember I woke up one day and thought, ‘Oh my god, I don’t feel sick anymore,’” she said.

    That kind of result has researchers optimistic.

    “We’ve never been closer to getting to — and we don’t like to say it — a potential cure,” said Hopkins’ Konig. “I think the next 10 years will dramatically change our field forever.”

    Copyright 2025. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

    Associated Press

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  • A Proposed Federal THC Ban Would ‘Wipe Out’ Hemp Products That Get People High

    A provision in the federal spending bill that could end the US government shutdown would effectively destroy the hemp extracts industry by banning intoxicating hemp-based THC products, including gummies and drinks.

    The provision, part of the funding bill passed by the US Senate Monday night, would ban the “unregulated sale of intoxicating hemp-based or hemp-derived products, including delta-8, from being sold online, in gas stations, and corner stores,” according to a Senate Appropriations Committee summary of the legislation. The bill, accounting for $26.65 billion in funds, is being voted on in the House of Representatives Wednesday. If passed, President Donald Trump is expected to sign it into law.

    The hemp provision ends a loophole provided by the 2018 Farm Bill that essentially decriminalized intoxicating hemp-based products. Those products include cannabinoids like delta-8 and THCA, which are found in a variety of edibles and drinks. However, the Farm Bill stipulates that hemp products can’t contain more than 0.3 percent delta-9 THC by dry weight; delta-9 is the main psychoactive compound in cannabis, which remains federally illegal. Both hemp and cannabis come from the cannabis sativa plant, but hemp contains very low levels of delta-9.

    Kentucky Senator Rand Paul was the sole Republican to vote against the spending bill Monday after failing to amend the bill by striking the hemp ban from it. In September dozens of Kentucky hemp farmers sent a letter to fellow state Senator Mitch McConnell, who has been pushing for the ban, pleading with him to reconsider.

    The letter said the hemp-derived cannabinoid market “gave us—for the first time in decades—a new crop with real economic opportunity” and that a ban would result in “immediate and catastrophic consequences.”

    According to a report from the Cannabis Business Times, sales for hemp-derived cannabinoids exceeded $2.7 billion in 2023.

    “This will ultimately devastate the industry and devastate hemp farmers as well,” says attorney and hemp advocate Jonathan Miller, adding that it would “wipe out” 95 percent of hemp ingestibles.

    While the provision says it will preserve “non-intoxicating CBD and industrial hemp products,” Miller disputes that, noting that the most popular hemp-derived CBD products still contain more that the proposed limit of 0.4 milligrams of THC per container. CBD products do not get people high, but are popular and used for things like insomnia and anxiety, though research on their efficacy is still limited.

    Manisha Krishnan

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  • A Gene Editing Therapy Cut Cholesterol Levels by Half

    In a step toward the wider use of gene editing, a treatment that uses Crispr successfully slashed high cholesterol levels in a small number of people.

    In a trial conducted by Swiss biotech company Crispr Therapeutics, 15 participants received a one-time infusion meant to switch off a gene in the liver called ANGPTL3. Though rare, some people are born with a mutation in this gene that protects against heart disease with no apparent adverse consequences.

    The highest dose tested in the trial reduced both “bad” LDL cholesterol and triglycerides by an average of 50 percent within two weeks after treatment. The effects lasted at least 60 days, the length of the trial. The results were presented today at the American Heart Association’s annual meeting and published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

    The Nobel Prize–winning Crispr technology has mostly been used to address rare diseases, but these latest findings, while early, add to the evidence that the DNA-editing tool could be used to treat common conditions as well.

    “This will probably be one of the biggest moments in the arc of Crispr’s development in medicine,” Samarth Kulkarni, CEO of Crispr Therapeutics, tells WIRED. The company is behind the only approved gene-editing treatment on the market, Casgevy, which treats sickle cell disease and beta thalassemia.

    The American Heart Association estimates that about a quarter of adults in the US have elevated LDL levels. A similar number have high triglycerides. LDL cholesterol is the waxy substance in the blood that can clog and harden arteries over time. Triglycerides, meanwhile, are the most common type of fat found in the body. High levels of both raise the risk of heart attack and stroke.

    The Phase I trial was conducted in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand between June 2024 and August 2025. Participants were between the ages of 31 and 68 and had uncontrolled levels of LDL cholesterol and triglycerides. The trial tested five different doses of the Crispr infusion, which took about two and a half hours on average to administer.

    “These are very sick people,” says Steven Nissen, senior author and chief academic officer of the Heart, Vascular and Thoracic Institute at Cleveland Clinic, which independently confirmed the trial’s results. “The tragedy of this disease is not just that people die young, but some of them will have a heart attack, and their lives are never the same again. They don’t get back to work, they develop heart failure.”

    One trial participant, a 51-year-old man, died six months after receiving the lowest dose of the treatment, which was not associated with a lowering of cholesterol and triglycerides. The death was related to his existing heart disease, not the experimental Crispr treatment. The man had a rare, inherited genetic form of high cholesterol and previously had several procedures to improve blood flow to his heart.

    Emily Mullin

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  • Here’s Why You Should (or Shouldn’t) Dunk Yourself In a Full Body Ice Bath

    Cold plunging at the gym or having a chilly shower at home has become a popular practice in recent years. But is all the self-inflicted freezing really that good for you? With the promise of boosting your mood, providing mental clarity, and reducing muscle soreness post-workout, it may sound enticing, but it’s not for everyone. Aside from making your teeth chatter, there are the notable negatives as well as its positives to consider.

    Tasked with the challenge of testing the latest cold-plunge pools earlier this year, I reluctantly jumped on the bandwagon. With my adrenaline pumping and my endorphins having a disco post-plunge, I was hooked and have since became an ice bath advocate. But as with every wellness craze, it’s worth keeping up with the ever-changing advice on best practices. Keen to find out more, I asked Gary Brecka, top biohacker and founder of The Ultimate Human, for advice on how to cold plunge for maximum benefit.

    Whether you’re a seasoned pro or a newbie wondering what all the fuss is about, take a deep, calming breath and jump right in. Find options for your own ice bath in the WIRED guide to the best cold-plunge tubs, with designs from the likes of PolarMonkeys, CalmMax, Plunge, and more.

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    What Is Cold Plunging?

    Whether it’s in the sea, a lake, or an ice bath at your local gym or at home, cold plunging means immersing your body in water that is 39 to 59 defrees Fahrenheit (4 to 15 Celsius). If you don’t have a gym membership and don’t fancy stripping down to your bathing suit at the local lake, an indoor bathtub filled with icy cold water will do. “You don’t need an expensive set up,” says Brecka. “A bathtub with ice works. A horse trough in the backyard works. Dedicated plunge pools are convenient, but you’ll get benefits no matter how you create cold exposure. It’s consistency that matters more than equipment.”

    So how long do you cold plunge and what temperature should a cold plunge be? Brecka suggests two to six minutes as the ideal time. It’s long enough to activate the nervous system and short enough to stay safe. If you’re new to cold plunging, however, under a minute is plenty.

    Is Cold Plunging Good for You?

    “What are the benefits of cold plunging?” is the million dollar question you’re probably asking yourself, right as you’re staring into the tub (along with “Why don’t you just have a warm cookie and hot chocolate instead?” which is what I often hear my inner child say.) Brecka suggests persevering for maximum benefit.

    “We do a plunge because cold exposure activates your nervous system, improves circulation, and helps your body adapt to stress,” he says. “Cold plunging is not about powering through the shock, it’s about letting that shock drive physiological change.”

    Some studies show benefits for cold plunging, including from Harvard Medical School. While those studies are encouraging, however, they are not conclusive, and their effects vary considerably across the board.

    Emily Peck

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  • A Peabody teacher’s hopeful future after early breast cancer diagnosis

    DANVERS — Getting an annual mammogram is critical for women over 40. Peabody teacher and Georgetown resident Pam Davies knows that better than most.

    Davies, a first-grade teacher of 31 years at the Captain Samuel Brown Elementary School, was diagnosed with stage-zero breast cancer three days before school let out in June.


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  • MBTA balks at expanding overdose prevention kiosks

    BOSTON — MBTA officials are pouring cold water on a legislative push to make the opioid overdose reversing drug naloxone available at subway stations, citing a lack of proper staff and a shortage of funding.

    The T recently wrapped up a federally funded pilot project that installed 15 kiosks with doses of the medicine – also known by its brand name, Narcan – at several Red Line stations to help reduce fatal drug overdoses.


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    By Christian M. Wade | Statehouse Reporter

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  • Ex-Neuralink Exec’s New Startup Is Tackling Blindness—and Winning

    Science Corp. uses solar panel-like technology implanted in a patient’s eye. Early results for people with macular degeneration are impressive.

    Claire Cameron

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  • Apple Pioneer Bill Atkinson Was a Secret Evangelist of the ‘God Molecule’

    Bill Atkinson was a computing pioneer who, in the 1980s, effectively made Apple computers usable for everyday people by transforming code into windows, menus, and graphics.

    But few people know that later in life he was a secret advocate of what’s widely considered the world’s most potent psychedelic: 5-MeO-DMT.

    The hallucinogen, also called “the God molecule,” is a compound found in the venomous secretions of the Sonoran Desert toad named Incilius alvarius (it’s commonly called Bufo alvarius) and is known to bring about ego death, a total dissolution of the senses, and a euphoric feeling of existential connectedness, all in a roughly 20-minute trip. Atkinson, who died from pancreatic cancer on June 5 at the age of 74, was a member of a close-knit, private online community of 5-MeO-DMT enthusiasts called OneLight, where he went by the alias “Grace Within.”

    Several of Atkinson’s friends and fellow psychonauts tell WIRED their “beloved” Atkinson played a key role in helping people access smaller doses of 5-MeO-DMT, which can be made synthetically, as he believed it would maximize the benefits of the potentially dangerous drug while minimizing harm. “The same creative mind who affected personal computers so profoundly continued to influence human evolution through his efforts to make the miracle of ‘bufo’ safer and more manageable,” says friend Charles Lindsay, an artist who has worked with the SETI Institute, which works to find signs of extraterrestrial intelligence. “He truly pushed boundaries. That requires a willingness to consider what might easily be deemed ridiculous.” Or, he adds, “risky.”

    Many people have reported benefits to their mental health thanks to smoking 5-MeO-DMT, and biotech companies are preparing advanced trials to test the drug as a treatment for depression and addiction. Former heavyweight champion boxer Mike Tyson, longevity guru Bryan Johnson, and podcaster Joe Rogan have told of transcendent, life-changing experiences under the influence of the powerful drug.

    But 5-MeO-DMT remains illegal in the US, and while underground options exist, people often go to legal centers and retreats in Mexico to take strong doses.

    Atkinson took “many hundreds” of 5-MeO-DMT trips, according to friend Jamis MacNiven, the founder of popular Silicon Valley diner Buck’s of Woodside. “Nobody hit it harder than Bill,” he says.

    The 5-MeO-DMT experience, with its daunting ego death awaiting within seconds of smoking the molecule, can be discombobulating, and a sometimes fraught period afterward can lead to serious destabilization and lasting trauma. Comedian Chelsea Handler had a “scary” trip, which she said left her “feeling as sick as I’ve ever felt.”

    Mattha Busby

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  • Jona Health’s Mail-Order Kit Helps You Decode Your Microbiome

    Look, there’s nothing quite like starting your day by pooping on a little paper hammock affixed to your toilet seat and then poking it a bunch of times with a cotton swab. It was more of a mental hurdle than a practical one, though, as the collection and disposal (you just flush the hammock down when you’re done) was easy enough. You then swish the stick around in a solution, cap it, and send it off. Twenty days later, I got an email that my results were in.

    On the website, your results are broken down into a few sections: Summary (with tabs for Brain Health, GI Health, Metabolic Health, Skin Health, and Physical Performance), Action Plan (with tabs for Highest Impact, Diet, Lifestyle, and Probiotics), and the Organisms page, which shows you every single organism it found in your sample, and their relative abundance. Mine held some surprises.

    On the positive side, my Microbiome Diversity came in at 4.19, which is above average (normal range is 2.80–3.99, as measured by the Shannon Index), which it says is a sign of a healthy microbiome, and it didn’t find any pathogens or parasites. It says I digest lactose well (thank goodness). It didn’t find any associations for things like depression, celiac disease, IBS, ulcerative colitis, leaky gut, hypertension, eczema, or a bunch of other things that I’m thankful to not have. Some of these were actually a bit puzzling, frankly, as I’ve struggled with insomnia pretty much my entire life, but it didn’t find any associations there, or for fatigue, and I am most assuredly a tired human.

    As far as associations that it did find, some were things I suspected, while others were total surprises. Under Brain Health, I had a moderate association for stress and a low association for ADHD, neither of which shocked me. Under Metabolic health was a “very low” association for prediabetes, which I actually thought would be higher, unfortunately. I had a moderate association with osteoarthritis, which made sense, given my family history.

    Brent Rose

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  • Trump Unveils Plan For ‘Fertility Insurance’ and IVF Drugs

    President Donald Trump on Thursday announced a pair of initiatives aimed at making in vitro fertilization more affordable and accessible, marking his administration’s most significant step yet on an issue that has divided conservatives and became a key point of last year’s campaign outreach to women and families.

    Speaking from the Oval Office, Trump said his administration would encourage employers to offer fertility benefits directly to their employees—similar to dental or vision coverage—and unveiled a new agreement with EMD Serono, the maker of Gonal-F, one of the most widely used fertility drugs in the United States. The company, he said, had agreed to provide “massive discounts” on its fertility medications through a government website, TrumpRx.gov, beginning next year.

    “With the actions I will outline this afternoon, we’ll dramatically slash the cost of IVF and many of the most common fertility drugs for countless millions of Americans,” Trump said. “Prices are going way down—way, way down.” He called the announcement a “historic victory for American women, mothers, and families.”

    The administration said the new Labor Department guidance would make it easier for companies, including small businesses, to add fertility coverage as a supplemental benefit, without overhauling their primary health insurance plans. The White House is not mandating participation, nor will it subsidize employers that choose to offer the coverage.

    “With what we signed, Americans will be able to opt in to specialized coverage, just as they get vision and dental insurance, they can get fertility insurance for the first time,” Trump said. He claimed that the fertility coverage “will reduce the number of people who ultimately need to resort to IVF, because couples will be able to identify and address problems early.” 

    “The result will be healthier pregnancies, healthier babies, and many more beautiful American children,” Trump added.

    Only about one in four large employers currently provides in vitro fertilization coverage, according to a report from KFF, a nonprofit research organization, and very few states require insurance companies to cover fertility treatments. While some insurance plans already include such benefits, most patients pay out of pocket for procedures that can cost $15,000 to $25,000 per cycle, often requiring multiple rounds.

    Trump said the new drug pricing deal would reduce the cost of Gonal-F and other fertility medications by as much as 73%. EMD Serono said in a statement that “eligible patients” will be able to purchase its fertility drugs at an 84% discount from list prices.

    Still, it remains unclear how much the lower drug prices will reduce the total cost of IVF, since medications are only one component of the procedure. Patients must also pay for ultrasounds, anesthesia, laboratory work and embryo storage—costs that together can exceed $20,000 per round.

    The announcement represents a partial fulfillment of a campaign promise that Trump made in 2024, when he declared that his administration would ensure all Americans had access to fertility treatment. “Under the Trump administration, we are going to be paying for that treatment,” he said in an August 2024 interview with NBC News. “We’re going to be mandating that the insurance company pay.”

    Trump has repeatedly highlighted infertility as a family issue, casting his approach as a way to build and expand American families. The issue took on new urgency for Republicans last year, after the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that frozen embryos created through IVF should be considered children—a decision that prompted some clinics to pause operations and forced GOP leaders to clarify their positions. Trump quickly distanced himself from the ruling and urged Alabama lawmakers to protect access to IVF.

    Infertility affects roughly one in six women of reproductive age, according to the World Health Organization, and IVF accounts for about 2% of all births in the United States.

    While Trump’s announcement drew praise from some fertility advocates, others noted that the plan relies heavily on voluntary employer participation and does not guarantee coverage for those who need it most. Critics also questioned whether the discounts negotiated by the administration would meaningfully lower costs for middle-income families who must still pay out of pocket for other parts of treatment.

    Nik Popli

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  • Why We Know So Little About Medicines During Pregnancy

    One evening in 2019, when I was a pediatrics resident, I admitted a two-month-old to the hospital for observation after a minor surgery. I explained to the baby’s mother that I planned to order acetaminophen—commonly sold over the counter as Tylenol—every six hours, because the baby had an obvious source of pain. If pain still kept the baby from eating, sleeping, or calming down, the mother could ask for an opioid. I was just leaving the room when the mother stopped me to ask about the acetaminophen.

    “Doesn’t it cause autism?” she said.

    “I’m not familiar with any research linking Tylenol to autism,” I told her. “But I’ll look into it and get back to you.” In the meantime, we agreed to use both the acetaminophen and the opioid as needed, instead of administering them on a schedule.

    When I sat down at a hospital computer, I was surprised to find that the mother’s question had a basis in mainstream research. Small studies had associated acetaminophen exposure in utero with a baby’s risk of developing autism. But this wasn’t the same as saying that Tylenol caused autism. Perhaps whatever the drug was treating—for example, fevers, infections, or painful chronic conditions—contributed to autism, and acetaminophen did not.

    For babies under three months, as for pregnant women, Tylenol is considered the safest medicine for fever. (Ibuprofen and similar medications, NSAIDs, have been associated with kidney injury in babies.) I continued to order it for patients, if a little more cautiously. Then, in 2024, a more rigorously controlled study of more than two million children born in Sweden found no connection between acetaminophen and neurodevelopmental disorders. As the epidemiologist Katelyn Jetelina has written, “the evidence leans heavily towards correlation, not causation. (Tylenol is not the cause.)”

    Last week, during a press conference, President Trump contradicted existing research by urging women to “tough it out” and avoid Tylenol during pregnancy. “Fight like hell not to take it,” he said. On Friday, he wrote on Truth Social, “DON’T GIVE TYLENOL TO YOUR YOUNG CHILD FOR VIRTUALLY ANY REASON.” Medical groups disagreed. The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) advised women to continue using Tylenol when needed. “Misleading claims that the medicine is not safe and is linked to increased rates of autism send a confusing, dangerous message to parents and expectant parents and does a disservice to autistic individuals,” the American Academy of Pediatrics said.

    Now doctors are reporting that pregnant women are hesitating to use the medicine, even when professionals recommend it for pain or for fever. One reason that Trump’s claims are difficult to dispel is that he makes them sound certain. Doctors, in contrast, can say that the strongest research does not show a link between Tylenol and autism, and that medical professionals consider it the best option for pain and fever in pregnancy. But we know that there is uncertainty in medical research, and so we speak with care.

    It ought to be possible for doctors to be more definitive. Pregnancy is not a rare condition—millions of people get pregnant each year—yet those who experience it are frequently told that there’s not enough research to guarantee that a medicine is safe. When a pregnant woman needs medicine, whether for lupus or for high blood pressure, she may feel that she faces an impossible choice: suffer through a condition that may itself harm her or her baby, or else allow an uncontrolled experiment inside one’s own body. Isn’t there a better way?

    Many of the rules that govern research on human beings date back to the Nuremberg Code, a response to Nazi doctors who conducted brutal experiments in concentration camps. To this day, research participants must consent; trials must be stopped if there is evidence of substantial harm. In the nineteen-sixties, the public became aware that thalidomide, a widely used nausea drug, had caused birth defects in an estimated eight thousand children outside of the United States. The drug became a case study for the growing field of bioethics. In 1977, the F.D.A. excluded not only pregnant women but also women “of childbearing potential” from early-stage clinical trials, which focus on safety and toxicity. Drugs are instead tested for toxicity in pregnant animals—usually, rats and rabbits—which often respond very differently than humans.

    According to Ruth Faden, the founder of the Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics, these efforts to protect women and babies had unintended consequences. In fact, she said, public responses to thalidomide were a “misreading of history.” Thalidomide wasn’t systematically tested on pregnant women. If it had been, then its risks likely would have been discovered sooner, and fewer children would’ve been affected.

    In the nineteen-nineties, the F.D.A.’s exclusion of women “of childbearing potential” ended, and the National Institutes of Health established guidelines to encourage women in general to participate in research. In 2018, the Common Rule, which establishes scientific practices for twenty federal agencies, was revised to make it easier for researchers to include pregnant women. But, in 2024, a report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine asserted that that “very little progress has been made on research involving pregnant and lactating women.” Too often, Faden told me, pregnant women are still viewed as fragile vessels who need to be sequestered from the world. “We need to protect women through research, not from research,” she said.

    Thoughtful safety protocols would be necessary to ethically include pregnant women in research studies. Medicines whose mechanism could plausibly harm a fetus—those that inhibit crucial nutrients such as folate, for example, or that stop cells from dividing—would be excluded. So would drugs that have worrisome effects in pregnant animals. As in any research study, participation would need to be voluntary, and the trial would need to be more likely to benefit women than to harm them. If scientists started to suspect that women or their babies were being harmed, the trial would need to be paused or stopped altogether.

    Rachel Pearson

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  • Trump administration restores UCLA research grants following judge’s order

    By MIKHAIL ZINSHTEYN | CalMatters

    The Trump administration has restored almost all of the 500 National Institutes of Health grants it suspended at UCLA in July in response to a federal judge’s order last week.

    Attorneys in the U.S. Department of Justice submitted a court-mandated update on the status of the grant restorations Monday evening. They report that the National Institutes of Health, or NIH, has restored all but nine grants to UCLA health science researchers, though that figure may be even smaller.

    In response to a similar court order in August, the federal National Science Foundation restored 300 grants it had suspended in July.

    The restorations cap a remarkable turnaround for UCLA, which lost access to more than $500 million in research in July after the Trump administration froze 800 science grants to the esteemed public university. The National Science Foundation and National Institutes of Health accused UCLA of tolerating antisemitism as part of their justification for the grant funding freezes. Those claims followed months of efforts at the university to implement the recommendations of a task force on antisemitism that campus administrators appointed to examine bias at the school.

    The science grants pay for research into life-saving drugs, dementia, heart disease in rural areas, robotics education and a vast array of science inquiries across the country. They help propel the country’s research enterprise and are the top source of federal research grants at the University of California. The UC system has battled the Trump administration over various efforts to slash its funding since President Donald Trump’s second term began. Science funding is also a key source of income and training for graduate students, who are the next generation of publicly funded academics. Still, UCLA and the rest of the UC remain in the hot seat as the system contends with settlement demands from Trump that amount to $1.2 billion. Trump sought that settlement over a litany of accusations, including that the campus tolerates antisemitism.

    More than 600 Jewish faculty, students, staff and alumni of the University of California wrote in a public letter that stripping funding in response to those claims is “misguided and punitive.”

    Associated Press

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  • Telehealth Is About to Abruptly End for Seniors

    In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic, President Donald Trump and Congress put into place a program that allowed people on Medicare to get their health care over the Internet.

    The policy proved wildly popular. Nearly half of Medicare beneficiaries received telehealth services in 2020 in an effort to keep their distance from hospitals and doctor’s offices during the pandemic.

    But the program is set to expire Sept. 30 without Congressional action, which would leave millions of seniors suddenly unable to access the telehealth care that allowed them to avoid long drives and crowded waiting rooms. The program has been threatened before—Congress had to extend it in 2021, 2022, 2023, and in March 2025—but telehealth advocates say that they have little hope that the program will be saved in time for services to avoid disruption.

    “People are going to go to sleep tonight having had telehealth coverage since the beginning of the pandemic—and most of them have used it one way or another,” said Kyle Zebley, the executive director of ATA Action, the advocacy arm of the American Telemedicine Association, on Sept. 30. “They will wake up in the morning not having that coverage.”

    Two of those people are Dan and Doreen Nishimi, who are 82 and 78 respectively and who live in Elk Grove, Calif. Doreen, who had surgery for breast cancer last year, says she vastly prefers using telehealth to check in with her oncologist rather than driving the 27 miles round-trip to the office. And Dan, who has pulmonary hypertension and interstitial lung disease, says the video visits help save him from difficult trips to the doctor in which he needs to bring an oxygen tank and use a scooter. Traveling has gotten even more difficult in recent weeks after Doreen pinched a nerve in her spine and is now unable to lift Dan’s scooter.

    “If you don’t have video visits, I would never see a doctor because I have such a hard time getting out of the house,” he says. He has a video visit scheduled with his primary care doctor next week.

    Read More: Why Obamacare Is About to Get a Lot More Expensive

    Another program called acute hospital care at home, which allows convalescing patients to be discharged and receive monitored care at home, is also set to expire Sept. 30 without Congressional action. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services has said that all patients must be discharged or returned to the hospital on Sept. 30.

    Before the pandemic, it was extremely difficult for Medicare patients to qualify to get telehealth care. They had to live in a rural area classified a certain way, and they had to receive their telehealth services in a certain type of location—often a medical office. Congress passed waivers to those rules in the beginning of the pandemic, which are often referred to now as Medicare telehealth flexibilities.

    Usage of telehealth through Medicare has declined since 2020, to about 25% of patients in 2024, according to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services. But telehealth is still a lifeline for certain patients, including those who are immunocompromised or who live a long distance from their doctors’ office, says Mei Kwong, executive director of the Center for Connected Health Policy, a nonprofit that provides technical assistance to people with questions about telehealth policies.

    What happens now?

    Most mental-health telecare services under Medicare will continue after Sept. 30 because of a separate bill passed in 2021. But for other types of appointments, what will happen next is unclear. 

    Some providers may continue to offer telehealth to Medicare patients after Sept. 30, Kwong says. The telehealth flexibilities have been extended so many times in the past that many providers may assume they will be extended again, eventually—perhaps with retroactive payment for services rendered before Congress takes action. Smaller providers might not have the financial flexibility to do that, though. They may try to reschedule telehealth patients for a few weeks or months down the line, at which time they hope Congress will have acted.

    Dr. James Marcin, director of the Center for Health and Technology at the University of California, Davis, who directs the system’s telehealth program, is urging administrators to continue business as usual and keep providing telehealth visits for Medicare patients, even though reimbursement is ending. It would be “disastrous” for many patients to have their visits rescheduled or to have to come to the doctor’s office in person and arrange for rides, childcare, and travel expenses, he says. UC Davis Health has 2,500 patients covered by Medicare scheduled for telehealth visits in October, he says.

    Telehealth visits have been extremely helpful for patients who live many hours away, he says, and would otherwise have to come in for something quick like a medication check after surgery or a check-in on a chronic condition like arthritis. “We are thoughtful about these visits,” Marcin says. “If you need to come in and see someone, or have labs, you can, but we don’t want to force people to come in when it’s not necessary.”

    Read More: Mississippi Declares a Public Health Emergency Over Infant Deaths

    Some providers, including Mass General Brigham Medical Group, expanded their telehealth capabilities in recent years as patients have embraced the option. In 2021, Mass General Brigham launched a virtual urgent care service that allows doctors to see patients in Massachusetts and New Hampshire via telehealth 365 days a year from 7 a.m. to 11 p.m., says Lindsay Gainer, president and chief operating officer of the Mass General Brigham Medical Group. That’s allowed doctors to help patients resolve complaints or be seen quickly and bypass expensive emergency room visits.

    Doctors are also able to see patients virtually to deal with chronic disease management, Gainer says. Even though the practice gets compensated at a slightly lower rate for telehealth, virtual visits save money overall, she says, because doctors don’t need the office infrastructure and personnel that they might need if they were seeing someone in-person. Like UC-Davis, Mass General Brigham plans to keep offering telehealth to Medicare patients in the hope that Congress will resolve the issue quickly.

    The need for a telehealth solution

    Even if Congress does eventually extend the telehealth flexibilities, there’s a need for a longer-term solution making telehealth under Medicare more permanent, says Sarah Hohman, director of government affairs at the National Association of Rural Health Clinics. For one thing, it is stressful for providers to keep nearing a cliff after which they won’t be compensated for providing telehealth to Medicare patients. For another, under current law, rural health clinics can only bill a very low amount for telehealth visits: $94.45, no matter what the visit is for.

    This has forced rural health clinics to operate without adequate reimbursement since 2020, Hohman says. “If a facility is getting significantly less through telehealth, it’s a lot harder for them to invest in what are often very expensive technologies,” she says.

    Read More: The World’s Richest Woman Has Opened a Medical School

    Telehealth advocates worry that if the flexibilities are allowed to expire, private insurers may follow suit and stop offering coverage of telehealth services. “As Medicare goes, so goes the nation,” says Zebley, of ATA.

    To many advocates, the failure of Congress to extend the Medicare telehealth flexibilities points to a large problem of how Congress has started to operate in recent years. Both the telehealth flexibilities and the acute hospital at-home care “should have been made permanent in a normal world of DC operating like it should,” says Zebley.

    But Congress is less prone to doing standalone pieces of legislation anymore and instead keeps passing “extenders,” he says, which essentially kick the can down the road. (Enhanced premium tax credits, which made health plans through the Affordable Care Act much more affordable, are also set to end soon because a Congressional extender is expiring.)

    Of course, even if Congress had acted, it might not have given telehealth advocates the breathing room they wanted. Proposed Democratic and Republican plans—none of which passed—would have extended the telehealth flexibilities a few months at most, he says—until October or November.

    Alana Semuels

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  • Scientists Made Human Eggs from Skin Cells and Used Them to Form Embryos

    “The biggest challenge is how to make this egg extrude half of its chromosomes—and the correct half,” Amato says. “We’re not quite there yet.” The team dubbed their technique “mitomeiosis” and is trying to better understand how chromosomes like to pair and how they segregate in order to find a way to experimentally induce those conditions.

    The ability to make eggs and sperm in the lab—called in vitro gametogenesis, or IVG—has been a growing area of research in recent years.

    In 2016, a group of Japanese researchers led by stem cell researcher Katsuhiko Hayashi reported that they produced healthy mouse pups after making mouse eggs entirely in a lab dish. Later, they generated mouse eggs using cells from males and as a result, created pups with two dads. Those advancements were achieved by reprogramming skin cells from adult mice into stem cells, then further coaxing them to develop into eggs and sperm.

    Mitinori Saitou at Kyoto University first documented in 2018 how his team turned human blood cells into stem cells, which they then transformed into human eggs, but they were too immature to be fertilized to make embryos.

    US startups Conception Biosciences, Ivy Natal, Gameto, and Ovelle Bio are all working on making eggs or sperm in a lab.

    But the prospect raises significant ethical questions about how the technology should be used. In a 2017 editorial, bioethicists warned that IVG “may raise the specter of ‘embryo farming’ on a scale currently unimagined.” Conceivably, it could allow anyone at any age to have a child. And combined with advances in embryo screening, the fertility clinics of the future could use IVG to make mass numbers of embryos and then choose the ones with the most desirable qualities. Gene editing could also be used with IVG to snip out disease-causing DNA or create new traits.

    Amato says it will likely take another decade of research before IVG could be deemed safe or effective enough to be tested in people. Even then, it’s unclear if the technique would be permitted in the US, since a Congressional rider forbids the Food and Drug Administration from considering clinical trials that involve genetically manipulating an embryo for the intention of creating a baby.

    “Their method is very sophisticated and well-organized,” Hayashi, now a professor at the University of Osaka, says of the Oregon group’s approach. However, because of the high rate of chromosomal errors, “it is too inefficient and high risk to apply immediately to clinical application.”

    Also, because their process requires donor eggs, it could limit its use as an infertility treatment. As more people turn to IVF to conceive, the demand for donor eggs is increasing, and using them can involve wait times.

    Amander Clark, a reproductive scientist and stem cell biologist at UCLA who was not involved in the work, agrees that in its current form, mitomeiosis should not be offered for fertility care until more research is done. But in the meantime, the research has other uses.

    “The technology of mitomeiosis is an important technical innovation and could be highly valuable to our understanding of the biology of meiosis in human eggs. Meiotic errors increase as women age. Therefore, understanding causes of meiotic errors is a critical area of research,” Clark says.

    Emily Mullin

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  • Trump’s Tylenol Directive Could Actually Increase Autism Rates, Researchers Warn

    For decades, the discussion around autism has been a hotbed of misinformation, misinterpretation, and bad science, ranging from the long-discredited link between the neurodevelopmental condition and vaccines, to newer claims that going gluten-free and avoiding ultra-processed foods can reverse autistic traits.

    On Monday night, this specter arose again in the Oval Office, as President Donald Trump announced his administration’s new push to study the causes of autism with claims that the common painkiller Tylenol, otherwise known as acetaminophen, can cause the condition. The FDA subsequently announced that the drug would be slapped with a warning label citing a “possible association.”

    David Amaral, professor and director of research at the UC Davis MIND Institute, was among those watching in dismay as the president launched into a diatribe about Tylenol, repeatedly warning pregnant women not to take it, even to treat fevers.

    “We heard the president say that women should tough it out,” says Amaral. “I was really taken aback by that, because we do know that prolonged fever, in particular, is a risk factor for autism. So I worry that this admonition to not take Tylenol is going to do the reverse of what they’re hoping.”

    The speculation surrounding Tylenol stems from correlations drawn by some studies that have touted an association between use of the painkiller and neurodevelopmental disorders. One such analysis was published last month. The problem, says Renee Gardner, an epidemiologist at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden, is that these studies often reach this conclusion because they don’t sufficiently account for what statisticians describe as “confounding factors”—additional variables related to those being studied that might influence the relationship between them.

    In particular, Gardner points out that pregnant women needing to take Tylenol are more likely to have pain, fevers, and prenatal infections, which are themselves risk factors for autism. More importantly, given the heritability of autism, many of the genetic variants that make women more likely to have impaired immunity and greater pain perception, and hence use painkillers like acetaminophen, are also linked to autism. The painkiller use, she says, is a red herring.

    Last year, Gardner and other scientists published what is widely regarded within the scientific field as the most conclusive investigation so far on the subject, one that did account for confounding factors. Using health records from nearly 2.5 million children in Sweden, they reached the opposite conclusion to the president: Tylenol has no link to autism. Another major study of more than 200,000 children in Japan, published earlier this month, also found no link.

    Doctors are worried that Trump’s claims will have adverse consequences. Michael Absoud, a pediatric neurodisability consultant and a researcher in pediatric neurosciences at King’s College London, says he fears that pregnant women will start using other painkillers with a less well-proven safety profile.

    Gardner is concerned that it will also lead to self-blaming among parents, a flashback to the 1950s and ’60s, a time when autism was wrongly attributed to emotionally cold “refrigerator mothers.” “It’s making parents of children with neurodevelopmental conditions feel responsible,” she says. “It harks back to the early dark days of psychiatry.”

    David Cox

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  • Vaccine Panel Stacked by RFK Jr. Recommends Delaying MMRV Immunization

    A federal vaccine advisory committee made up of members hand-picked by Health and Human Services secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. recommended in an 8-3 vote on Thursday that the combined measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella (MMRV) vaccine should not be given before age 4, citing long-known evidence that shows a slightly increased risk for febrile seizures in that age group.

    Experts say that while frightening, febrile seizures—which are uncommon after vaccination—are usually short-lived and harmless, and removing the option for parents could cause a decline in immunization rates against measles, mumps, and rubella, some of the most dangerous childhood diseases.

    Known as the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, or ACIP, the group provides recommendations to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on vaccine usage. These recommendations are typically adopted by CDC and have an impact on state vaccine requirements for school, insurance coverage of vaccines, and pharmacy access—something at least one member of the panel seemed to be unaware of.

    Thursday’s vote is part of a new shift in vaccine policy being spearheaded by Kennedy, a longtime anti-vaccine activist. In his short time as HHS secretary, Kennedy has implemented restrictions on who can receive Covid-19 vaccines and dismissed all 17 sitting members of ACIP, replacing them with 12 new members—some of whom were installed just this week. Several of the new advisers have a history of criticizing vaccines or denouncing public health measures taken during the Covid-19 pandemic. Kennedy said a “clean sweep” of ACIP was necessary to build back public confidence in vaccine science.

    On Thursday, committee members were asked to evaluate whether to recommend against the combined MMRV vaccine before age 4, as well as whether to delay the first dose of the hepatitis B vaccine until the child is at least one month old.

    Currently, parents have two options for vaccinating their children against measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella, also known as chickenpox. They can choose the combined shot, known as MMRV, or two separate shots—one for MMR and another for chickenpox. About 85 percent of children get separate shots.

    In the US, the hepatitis B vaccine is given in the hospital shortly after birth, because the virus can be transmitted to children during delivery. A serious liver infection, hepatitis B can lead to cirrhosis and cancer. Each year in the US, an estimated 25,000 infants are born to women diagnosed with the hepatitis B virus. Without vaccination, up to 90 percent of them would develop chronic infections. The World Health Organization advises a universal birth dose of the hepatitis B vaccine.

    The topics of discussion at Tuesday’s meeting were not based on new data or evidence, and in fact, two ACIP members, Joseph Hibbeln and Cody Meissner, as well as several representatives from professional medical organizations who were in attendance, questioned why these changes were up for consideration.

    Robert Malone, one of the more controversial new ACIP members, offered an explanation: “It’s clear that a significant population of the United States has significant concerns about vaccine policy and about vaccine mandates.” Malone is a former mRNA researcher who rose to prominence during the Covid-19 pandemic by spreading falsehoods about the disease and the vaccines; he abstained from Thursday’s vote because he previously served as an expert witness in a lawsuit over the mumps vaccine.

    Emily Mullin

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  • Central Florida doctor unveils kratom research findings, potential dangers

    Central Florida doctor unveils kratom research findings, potential dangers

    Orlando Health Orlando Regional Medical Center emergency medicine physician and toxicologist, Dr. Josef Thundiyil, joins WESH 2 to discuss the potential dangers of kratom.

    ALERT AND FOCUSING ON A SUBSTANCE CALLED KRATOM. ACCORDING TO THE U.S. FOOD AND DRUG ADMINISTRATION, THE FDA HERE SAYS THIS SUPPLEMENT IS TYPICALLY MARKETED AS AN ENERGY BOOSTER, MOOD LIFTER, PAIN RELIEVER, AND OPIOID WITHDRAWAL REMEDY. IT’S FOUND AT DISPENSARIES, EVEN RESTAURANTS, SOMETIMES INFUSED WITH DRINKS. AND DESPITE ITS GROWING POPULARITY, THERE ARE MANY QUESTIONS WHEN IT COMES TO THE SUBSTANCE. SO HERE TO GIVE US ANSWERS AND SHARE RESEARCH AND FINDINGS, WE HAVE EMERGENCY MEDICINE PHYSICIAN AND TOXICOLOGIST AT ORLANDO REGIONAL MEDICAL CENTER, DOCTOR JOSEPH DUNHILL. GREAT TO SEE YOU, DOCTOR. THANK YOU FOR HAVING ME. OKAY, SO YOU’VE DONE THE WORK HERE. THIS IS SOMETHING THAT WE’VE HEARD A GOOD BIT ABOUT LATELY. THE KRATOM PRODUCTS. WHAT ARE YOUR FINDINGS IN TERMS OF LOOKING INTO THIS SUBSTANCE THAT IS REALLY WIDELY POPULAR AND WIDELY AVAILABLE? YEAH. AS A BACKGROUND, THERE’S A FEW CONCERNS THAT HAVE COME UP. NUMBER ONE, IT’S VERY UNREGULATED. THERE’S ABOUT 40 DIFFERENT CHEMICAL ALKALOIDS IN THIS. THE SECOND IS THAT WE KNOW IT’S ADDICTIVE. SOME OF THE REPORTS FROM PEOPLE IS THAT IT’S COMPULSIVELY ADDICTIVE. PEOPLE SPENDING HUNDREDS OF DOLLARS A DAY TO GET SORT OF A FIX WITH IT. THE OTHER THING WE KNOW IS THAT IT INTERACTS WITH EXISTING MEDICATIONS THAT MANY PEOPLE ARE ON. WE DON’T KNOW EXACTLY WHAT THOSE INTERACTIONS ARE. AND THEN THE FINAL THING, EVEN BEFORE I GOT INTO THIS RESEARCH, IS THAT WE KNOW THAT THERE’S NO PROVEN MEDICAL BENEFITS. SO PEOPLE ARE USING THIS WITH THE THOUGHT IT MIGHT BE HELPING, BUT WE DON’T KNOW THAT IT’S HELPING THEM WITH ANYTHING. AND YOU WORKED WITH A LOT OF MEDICAL PROFESSIONALS TO PUT THIS TOGETHER. MORE THAN TWO DOZEN, I BELIEVE. YEAH. WE WORKED ACTUALLY. IT WAS A GROUP OF US PHYSICIANS. WE ESSENTIALLY REACHED OUT TO 25 MEDICAL EXAMINERS IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA. REALLY TO TRY TO ANSWER THE QUESTION IS, ARE PEOPLE DYING FROM KRATOM? AND WE FOUND SOME VERY INTERESTING THINGS. WE ACTUALLY HAD THE MEDICAL EXAMINER SEND US ANY REPORTED DEATHS, AND WE FOUND ALMOST 40 DEATHS IN THE STATE OF FLORIDA OVER A PERIOD OF ABOUT FIVE YEARS. OKAY. AND WAS THIS TIED TO ANYTHING SPECIFIC? THE SUBSTANCE AND OPIOIDS OR ANYTHING ALONG THOSE LINES? NO, THESE ARE DEATHS IN THE ABSENCE OF OPIOIDS. NOW, WE KNOW THAT THE CHEMICAL STRUCTURE RESEMBLES OPIOIDS. AND THAT’S WHAT GAVE US THIS CONCERN THAT IT COULD CAUSE DEATH. AND WE STILL ARE LEFT WITH NOT KNOWING EXACTLY WHY SOME PEOPLE DIE AND SOME PEOPLE DON’T. BUT THE BOTTOM LINE IS IT STILL HAS SOME SIGNIFICANT DANGERS WITH IT. RIGHT. AND, YOU KNOW, AS A PHYSICIAN, YOU KNOW, WHAT IS YOUR ADVICE TO SOMEONE WHO’S, YOU KNOW, THERE’S SOMETHING THAT MAY CAUSE SOMETHING AS SEVERE AS DEATH? WHAT WHAT ARE YOU ADVISING PEOPLE? I WOULD ADVISE TREMENDOUS CAUTION. IT IS UNREGULATED. MOST OF THESE PRODUCTS DON’T HAVE ANY DOSING LISTED ON IT. WE KNOW IT INTERACTS WITH MEDICATIONS. YOU KNOW, MY TYPICAL ADVICE WOULD BE TALK TO YOUR PHYSICIAN ABOUT IT. BUT WHAT I’M FINDING IN THE COMMUNITY IS THIS THERE’S ENOUGH UNKNOWNS ABOUT THE SUBSTANCE THAT EVEN YOUR PHYSICIAN MAY NOT KNOW WHAT ALL THE INTERACTIONS WITH OTHER SUBSTANCES ARE. SO MAKE SURE YOU KNOW WHAT THEY ARE. AND AT THE MOMENT, I PERSONALLY WOULD ADVOCATE FOR SAFETY. BE VERY, VERY CAREFUL WITH THIS BECAUSE WE KNOW THERE IS HARM. WE KNOW THERE’S ADDICTION. ANYTIME THERE’S A POTENTIAL FOR ADDICTION AND ESCALATING USE, WE NOW KNOW THAT IT CAN ALSO CAUSE DEATH. YEAH. WHAT ARE THE MOST VULNERABLE POPULATIONS YOU’RE SEEING WHEN IT COMES TO THE SUBSTANCE? YEAH. FROM A PUBLIC HEALTH STANDPOINT, WE ALWAYS THINK ABOUT VULNERABLE POPULATIONS IN TERMS OF WHO MIGHT BE AT RISK. SO PEOPLE WHO ALREADY SUFFER FROM ADDICTION BECAUSE THEY MAY BE LOOKING FOR ANYTHING TO HELP THEM GET OFF OF SUBSTANCE USE. I ALWAYS AM CONCERNED ABOUT ADOLESCENTS AND YOUNG ADULTS. FOR THIS REASON, PEOPLE WHO ARE ON OTHER MEDICATIONS BECAUSE OF THE POTENTIAL TO INTERACT. AND SO THAT INCLUDES NOT ONLY YOUNG PEOPLE WHO ARE ON MEDICINES, BUT ESPECIALLY PEOPLE WHO ARE OLDER AND THE ELDERLY. THOSE ARE SOME OF THE HIGHEST RISK GROUPS THAT WE GET CONCERNED ABOUT. YEAH, WELL, THIS IS REALLY AMAZING FINDINGS AND GREAT RESEARCH THAT YOU AND ALL THESE OTHER PHYSICIANS AND MEDICAL EXAMINERS HAVE WORKED ON COLLECTIVELY. WE’RE GOING TO POST SOME MORE INFORMATION ON OUR WEBSITE SO YOU CAN FIND OUT AND HELP NAVIGATE YOUR JOURNEY. IF YOU IF YOU HAV

    Central Florida doctor unveils kratom research findings, potential dangers

    Orlando Health Orlando Regional Medical Center emergency medicine physician and toxicologist, Dr. Josef Thundiyil, joins WESH 2 to discuss the potential dangers of kratom.

    Updated: 10:00 AM EDT Sep 15, 2025

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    Orlando Health Orlando Regional Medical Center emergency medicine physician and toxicologist, Dr. Josef Thundiyil, joins WESH 2 to discuss the potential dangers of kratom.Click here to learn more.

    Orlando Health Orlando Regional Medical Center emergency medicine physician and toxicologist, Dr. Josef Thundiyil, joins WESH 2 to discuss the potential dangers of kratom.

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  • Do You Need A DEXA BD/BC Scan?

    For most people, though, “if results are strong, maybe you don’t need another scan for five years,” says Wagner. “If they’re lower, lifestyle interventions can help, and you may want to recheck in a year.”

    Radiation exposure is negligible, less than a chest x-ray. But the psychological impact can be more complicated. For some, the numbers motivate: “When I did a body composition test at 36, I had way more body fat than I expected,” Cheema says. “That pushed me to change my workouts and eating patterns in ways that improved my health—something BMI alone wouldn’t have prompted.”

    For others, especially those with histories of disordered eating or body image issues, it can be destabilizing and overwhelming. Numbers can become another metric to obsess over rather than a tool for health. “It can be overwhelming if you don’t have a clinician to interpret the results,” Gidwani says. “That’s why I review all of my patients’ scans with them.”

    Cheema agrees: “Too much detail without guidance risks overwhelming people with information that isn’t clinically actionable.”

    “I don’t think DEXA gives too much information compared to, say, a whole-body MRI, which can reveal incidental findings that can cause anxiety and lead to unnecessary interventions,” says Gidwani. “Its data points are actionable: decrease body fat, reduce visceral fat, increase muscle.”

    Experts emphasize that actionability is key. “The most important metrics are visceral adipose tissue and total body fat percentage, especially when tracked over time,” Cheema says. “But DEXA also breaks things down by arms, legs, trunk, etc. That can veer into aesthetics rather than health.

    Should You Get One?

    If you’re 65 or older, or at risk for osteoporosis, your doctor may already recommend a DEXA scan for bone health. For women in perimenopause, when bone density can drop by as much as 20 percent, an early baseline scan could flag risks years before they become urgent.

    DEXA also detects sarcopenic obesity, where muscle loss occurs alongside high body fat. “Someone may look normal weight on a scale, but a DEXA can reveal poor muscle-to-fat balance,” Gidwani says.

    Beyond those groups, the use case narrows. Athletes, bodybuilders, and people on GLP-1 medications may find the data genuinely useful. For generally healthy adults who exercise, eat decently, and check in with a doctor, many clinicians are indifferent.

    “For a healthy individual, I wouldn’t universally recommend it,” Cheema says. “Lifestyle changes and basic care may matter more than getting a DEXA.” There are alternatives—bioimpedance scales, Bod Pods, and AI-enabled wearables—but none are as accurate as DEXA. For now, it remains the most precise, if expensive, tool available.

    Final Takeaways

    My DEXA results were somewhat humbling. Despite near-daily workouts and a decent diet, the scan flagged more body fat than I expected and the beginnings of osteopenia in my spine. The bright side was an “excellent” visceral fat score, something I’ll be bragging about indefinitely.

    Catching early bone loss feels actionable; I can tweak my workouts to prioritize strength and mobility. But the body fat percentages have lived in my brain rent-free ever since, without offering much in return. I don’t plan to shell out a few hundred dollars for another scan anytime soon, so I may never know if my adjustments are actually working.

    That’s the paradox of DEXA. For those with medical risks, it can be invaluable. For athletes chasing marginal gains, it’s another knob to turn. But for the rest of us, it’s a reminder that data is only as useful as what you’re willing or able to do with it. In the end, DEXA doesn’t promise longevity so much as it promises numbers, and numbers alone don’t add years to your life.

    Meet the Experts

    • Jennifer Wagner, MD, MS, chief health and performance officer, Canyon Ranch in Tucson, Arizona.
    • Josh Cheema, MD, medical director of Northwestern Medicine Human Longevity Clinic in Chicago, Illinois.
    • Pooja Gidwani, MD, MBA, board-certified physician in internal medicine and obesity medicine in Los Angeles, California.

    Boutayna Chokrane

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  • Unbelievable facts

    Scientists have found that a natural compound found in broccoli and other cruciferous vegetables can…

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