Reaching for the salt shaker at the kitchen table may seem like second nature for some – but it could reveal troubling details about your health.

Recent Brazilian research, published in the journal Frontiers in Public Health, investigated the impact of adding salt to food with a focus on older adults.

The study used national survey data from more than 8,000 Brazilians over the age of 60, collected between 2017 and 2018.

AGING COULD SLOW DOWN WITH ONE COMMON DAILY HABIT: ‘LIVE LONGER AND BETTER’

Participants were asked the question, “Do you have the habit of adding salt to food at the table?” The researchers then deciphered certain traits that were linked to the habit.

About 10.9% of older adults said they used salt at the table. Men reported this habit more than women – 12.7% compared to 9.4%, according to the published study.

Men not following a diet for high blood pressure were more than twice as likely to add salt compared to men who follow this diet.

Men who reported living alone had a 62% higher likelihood of using salt compared to men who lived with others.

HEART DISEASE THREAT PROJECTED TO CLIMB SHARPLY FOR KEY DEMOGRAPHIC

Women not following a high blood pressure diet had 68% higher likelihood of using extra salt.

Adding salt was also associated with a lower intake of fruits and vegetables among women. The odds of adding salt to food were 81% higher in women who did not eat fruit, and 40% higher in those who did not eat vegetables.

Women who have a high concentration of ultraprocessed foods in their diet were more than twice as likely to add salt to food, as were those living in urban areas.

As this study was cross-sectional, it showed an association but could not prove that one thing caused another, the researchers acknowledged. Some of the information was self-reported, which could also limit the findings.

Diets high in sodium are known to cause an increase in blood pressure, which also raises the risk of heart disease, gastric cancer, obesity, osteoporosis and kidney disease, according to the World Health Organization.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE HEALTH STORIES

About 1.89 million deaths each year are associated with consuming too much sodium, the organization reported.

The WHO recommends that adults consume less than 5 grams of salt per day, or just under a teaspoon, for best health outcomes.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR OUR HEALTH NEWSLETTER

Study co-author Dr. Débora Santos, a titular professor at Rio de Janeiro State University, called for alternative ways to decrease additional use of salt.

“The use of herbs and natural seasonings as alternatives to salt, or culinary techniques such as using the acidity of citrus fruits, may help reduce discretionary salt use while maintaining food palatability,” she wrote in a press release.

“Practical strategies, such as avoiding the routine placement of saltshakers on the table, may also help reduce habitual salt use.”

Los Angeles-based registered dietitian nutritionist Ilana Muhlstein said adding salt to food before trying it is one of her “biggest pet peeves.”

“It’s interesting that this study found that men were significantly more likely to add salt to their food compared to women, because this is an observation I’ve had as well,” Muhlstein, who was not involved in the study, told Fox News Digital.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

“It could be because women are more bloat-conscious overall and may be more informed on the medical harms of excessive salt, as well as the more superficial ones like making your rings hard to take on or off (when you’re dealing with water retention from increased salt intake).”

For men, Muhlstein suggested that those who live alone are potentially more likely to order takeout – and restaurants “tend to use much more salt than home cooking, which could make someone’s preference for salty food much higher.”

“That is further reflected in the stats showing that the less fruits and vegetables one eats, and the more processed foods consumed, the more likely one was to add salt to their food,” she noted.

The finding that a low blood pressure diet positively influences a person’s salt intake is “promising and intriguing,” according to Muhlstein.

TEST YOURSELF WITH OUR LATEST LIFESTYLE QUIZ

“This should encourage HHS and public health officials to promote nutrition education and the importance of whole foods, less processed foods and reduced salt intake overall,” she said.

Illicit labs are creating new synthetic drugs at breakneck speed. Dangerous, untested compounds are reaching users long before health agencies know they exist. Older drugs are regularly modified to create novel threats. Ecstasy is a prime example.

The party drug MDMA has been illegal since 1985. Its molecular structure can be drawn like this:

But what if you could add one atom to this molecule to change both the experience of taking the drug and its legal status?

You can. A single oxygen atom changes the molecule to methylone, which provides an Ecstasy-like euphoria.

This simple change had a profound consequence. When methylone reached the U.S. market in 2010 the drug could be sold legally in corner stores and smoke shops as “bath salts.”

But methylone wasn’t the end of the story. Illicit chemists now use methylone’s structure as a template for modern-day alchemy. New drug laws push them to invent new variants, which emerge in the illicit drug market with untested potencies and effects — a vicious cycle that has been impossible to contain.

These chemists are located in unregulated labs around the globe, from big enterprises in China and India that produce drugs and their precursor compounds in huge volumes, to single-person and small domestic operations that cut and package drugs for retail sale. Some of the most-used drugs, such as fentanyl, are mixed in Mexico and exported north.

Waves of Bath Salts

Methylone was an early example of a class of drugs known as synthetic cathinones, which continue to proliferate.

Beginning in 2010, emergency rooms began seeing agitated patients who were violent, paranoid and psychotic after ingesting synthetic cathinones sold as bath salts. Poison control centers received a few hundred calls about the drugs in 2010. The following year had over 6,000 calls.

When methylone was finally banned in 2011, unregulated chemists simply tweaked the molecule to evade the ban, creating new drug formulas. The Drug Enforcement Administration noted in 2019 that “as one synthetic cathinone is controlled, another unscheduled synthetic cathinone appears in the recreational drug market.”

Examining the drug on a molecular level shows how illicit chemists try to increase potency and heighten the effect in a user’s brain.

As cathinone molecules become more potent, they also become more addictive. “Because they hijack the dopamine system in the brain — the salience and reward system in the brain — they’re going to be extremely addictive,” said Dr. Michael Baumann, director of the Designer Drug Research Unit of the National Institute on Drug Abuse. “There’s a reason why chemists would design these.”

Experts confirmed that the molecules described in this article are well known among illicit chemists, who have moved on to newer structures. “These are not rudimentary chemists,” Dr. Baumann said. “They’re actually ahead of us.”

Nitazenes, the ‘Frankenstein Opioids’

Another class of drugs has been following a similar pattern. When China banned all variants of fentanyl in 2019, illicit chemists began to research non-fentanyl opioids and rediscovered nitazenes, drugs developed in the 1950s as alternatives to morphine but never approved for medical use. Chemists modify the molecules — which are more complex than cathinones — in similar ways to increase potency.

“This is trial and error,” said Dr. Alex Krotulski, director of the Center for Forensic Science Research and Education, of the efforts. “They’re pushing the envelope to make more and more potent drugs.”

By the end of 2024, at least 22 nitazene molecules had been identified. New variants are prized because of their inexpensive production costs, high potency and vague legal status, according to a 2023 paper.

Ohio’s attorney general was referring to nitazenes when he warned that “Frankenstein opioids are even more lethal than the drugs already responsible for so many overdose deaths.”

China banned nitazenes in July 2025, a move that may cause production to shift to other countries. In the meantime, illicit chemists searching through patents and research papers may stumble on another class of legal molecules to tweak and modify.

“It’s so much more dangerous today, the drugs are so much more potent,” said George W. Hime, assistant director of toxicology at the Miami-Dade Medical Examiner. “Someone out there is playing chemistry.”

Cholera can quickly become life-threatening, but the best defense might be sitting in your pantry.

New research from UC Riverside in Southern California reveals that a high-protein diet can effectively “disarm” the bacteria, slash infection levels by 100-fold, and stop the disease in its tracks before it turns fatal.

Published in the journal Cell Host and Microbe, the study found that diets rich in casein, the main protein in milk and cheese, along with wheat gluten, could limit cholera bacteria in the gut.

PEOPLE WITH A CERTAIN BMI ARE MORE PRONE TO DEADLY INFECTIONS, STUDY REVEALS

Cholera is a bacterial disease spread through contaminated water and food, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The disease can cause severe diarrhea, dehydration and even death if it goes untreated.

The research team aimed to determine whether harmful bacteria would respond to dietary changes in the same way as other bacteria.

They began by feeding infected mice different foods. Some mice ate high-protein diets, while others ate food high in simple carbohydrates. Others were fed high-fat diets, according to the study’s press release.

SPACE EXPERIMENTS REVEAL NEW WAY TO FIGHT DRUG-RESISTANT SUPERBUGS, SCIENTISTS SAY

“The high-protein diet had one of the strongest anti-cholera effects compared to a balanced diet – and not all proteins are the same,” said Ansel Hsiao, UCR associate professor and senior author of the study, in the release. “Casein and wheat gluten were the two clear winners.”

Hsiao said he was surprised by the magnitude of the effect. “We saw up to 100-fold differences in the amount of cholera colonization as a function of diet alone,” he noted.

The secret lies in the bacteria’s design, the researchers discovered. Cholera uses a microscopic, syringe-like structure to inject toxins into and kill “good” microbes in the gut.

In the study, casein and gluten effectively jammed this “syringe.” Without its primary weapon, cholera wasn’t able to compete.

CLICK HERE FOR MORE HEALTH STORIES

The World Health Organization has emphasized that while cholera is preventable and treatable, a global surge in cases has strained the supply of oral cholera vaccines and heightened the need for diversified treatment strategies.

Overreliance on antibiotics can lead to drug-resistant “superbugs.” While cholera hasn’t yet reached that crisis point, the bacteria’s ability to adapt means current medications could eventually become useless, experts warn.

“Dietary strategies won’t generate antibiotic resistance in the same way a drug might,” Hsiao noted.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR OUR HEALTH NEWSLETTER

This means food-based prevention could offer a safer, cheaper and more sustainable weapon for vulnerable communities.

“Wheat gluten and casein are recognized as safe in a way a microbe is not, in a regulatory sense, so this is an easier way to protect public health,” Hsiao said.

TEST YOURSELF WITH OUR LATEST LIFESTYLE QUIZ

The next step, according to the researchers, is to explore the effect of these proteins in humans, given that the major limitation of this study is that it only shows cholera effects in mice.

Because the study is preclinical and there is not yet data on human subjects, Hsiao and his team don’t know how much casein or wheat gluten a person would need to consume to see a protective effect.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FOX NEWS APP

They would also need to test whether the protein must be consumed before exposure to cholera as a preventative measure, or if it can effectively “shut down” an active, mid-stage infection.

“The more we can improve people’s diets, the more we may be able to protect them from succumbing to disease,” Hsiao added.