Health
Simple dinner table habit linked to poor diet and higher health risks in adults over 60
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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.
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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.
About 10.9% of older adults said they used salt at the table in a recent Brazilian survey. (iStock)
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.
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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.
Women who added salt were less likely to eat fruits and vegetables, the data showed. (iStock)
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.
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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.
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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.”
About 1.89 million deaths each year are associated with consuming too much sodium, the organization reported. (iStock)
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.
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“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.”
“Public health officials [should] promote nutrition education and the importance of whole foods, less processed foods and reduced salt intake overall,” a nutritionist said. (iStock)
“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.
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“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.
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During a recent episode of her podcast, Gwyneth Paltrow spoke with neuroscientist Dr. Andrew Huberman about retatrutide, a new advancement in GLP-1 (glucagon-like peptide-1) therapies.
In recent years, GLP-1 receptor agonists have become a major focus in discussions around biohacking, longevity and wellness – but they’re not without a multitude of side effects.
Huberman noted that while first-generation weight-loss drugs curbed users’ appetites, they frequently plunged them into massive, rapid caloric deficits.
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Without aggressive resistance training, a high percentage of that lost weight came directly from lean muscle. “People would lose a ton of weight, but they would also lose muscle mass,” Huberman told Paltrow.
In clinical trials, retatrutide is administered as a once-weekly subcutaneous injection. (iStock)
That is where retatrutide comes in, he said. Unlike older single- or dual-action medications, retatrutide is a triple agonist.
That means it activates the body’s receptors for glucose-dependent insulinotropic polypeptide (GIP), glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) and glucagon – three hormones involved in regulating blood sugar, appetite and metabolism.
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“Retatrutide is a more mild agonist of GLP-1,” said Huberman. “It also increases glucagon and … GIP. So, it hits three different pathways, each a bit more subtly.”
In clinical trials, retatrutide is administered as a once-weekly subcutaneous injection.
Without aggressive resistance training, a high percentage of lost weight can come directly from lean muscle mass, said Andrew Huberman. (iStock)
Because of its balanced, multi-receptor approach, Huberman said the drug has a “lower side effect profile” while still allowing people to lose up to a third of their body weight “across a year or so.”
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Most importantly for fitness and longevity advocates, the doctor pointed out that retatrutide seems to have “some muscle sparing effect.”
Because the drug is still moving through official pipelines, a massive gray market of compounding pharmacies and online peptide suppliers has cropped up to meet the growing demand.
Retatrutide is an investigational molecule that is legally available only to participants in Lilly’s clinical trials, according to Lilly’s website, and the company is currently “evaluating its safety and efficacy” in these clinical studies. (iStock)
Huberman issued a strict warning regarding these unregulated online sources, noting that these options “can say 99% purity, but that 1% means there could be some LPS,” referring to lipopolysaccharides, a type of bacterial toxin.
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“LPS will cause inflammation,” he cautioned. “One injection isn’t gonna do it, but multiple injections over time, I could see where that could become problematic.”
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Paltrow echoed the safety concerns, comparing the current “wild-west” peptide craze to the landscape of supplements in the 90s, “where there’s really no third-party testing and it’s kind of word of mouth.”
“Multiple injections over time, I could see where that could become problematic.”
Both agreed that anyone exploring these therapies should avoid unverified online sources and prioritize working with a medical doctor.
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Retatrutide is an investigational molecule that is legally available only to participants in Lilly’s clinical trials, according to the manufacturer’s website. The company is currently “evaluating its safety and efficacy.”
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The drug has not been reviewed or approved by any regulatory agency, and no one should consider taking anything claiming to be retatrutide outside of a Lilly-sponsored clinical trial, experts advise.
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A new treatment for endometrial cancer demonstrated strong potential in a Phase 3 clinical trial.
Drugmaker Merck announced Monday that the investigational drug sacituzumab tirumotecan (sac-TMT) met its “primary endpoints” of overall survival and progression-free survival in patients with advanced or recurrent endometrial cancer.
The TroFuse-005 trial is the first global Phase 3 trial to “demonstrate statistically significant improvement” in survival compared to chemotherapy in these patients, according to a Merck press release.
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This was also the first and only antibody-drug conjugate (ADC) to achieve such a result for endometrial cancer patients in this setting, the researchers stated.
An ADC is a targeted cancer therapy that delivers more of the drug to tumor cells while limiting damage to healthy cells.
The investigational drug, sac-TMT, is administered every two weeks via IV infusion. (iStock)
The trial involved 776 patients with endometrial cancer whose disease worsened after receiving both platinum chemotherapy and immunotherapy.
The patients were randomly assigned sac-TMT, administered every two weeks, or a treatment of the physician’s choice, including doxorubin or paclitaxel chemotherapy. The patients were aware of which treatment they were receiving.
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Those receiving sac-TMT showed “clinically meaningful improvement” in their disease state compared to the treatment of physician’s choice, the researchers found.
The study also met response rate benchmarks and exhibited similar side effects to earlier studies of the same drug, Merck reported.
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The drugmaker did not disclose any statistics on exact survival benefit, response rate, side effect rates or other details, but the researchers aim to present this Phase 3 data at an upcoming medical meeting.
The drug “may be able to address a critical unmet need for certain patients with advanced endometrial cancer,” said the lead researcher (not pictured). (iStock)
Dr. Domenica Lorusso, the study’s global lead investigator and professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Humanitas University and Humanitas San Pio X in Milan, wrote in a press release that these results show sac-TMT “may be able to address a critical unmet need for certain patients with advanced endometrial cancer, one of the only cancers increasing in both incidence and mortality worldwide.”
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“Despite recent advances, patients whose disease progresses following treatment with platinum and immunotherapy are urgently in need of new options, and these findings show for the first time that a TROP2 ADC may be an effective option in this setting,” she added.
Dr. Brian Slomovitz, co-director of gynecologic oncology at Mount Sinai and an investigator on this trial, reflected on the study findings during an interview with Fox News Digital.
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“Unlike many other cancers that we are treating, the number of endometrial cancers and the number of deaths due to endometrial cancers are on the rise,” Slomovitz noted.
“In the United States, the number of deaths due to endometrial cancer has surpassed the number of deaths due to ovarian cancer, [making it] the deadliest of all gynecologic malignancies.”
Endometrial cancer has become “the deadliest of all gynecologic malignancies,” one doctor shared. (iStock)
Despite recent advancements introducing immunotherapy as the standard of care, “better treatment options” for patients with recurrent disease “remains an unmet need,” Slomovitz commented.
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“If the full data confirm this announcement, the key questions will be the magnitude of the survival benefit and the toxicity profile — those will define sac-TMT’s role,” he said.
“But an overall survival improvement in recurrent disease is a real, meaningful result for patients and their families, not just a statistical one.”
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