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ANH News Beat (21/2026)

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Our weekly roundup of the latest natural news from across the globe in one place. This week: Evolutionary mismatches; Depression & teenagers; Healing touch; Updates from ANH-USA; Free Speech Threats, Post-covid News and much more...

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Natural News

  • Think your regular nap is harmless? Think again. New research suggests that long, frequent daytime naps—especially morning snoozes—could be a red flag for serious underlying health problems and may even be linked to a higher risk of early death in older adults. Scientists tracking seniors for years found that every extra hour spent napping raised mortality risk, with excessive dozing potentially signalling issues like heart disease, poor sleep, or neurodegeneration. Experts stress this doesn’t mean the odd power nap is dangerous—but if you’re regularly nodding off for lengthy stretches, it might be time to speak to your integrative health professional who can assess your underlying health.
  • New research published in Communications Biology offers compelling scientific evidence for what many natural health advocates have long understood: the mind has profound and measurable effects on the body. Researchers examined participants who completed a 7-day retreat, led by Dr Joe Dispenza, combining meditation, mindset work, and open-label placebo healing rituals — with remarkable results. After just one week, participants showed meaningful changes in improved brain efficiency, boosted immune signalling, and increased natural pain relief chemicals in participants’ blood. The effects even promoted neuron growth and stronger brain connectivity, including upregulation of BDNF (a key brain growth and repair protein). No drugs were involved whatsoever. This research powerfully validates the case for the use of non-pharmaceutical, mind-body approaches to health and wellbeing. Especially given the increasing levels of mental health issues that now afflict young people and adults.

>>> Turning the screws on depression and anxiety among today’s youth

  • A recent op-ed in The Conversation vindicates Linus Pauling’s assertions that high dose vitamin C can help those with cancer. Whilst a conservative overview, the piece concedes that Pauling was definitely on the right track and that latter backlash against his work wasn’t entirely justified. Trials that tried to replicate his work failed in one crucial area—they used vitamin C orally not intravenously, consigning vitamin C as a cancer treatment to the bin, until now. Once again, science is only now catching up with what practitioners in the natural health space supporting cancer patients have long known and embraced.

>>> Listen to Rob Verkerk PhD’s conversation with Dr Jeanne Drisko – a pioneer in the use of intravenous vitamin C therapy for cancer patients

  • Time restricted eating (TRE) has significant benefits for a range of metabolic markers including body weight, blood pressure and blood glucose levels compared to usual diets. A recent systematic review and network meta-analysis, published in The BMJ, showed those adopting TRE stuck to the regime more easily than other dietary interventions, possibly due to the flexibility it gives to individuals to tailor it to their individual circumstances. Researchers found restricting eating times to earlier in the day was more efective than late eating, which creates negative impacts on the gut. TRE was also found to be safe with little or no adverse effects.

>>> Calling time on eating little and often

  • This week saw Alzheimer’s Prevention Day, reminding us that dietary and lifestyle changes can significantly reduce the risk of developing the debilitating condition. A new study published in The Journal of Nutrition, has found that eating at least one egg for five or more days per week had up to a 27% lower risk of developing Alzheimer’s but even eating fewer eggs conferred a benefit. Often given a bad rap, eggs are rich in choline, which is essential for memory and communication between brain cells as well as carotenoids, which reduce oxidative stress, omega-3 fatty acids and phospholipids, which support neurotransmitter function. So, as the old adage goes – ‘go to work on an egg’ was on the money when it comes to these nutritional powerhouses. But you need to start early as neurogedeneration begins decades before any symptoms may show.
  • After decades and billions of dollars wasted targeting amyloid plaques, Alzheimer’s researchers, publishing in PNAS NEXUS, now propose that the disease stems from intracellular protein disruption, with plaque buildup as a consequence, not a cause. This follows 2022 revelations of image fraud in the foundational 2006 amyloid study and countless failed drugs with serious side effects. How much sooner might we have understood neurodegeneration’s metabolic, inflammatory, and environmental roots if reductionist pharmaceutical thinking hadn’t monopolised the field?

>>> Get fat happy

  • Has the death knell for the traditional scientific journal finally sounded? A provocative recent op-ed in The Transmitter argues that AI is pushing scientific publishing to a breaking point, with machine-generated papers flooding journals and overwhelming the peer review. The deeper issue withn which the paper’s authors grapple is that the conventional “scientific paper” — largely unchanged for centuries — may no longer be fit for the complexity and interconnectedness of modern science. So what’s the alternative? The authors propose that the way forward may involve dynamic, machine-readable knowledge networks where data, methods and findings are linked transparently and explored interactively rather than buried in static PDFs. While this evolution could democratise and accelerate discovery, it also raises an important question: if scientific writing itself is part of the thinking process, what happens when AI takes over the writing too?
  • Polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS), which affects around one in eight women, is being renamed polyendocrine metabolic ovarian syndrome (PMOS) to better reflect the true nature of the condition. Experts and patient groups worldwide agreed that the term “PCOS” is misleading, as it focuses narrowly on ovarian “cysts” that are often not present, while overlooking the broader hormonal and metabolic dysfunction that characterises the disorder. The new name emerged from a major international consensus process involving more than 14,000 patients and healthcare professionals, with the aim of improving scientific accuracy, reducing stigma, supporting earlier diagnosis, and encouraging more integrated care and research.

>>> PCOS beyond reproduction: the metabolic roots of an hormonal disorder

  • Recent headlines around GLP-1 weight-loss drugs like Wegovy and Ozempic have been focusing on fewer sick days, reduced GP visits and the promise of easing pressure on the NHS through use of these treatments. But behind the excitement lies a more complicated picture. Emerging evidence suggests many people regain weight rapidly when they stop the injections, while concerns continue to grow around muscle and bone loss, long-term dependency, side effects, and widening health inequalities driven by private access. These drugs may prove useful for some morbidly obese patients with BMIs over 40 where attempts at all other interventions have failed. But they are not a silver bullet for the obesity crisis, nor a substitute for tackling the food environment, addictions, stress, inactivity and metabolic health at the root of chronic disease.
  • As the cost of long-term GLP-1 injections bites, Eli Lilly’s newly approved (in the US) weight-loss pill is now being promoted as a maintenance solution after coming off the jabs. But rather than questioning why rebound weight gain happens in the first place, the answer increasingly appears to be yet another lifelong pharmaceutical fix—reinforcing dependency while sidelining the deeper dietary, lifestyle and environmental drivers of metabolic health.

>>> The cost of ‘skinny jabs’

  • Fascinating new research published in Innovation in Aging adds creative expression to the list of practices that slow biological aging. Using seven epigenetic clocks to measure biological age, researchers found that engaging in the arts—both creating art and experiencing it through concerts, theatre, or museums—produced effects comparable to physical activity in slowing aging. The study reinforces the benefits of engaging in an enjoyable “non-pharmacological intervention” that gives a combination of pleasure and measurable health benefits.

ANH-USA Update

  • What if we had a common language and approach to look at what’s needed to maintain or build health? Might this help turn around the largely preventable chronic and degenerative disease epidemic that threatens to break our health systems? ANH founder, Rob Verkerk PhD lays out his thoughts on a ‘unified theory of health’. Find out more…
  • Sold as safer by the very industry producing them, “short-chain” PFAS chemicals are proving to be anything but as they take over environmental contamination from older PFAS compounds. Newer PFAS chemicals may stay in the body far longer than industry would have us believe. As quickly as regulators tackle members of the PFAS one at a time, companies introduce yet more. Take Action to ban PFAS chemicals as a class…

 Free Speech Updates

  • A new piece from Reclaim The Net highlights growing concern that “AI safety” initiatives emerging from policy summits could become less about protecting children and more about shaping what information is deemed acceptable to see or say online. Common Sense Media’s Youth AI Safety Institute, is framed as a non-profit effort to safeguard young people, but critics warn that embedding automated systems into speech moderation risks centralising control over knowledge itself — narrowing access to contested or inconvenient ideas under the banner of safety. The key question is whether these systems will genuinely empower users and protect the vulnerable or quietly redefine and manipulate the boundaries of permissible thought.

Post-covid related

  • Fresh controversy is swirling around the CDC after lawmakers and media outlets accused the agency of sidelining a covid vaccine safety study over methodological concerns igniting heated debate. Critics suggest the study was blocked because it showed covid booster shots are safe but Acting CDC Director Jay Bhattacharya and others raised concerns over the methodologies used. The Defender has the full story.
  • New whistleblower testimony presented to US lawmakers is reigniting questions around the origins of covid and the extent to which public debate may have been deliberately suppressed. A CIA whistleblower, testifying before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, alleged that efforts to dismiss the lab-leak hypothesis were coordinated at senior levels, adding to long-standing concerns about transparency, conflicts of interest and the politicisation of science during the pandemic. Regardless of where the evidence ultimately leads, the episode underscores why open scientific inquiry — not censorship or narrative management — is essential for maintaining public trust in health institutions.

>>> ANH Covid Zone – the back catalogue of all ANH’s articles and videos during the pandemic in one place for ease of searching.  

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