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How Bubbles Help Kids with Cleft Conditions
For thousands of children born with cleft conditions, Operation Smile provides simple, playful tools—like bubbles—to strengthen the skills they need to speak and thrive.
While a bottle of bubbles might seem out of place in a hospital setting, you might be surprised to learn that, for thousands of children around the world born with cleft lip and palate, they can be a helpful tool in comprehensive cleft care. Lilia, who was born with cleft lip and palate in 2020, is one of the many patients who received this care.
As a toddler, Lilia underwent two surgeries to treat cleft lip and palate with Operation Smile’s surgical program in Puebla, Mexico. Because of Operation Smile’s comprehensive care, it wasn’t long before her personality transformed: Lilia went from a quiet and withdrawn toddler to an exuberant, curious explorer, babbling, expressing herself with a variety of sounds, and engaging with others like any child her age.
Lilia is now a healthy five-year-old, with the same cheerful attitude and boundless energy. Her progress is the result of care at every level, from surgery to speech therapy to ongoing support at home—but it’s also evidence that small, sustained interventions throughout it all can make a meaningful difference.
Lilia at age 1, before surgery, and at age 5, 4 years post-surgery Cleft Conditions: A Global Problem
Since 1982, Operation Smile has provided cleft lip and cleft palate surgeries to more than 500,000 patients worldwide with the help of generous volunteers and donors. Cleft conditions are congenital conditions, meaning they are present at birth. With cleft lip and palate, the lip or the roof of the mouth do not form fully during fetal development. Cleft conditions put children at risk for malnutrition and poor weight gain, since their facial structure can make feeding challenging. But cleft conditions can have an enormous social impact as well: Common difficulties with speech can leave kids socially isolated and unable to meet the same developmental milestones as their peers.
Surgery is a vital step in treating cleft conditions, but it’s also just one part of a much larger solution. Organizations like Operation Smile emphasize the importance of multi-disciplinary teams that provide comprehensive, long-term care to patients across many years. This approach, which includes oral care, speech therapy, nutritional support, and psychosocial care, not only aids in physical recovery from surgery but also helps children develop the skills and confidence to eat easily, speak clearly, and engage in everyday life. This ensures that each patient receives the full range of support they need to thrive.
Marie, 11 months, with her mother at Operation Smile Madagascar before her cleft surgery (Operation Smile Photos) A Playful (and Powerful) Solution
Throughout a patient’s care, simple tools like bubbles can play a meaningful role from start to finish.
Immediately before surgery, children are often in a new and unfamiliar environment far from home, some of them experiencing a hospital setting for the first time. When care providers or loved ones blow bubbles, it’s a simple yet effective technique: Not only are the children soothed and distracted, the bubbles also help create a sense of joy and playfulness that eases their anxiety.
Milagros Rojas, a volunteer speech therapist in Peru, using bubbles in a screening with a patient. (Operation Smile Photos) In speech therapy, bubbles can take on an even more important role. Blowing bubbles requires controlled airflow, as well as the ability to form a rounded “O” shape with the lips, which are skills that children with cleft conditions may struggle to develop. Practicing these skills with bubbles allows children to gently strengthen their facial muscles, improve breath control, and support the motor skills needed for speech development. Beyond that, blowing bubbles can help kids connect with their parents or providers in a way that’s playful, comforting, and accessible even for very young patients.
Finally, bubbles often follow patients with cleft conditions home in the “smile bags” that each patient receives when the surgical procedure is finished. Smile bags, which help continue speech therapy outside of the hospital setting, can contain language enrichment booklets, a mirror, oxygen tubing, and bubbles. While regular practice with motor skills can help with physical recovery, small acts of play help as well, giving kids space to simply enjoy themselves and join in on what peers are able to do.
Bubbles at Home and Beyond
Today, because of Operation Smile’s dedication to comprehensive cleft care, Lilia is now able to make friends and speak clearly, all things that could have been difficult or impossible before. Instead of a childhood defined by limitation, Lilia—and others around the world—can look forward to a childhood filled with joy, learning, discovery, friends, and new possibilities.
CTA: Lilia’s life was changed for the better with the care she received through Operation Smile. Find out how you can make an impact in other children’s lives by visiting operationsmile.org today.
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Astounding 2013 study found that ‘expressive writing’ can help heal physical wounds
Remarkable things happen when you relieve your psychological stress.
It’s not breaking news that journaling has been proven, again and again, to be good for you—mind, body, and soul.
But not all journaling is created equal. Writing about what you did that day and your future plans has a profoundly different effect than writing about your deepest emotions, especially the upsetting ones. A growing body of research now shows that confronting your deepest traumas and experiences in order to put them on the page not only makes you feel better, but can even help heal you. One remarkable scientific study demonstrates how.
Landmark study indicates that “expressive writing” has healing powers
The body of research around expressive writing had been growing for years. American social psychologist James Pennebaker is considered one of the leading voices in pioneering this area of research.
In an interview with the American Psychological Association, Pennebaker recalled wondering, “If secrets are so bad, what if we brought people in the laboratory and had them talk about them… [but] that turned out to be way too complex. How about we just had them write about it? And that was kind of the birth of expressive writing.”
Pennebaker’s remarkable research revealed that expressive writing could improve mental health, boost the immune system, and reduce doctor visits. In 2013, a group of researchers wanted to see whether these benefits could carry over even further into the physical world.
In the study, two groups of adults ages 64 and older underwent a simple biopsy procedure. It left a small wound on the upper arm that was uniform in size across all participants and could easily be monitored for changes in healing.
A Band-Aid covers a wound. Photo credit: Canva One group was assigned to perform expressive writing for 20 minutes per day, writing about its deepest thoughts and most upsetting life experiences.
The other group, rather than not writing at all, journaled daily about its activities but did so in an emotionally neutral register.
Just 11 days after the biopsy, 76% of the expressive writing group had fully healed. That’s almost double the rate of the control group, of whom only 42% had healed.
A thorough review found almost no other differences in the adults’ cognitive or physical health, which makes a powerful case that the expressive writing exercises were responsible for the improved healing.
Why emotional writing can have a physical impact
Pennebaker, for his part, recognized that deeply emotional journaling is not just about the physical act of writing.
In order to write about upsetting experiences in your life, you have to turn them over and over in your mind and confront them head-on.
“Getting people to actually sit down and confront it and to write it, you don’t have to write a lot, but you have to first of all just acknowledge it and put it into words,” Pennebaker said. “And that was really for me, the breakthrough.”
Emotional writing eases psychological stress. Feelings like anxiety and stress can have severe negative health consequences, so it stands to reason that relieving some of that stress should have a positive payoff. Less stress on the immune system, for example, means it’s better able to do its job of warding off sickness and healing wounds.
According to Harvard Health Publishing, “The process of writing may enable [people] to learn to better regulate their emotions. It’s also possible that writing about something fosters an intellectual process — the act of constructing a story about a traumatic event — that helps someone break free of the endless mental cycling more typical of brooding or rumination.”
The power of “letting it out”
A majority of scientific research agrees that learning to understand and express what’s happening inside us is a key component of mental health.
“Labeling and expressing what’s going on inside can calm our nervous system. It also gets us in touch with our internal senses and what’s going on beneath the skin, in the heart, and in the brain,” said Alli Spotts-De Lazzer, a licensed therapist. “The connection of thoughts flowing through and out may be similar to ‘name it to tame it,’ a concept related to calming emotional distress and increasing emotional regulation.”
It can be dance, it can be art, or it can be talking it out with a therapist or friend. The important thing is that expression, or disclosure, is necessary. The unique power of expressive writing, however, is that it forces us to address our biggest sources of pain and anxiety head-on.
Expressive writing has its limitations, of course.
It’s not necessarily a cure-all for people suffering from serious mental health conditions like chronic anxiety or major depression. And it can’t cure cancer or miraculously heal a broken leg.
Some research also shows that expressive writing can temporarily make people feel worse before the mental health benefits kick in. And for people who have recently undergone trauma, it may simply be too soon to write about it. Pennebaker himself advises therapists not to assign expressive writing to patients until at least a few months after an incident.
However, the study is fairly undeniable evidence of the mind-body connection. Science shows us that placebos can work wonders, even when people know they’re taking a placebo. And expressive writing research is beginning to show just how incredible the physical benefits of relieving psychological stress can be.
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Researchers found that scrolling while pooping dramatically raises your chance of getting hemorrhoids
A good reason to be mindful of your time on the toilet.
Have you ever been scrolling through social media on your phone and then suddenly wondered where all the time went? You glance at the clock and wonder, “OMG, did I really just spend 30 minutes mindlessly scrolling on this app?” Well, after a new report published in PLOS ONE, you’ll think twice about getting lost doomscrolling while sitting on the toilet.
A team of researchers at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center found that people who scroll on their phones while pooping have a much higher chance of getting hemorrhoids. Hemorrhoids are swollen veins, akin to varicose veins, that are either internal or external. They can be painful, itchy, and sometimes bleed.
Looking at your smartphone on the toilet could cause hemorrhoids
“Smartphone use on the toilet was associated with a 46% increased risk of hemorrhoids,” the paper found after adjusting for sex, age, fiber intake, and exercise activity. To come to this grim conclusion, the researchers interviewed 125 patients at the medical center and asked them about their toilet habits, including whether they scrolled through their phone or not.
A woman looking at her phone on the toilet. via Canva/Photos What the researchers found was that those who bring their phone into the bathroom spend more time on the toilet; therefore, increasing the likelihood of developing hemorrhoids. “Of all respondents, 83 (66%) used smartphones while on the toilet,” the study found. “Furthermore, smartphone users spent considerably more time on the toilet compared to non-smartphone users, with many spending more than five minutes on the toilet per visit.”
Of those who looked at the phone on the toilet, 37.3% said that they sat on the throne for six to fifteen minutes. Non-phone users sat longer than six minutes only 7.1% of the time. “The likely explanation is that prolonged sitting increases pressure in the veins around the rectum, which can contribute to hemorrhoids,” Dr. Ernesto Gonzaga, a gastroenterologist from the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, told ABC News.
“When you’re sitting on an open toilet bowl, you have no pelvic floor support,” Dr. Trisha Pasricha, the study’s senior author and a gastroenterologist and director of the Gut-Brain Research Institute at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, told CNN. The study said that 54% of people who use the phone while pooping are reading the news, and 44% said they were scrolling through social media.
The study was conducted on people 45 and over
The study was conducted on people aged 45 and older, a beneficial group to examine because some individuals in this age group don’t bring their phones to the bathroom. The study would have been much harder to conduct on younger people.
“It was helpful to have this (45 and older) group because there were people who didn’t use their smartphones on the toilet. So we had a comparison group,” Dr. Trisha Pasricha, the study’s senior author, told CNN. “Having a third of people not bringing their smartphones to the bathroom helped us understand what a baseline could look like, especially as I imagine the situation is more profound for younger individuals.”
So what can you actually do about it?
If you’re afraid of developing hemorrhoids, the first step is to make sure that, if you take your phone with you to the bathroom, you stop scrolling when you’re done evacuating your bowels. You can also eat more high fiber foods, such as fruits and vegetables, and be sure to exhale while pushing and not strain. It’s also important to keep a healthy weight and to avoid sitting for too long, whether on a toilet or in your car. Hemorrhoids are a pain in the butt, and they’re not worth it, no matter how great the latest tea is on TikTok.
This article originally appeared one year ago. It has been updated.
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Doctors kept dismissing her persistent cough. One heroic nurse refused to let it go.
“Had Alison not picked up on the fact that she was sure something else was wrong, I don’t know what would have happened.”
Julie Silverman had been coughing for years. Not the kind of cough that goes away with some rest and cough syrup, but a persistent, worsening cough that no doctor seemed able to explain or fix. As she shared on NPR’s Hidden Brain podcast in the “My Unsung Hero” segment, the experience of being dismissed by the healthcare system over and over again was exhausting.
“I had, at this point, gotten kind of dismissive about it because I had been dismissed by so many doctors as, ‘There’s nothing wrong, you’re not responding to our treatments, we’ll try something else,’” Silverman recalled.
But one person refused to dismiss her: a nurse practitioner named Alison.
A nurse checks the vitals of a patient. Photo credit: Canva Alison worked at one of the clinics Silverman visited regularly, and unlike the doctors who had cycled through various unsuccessful treatments, Alison kept paying attention. She was perplexed by the cough and made it her mission to track Silverman’s condition over time.
During one of Silverman’s weekly appointments, Alison noticed something concerning. Silverman’s symptoms had gotten worse. Her voice was hoarse, she was breathless and wheezing, and the coughing was more severe than before.
“She was just adamant something was wrong with my airway,” Silverman said.
Alison immediately pushed one of the physicians at the clinic to perform a scope of Silverman’s trachea. The procedure involved inserting a small camera through her nose and down the back of her throat to look for blockages.
“I could just tell by their faces something was not right,” Silverman remembered.
The scope revealed what years of doctor visits had missed. Silverman had idiopathic subglottic stenosis, a rare condition that affects about one in 400,000 people. Scar tissue had been building up at the top of her trachea, and her airway was 75% blocked. That’s why she’d been coughing. That’s why nothing had worked. And if it had gone untreated much longer, it would have been fatal.
“This is a very serious condition and fatal if not treated because your airway completely closes,” Silverman explained.
The diagnosis finally gave Silverman what she needed: the right information to find the right specialist who could actually treat her condition. She’s now doing well, spending her time volunteering at her local hospital, riding her bike, hiking, skiing, and enjoying time with friends and family.
But she hasn’t forgotten what Alison did for her.
“Had Alison not picked up on the fact that she was sure something else was wrong and gotten this physician to look in my throat, I don’t know what would have happened,” Silverman said. “It was her persistence and diligence and her listening to me and taking me seriously that got my diagnosis in a timely enough fashion to do something about it. So, for these reasons, Alison is my unsung hero.”
Our healthcare system is increasingly driven by rapid diagnoses and technology, but sometimes what saves a life is just simple human attention. Someone who listens, keeps watching, and refuses to dismiss what they’re seeing even when everyone else has moved on.
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She emailed her boss to request time off. The ‘gibberish’ she wrote saved her life.
“Emails I had sent to my work were gibberish, so much so that a close colleague escalated to my boss, as it frightened him.” The diagnosis that followed saved her life.
When Becca Valle woke up with chronic headaches in 2021, she did what most people do. She went to her general practitioner, got a diagnosis (migraines, probably sinus-related), took the prescribed medication, and hoped things would get better. According to PEOPLE, the then-37-year-old tried everything to manage the pain, from different medications to morning walks, but nothing worked.
After three weeks of worsening symptoms, Valle started vomiting from the pain one afternoon and immediately called her boyfriend to take her to the emergency room. Before heading out, she pulled up her email to let her boss know she needed the day off.
What she typed wasn’t a day-off request. It was gibberish.
Woman writes an email at her computer. Photo credit: Canva “Emails I had sent to my work letting them know I was signing off for the day were gibberish, so much so that a close colleague escalated to my boss, as it frightened him,” Valle recalled. By the time she was in the ER, she was texting similar incomprehensible messages to her partner, who wasn’t allowed in with her due to COVID restrictions.
The scan results showed blood in her brain. Doctors performed an emergency craniotomy, a surgery that involves removing part of the skull to access the brain. What they found required a second emergency craniotomy. Valle had glioblastoma, an aggressive type of brain cancer.
The diagnosis finally explained the “chronic migraines” that had been plaguing her for weeks. But it also put her on a path she never expected to navigate. CBS News reported that Valle immediately told her doctors she wanted to pursue every possible trial and treatment option available to her.
After consulting with her radiologist and oncologist, she connected with Dr. Graeme Woodworth, Chief of Neurosurgery at the University of Maryland Medical Center, whose clinical trials involved drug therapies administered by temporarily opening the blood-brain barrier using ultrasound treatment.
Now 42, Valle describes her diagnosis journey as “interesting” and says she’s been cancer-free for four years. She rang the “cancer is clear” bell back in 2022, though her doctors have warned that glioblastoma can recur.
Still, she’s living her life fully and has advice for anyone facing a serious medical diagnosis: “As much as you can, take control of your journey. Talk to doctors and others who have gone through the same.”
That gibberish email, the one that scared her colleague enough to escalate it up the chain, turned out to be the alarm bell that got her into the ER in time. Sometimes the things that frighten us most are exactly what we need to pay attention to.
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A Bolivian tribe has nearly zero dementia. Scientists say our specific lifestyle is why we don’t.
Only 1% of this Bolivian tribe develops dementia. They walk 17,000 steps a day, eat almost no processed food, and have never heard of a wellness trend.
When CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta traveled deep into the Bolivian Amazon to spend time with the Tsimané people, he wasn’t expecting to find a population that had essentially solved one of modern medicine’s hardest problems. But that’s close to what he found.
The Tsimané, an indigenous group of roughly 17,000 people living in the lowland jungle near the Bolivian Amazon, have a dementia rate of approximately 1 percent. Among Americans 65 and older, that figure is around 11 percent. Researchers who have studied the Tsimané extensively through peer-reviewed work published in the journals PNAS and Alzheimer’s & Dementia say the gap isn’t genetic luck. It’s lifestyle.
Members of a Bolivian tribe take a break at sunset. Photo credit: Canva The Tsimané don’t have a wellness plan. They have a life. An average member of the community walks around 17,000 steps per day, not on a treadmill but out of necessity in order to do the fishing, farming, hunting, and foraging in the forest around them. Their diet is roughly 70 percent complex carbohydrates, primarily plantains, cassava, rice, and corn, with around 15 percent fats and 15 percent protein. Processed food, added sugars, and added salts are largely absent. Their diet is dense in fiber and micronutrients like selenium, potassium, and magnesium.
They also practice intermittent fasting, but not as a trend but because food availability has natural limits. They sleep on a consistent schedule. They spend most of their waking hours physically active.
“This ideal set of conditions for disease prevention prompts us to consider whether our industrialized lifestyles increase our risk of disease,” Dr. Andrei Irimia, an associate professor at the University of Southern California who led one of the major studies, told researchers.
The contrast with American life is stark. A study published in the BMJ found that 60 percent of Americans’ daily caloric intake comes from ultra-processed foods. For children, registered dietitian Ilana Muhlstein told Fox News Digital, that figure climbs above 70 percent. The Tsimané’s cardiovascular health, separately documented in The Lancet, is similarly remarkable with some of the lowest rates of coronary artery disease ever recorded in any population.
None of this means moving to the Bolivian jungle is the answer. The Tsimané face real hardships that come with their lifestyle, including limited access to medical care for acute conditions. But researchers are increasingly clear that the chronic disease burden plaguing industrialized nations isn’t inevitable. It’s a product of specific choices about food, movement, and how we structure daily life that we’ve collectively made and could, at least in part, collectively unmake.
The Tsimané didn’t design a diet. They just never stopped moving, and never started eating processed food. The results, it turns out, are remarkable.
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Richmond hospital’s 73-year-old ‘baby cuddler’ whispers these 6 words into every newborn’s ear
He calls his volunteer baby cuddler job “the best gig I’ve ever had.”
Volunteer work is often rewarding, but few volunteer gigs are as delightfully enjoyable as baby cuddling. Maternity wards around the country train baby cuddlers who provide human comfort for newborn babies in nurseries and neonatal intensive care units (NICUs).
One Richmond, Virginia, man shared with WTVR News why he shows up at Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU every Tuesday and Thursday to hold babies. Dave Whitlow, 73, has been a baby cuddler for eight years, calling it “the best gig I’ve ever had.”
Baby cuddling involves more than just holding babies
NICU babies need specialized care. Photo credit: Canva Cuddling babies in the NICU is delicate work. Whitlow puts on a gown and gloves before picking up the babies, who can sometimes weigh as little as two pounds. He’s been trained to watch the monitors while cuddling them. If a baby’s oxygen saturation dips, they may need to be repositioned.
Whitlow, a retired local government manager, also checks with the nurses to see what a baby’s specific needs are.
“I ask the nurse, ‘Tell me. Tell me what this child is receiving. What kind of treatment? Is there anything special I need to know about it?’” the father of two and grandfather of three told WTVR.
But perhaps the best part of Whitlow’s time with the dozen or so babies he cuddles each week is what he whispers in their ear: “Grow strong, grow smart, grow kind.”
That’s really what he wants from people in general, he said.
Baby cuddling is often a great way for retired people to volunteer, as it’s not too physically demanding.
How do you become a baby cuddler?
If baby cuddling sounds like a dream volunteer opportunity, check with your local hospital to see if it has a program. Some hospitals have volunteer coordinators you can speak with or sections on their websites for volunteers.
Though volunteer requirements differ from place to place, you can likely expect:
- age requirement (often a minimum age of 18 to 21)
- commitment of a certain number of hours per week over a minimum time period (such as a year)
- personal interview
- background check
- health screening, including immunization verification and updated flu vaccines
- orientation and training
Baby cuddlers serve an important purpose in infant care
Cuddling a baby may be beneficial for the cuddler, but it genuinely helps the infants as well. One study found that the length of stay in the NICU for newborns with Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome was six days shorter for babies who were part of a volunteer baby cuddling program. And according to Intermountain Healthcare, research shows that human touch helps a baby’s brain and body develop. Short-term and long-term benefits of positive touch for babies include increased stability in vital stats, faster weight gain, shorter hospital stays, better pain tolerance, improved sleep, stronger immune systems, and more.
Baby cuddling truly is a win-win volunteer experience, especially when you’re someone who whispers words of strength, wisdom, and kindness in babies’ ears.
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Blue Zone expert shares why partying all night isn’t decadent, it’s a key to longevity
You should no longer have to fight for your right to party.
In American culture, which still carries a hint of Puritanism from its early years, excessive partying can be seen as hedonistic, immature, and unhealthy. Party people are often criticized for being undisciplined, directionless, and irresponsible with their money.
Dan Buettner, a National Geographic fellow and expert on Blue Zones, says that going out and dancing until the crack of dawn is good for us and can even help us live longer. He learned the power of partying through his research on Blue Zones, five regions of the world where people live longer and have the greatest chance of reaching 100.
The five Blue Zones are:
- Ikaria, Greece
- Loma Linda, California
- Nicoya Peninsula, Costa Rica
- Okinawa, Japan
- Sardinia, Italy
“So in America, we tend to associate partying with decadence. But in the Blue Zones, partying is actually a longevity hack,” Buettner said in an Instagram video. “Why? Because when people get together for celebrations in the Blue Zone, they’re dancing. It can be an all-night dance party where they’re getting great physical activity. They’re remaking social bonds that exist throughout the village, and they last for years.”
Buettner adds that in many Blue Zones, people don’t just party to hang out with their friends; they also help their communities.
“In Icaria, for example, people donate all the food and the wine. The partygoers pay for that food and wine, but the proceeds all go to a school or to build a bridge the village needs or to a family that’s down on its luck,” he said. “So it’s this beautiful, virtuous circle. People get physical activity, build their connections, and help others. That’s what builds a Blue Zone, and that is the foundation to longevity.”
People enjoying a dance party. Photo credit: Canva What are the “Power 9”?
According to Buettner, there are nine common denominators across the five Blue Zones, and their party habits satisfy four of them:
Move Naturally
Dancing and milling about socializing is practical exercise. “The world’s longest-lived people don’t pump iron, run marathons, or join gyms. Instead, they live in environments that constantly nudge them into moving without thinking about it.”
Downshift
A party is a great way to de-stress after a hard week. “What the world’s longest-lived people have that we don’t are routines to shed that stress.”
Wine At 5
There’s nothing wrong with having a drink or two; in fact, it may help with longevity. “People in all Blue Zones (except Adventists) drink alcohol moderately and regularly.”
Purpose
Having a party that supports the community gives people a sense of purpose. “Knowing your sense of purpose is worth up to seven years of extra life expectancy.”
People in the club. Photo credit: Canva The remaining “Power 9”
The remaining “Power 9” includes:
- 80% Rule (eating smaller meals)
- Plant Slant (eating a lot of vegetables and beans)
- Belong (having a faith-based community)
- Loved Ones First (centenarians in the Blue Zones put their families first)
- Right Tribe (strong social networks)
Buettner’s video asks us to rethink what’s really going on when people go out to party. On the one hand, it can look decadent, but on the other, we’re building stronger social connections, getting some exercise, and enjoying a few drinks—which may help us live longer.
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Love spicy food? Research shows it could reduce your risk of death by 25%.
Incredible news for those addicted to hot sauce.
American food doesn’t have a reputation for being very spicy. But if things keep going the way they have over the past 20 years, that could change. America is going through a spicy renaissance that is hard to miss at fast-casual restaurants, drive-thrus, and in the snack aisle.
As of 2025, 19 out of every 20 restaurants in the United States offer at least one spicy item. Frito-Lay now sells at least 26 varieties of Flamin’ Hot snacks, and as of last year, more than half of Americans were likely to buy an item listed as “spicy,” compared to 39% in 2015.
While this massive shift in American tastes sounds like it is bound to cause more pain than pleasure, research suggests the opposite. In fact, multiple studies associate eating spicy food with living a longer life. A 2025 study published in the Chinese Medical Journal found that people who ate spicy food at least once a week had a lower risk of vascular disease than those who rarely or never ate it.
A 2017 study from Larner College of Medicine at the University of Vermont found that Americans who ate hot red chili peppers had a 13% lower risk of death. Here is the big one: In 2020, research presented at American Heart Association Scientific Sessions, using data from more than 570,000 people, found that those who regularly consumed chili peppers had a 26% lower risk of death from cardiovascular disease and a 25% lower overall risk of death.
Bottles of hot sauce. Photo credit: Dominik Gryzbon/Pexels The studies show that eating spicy food is associated with greater longevity, but they have yet to pinpoint a direct cause. Correlation is not causation, so other lifestyle factors could be involved. However, capsaicin, the compound that gives peppers their heat, has been found to have numerous health benefits that may directly affect longevity, particularly heart health. Plus, it binds to receptors throughout the body, so its greatest benefits may yet be discovered.
According to Mayo Clinic, capsaicin has been found to increase the body’s ability to burn calories. It is also known to fight low-grade inflammation, which may contribute to heart health. One study found that capsaicin significantly reduced risk factors in adults with low HDL cholesterol levels.
Indonesian sambal. Photo credit: Fadli Octora Channel/Pexels “Chili peppers have many life-extending benefits and can be used in many meal preparation strategies,” Dr. Philip Goglia told Your Tango. “Capsaicin, which can be found in chilies, has been shown through past studies to have antibacterial, anticarcinogenic, and anti-diabetic properties. Additionally, it can reduce cholesterol levels in obese individuals.”
In a world where things that taste good are often bad for your health, this is great news for people who love food with a kick. It is a great excuse to carry a little bottle of Tabasco wherever you go. If you are not into spicy food but want the health benefits of capsaicin, take it slow by trying a little spice here and there, and you may build a tolerance. Before you know it, you could be graduating from mild chicken wings to Molten Lava Atomic Inferno sauce and cruising down the road to longevity.
