Mind & body, in brief

The World Health Organization (WHO), the United Nations' health agency, published its new Global Health Estimates on 2 October: a count of what people die of and fall ill from, country by country, from 2000 to 2023. [1]

A baby born in 2023 could expect to live 73.3 years on average worldwide, almost back to the 73.4 years of 2019, before COVID. [1]

Years lived in good health have come back more slowly: 62.8 years in 2023, still 0.4 years below 2019. [1]

Illnesses that are not caught from other people, such as heart disease, diabetes and dementia, caused 74% of deaths in 2023, against 58% in 2000. [1]

Dementia, the loss of memory and thinking that stops people managing daily life, was the 19th cause of death in 2000, the 7th in 2021 and the 5th in 2023. [1][2]

Deaths from dementia tripled between 2000 and 2023. [1] About 57 million people lived with it in 2021, and there are nearly 10 million new cases a year. [3]

A count is not the same as a risk. A separate analysis of Global Burden of Disease data found new dementia cases rose 141% from 1992 to 2021, while the rate of new cases at each age stayed about level. [6]

The risk of dementia climbs steeply with age, that analysis found, and the number of older people is growing fast: 1.1 billion people were 60 or over in 2023, and WHO expects 2.1 billion by 2050. [6][8]

Anxiety and depression rose per person, not only in number. WHO's measure of healthy years lost, adjusted to take out the effect of an older population, rose about 20% for depression and about 45% for anxiety from 2019 to 2023. [1]

A Global Burden of Disease study found a similar rise in depression in the pandemic years: from about 594 healthy years lost per 100,000 people in 2019 to 681 in 2021. [7]

About 470 million people had an anxiety disorder in 2023, and only about one in four who need treatment get any. [4] About 322 million people have depression. [5]

In low-income countries, illnesses caught from other people caused less than half of all deaths in 2023, for the first time. [1] Heart disease from narrowed arteries is still the biggest killer, with about 9.5 million deaths. [1]

Why it matters. The next test is whether WHO's later estimates show the 0.4-year gap in healthy life closing, and whether the age-adjusted rise in anxiety and depression keeps climbing or falls back after the pandemic years. [1]

From 1 October, refugees in the US began losing Medicaid, the US government's health cover for people on low incomes. [11] The change comes from H.R. 1, the budget law Republicans passed in 2025, which narrowed which immigrants can get Medicaid. [11] KFF Health News estimates 280,000 people will lose it in October, including people let in on humanitarian grounds who are waiting for a green card. [11] Mustafa Rfat, a social work professor who arrived as a refugee from Iraq, says more than a third of refugees have at least one disability. [11]

Why it matters. Rfat says refugee parents of disabled children now call him not knowing how they will get medicines. [11] These are people who fled war or persecution, and many arrived with physical or mental illness. [11]

Montana began enforcing work rules for Medicaid on 1 October, three months before the US deadline of 1 January 2027. [12][14] Adults covered must show they work, volunteer or study 80 hours a month, or prove they are exempt, for example as a carer or as medically frail. [12] The state cannot yet check university enrolment automatically, so students must find and send the paperwork themselves. [12] Nebraska started first, in May. Of its new applicants, 46% met the rules, 39% were exempt and 14% were refused or cut off. [13]

Why it matters. The 2025 law makes 44 US states, counting Washington DC, impose these rules from January. [14] Advocates fear the early start in Montana, Nebraska and Arkansas will cost thousands of eligible people their cover over confusing rules. [12]

Hillsborough County in Florida, whose main city is Tampa, declared a local state of emergency over dengue on 24 September. [9] Health officials there had recorded 134 confirmed cases. [9] Dengue is a virus spread by mosquitoes, and its pain is so severe it is nicknamed breakbone fever. [9] A Yale-led study of earlier Florida outbreaks found they began from frequent new arrivals of the virus, mostly from the Caribbean. [10] Warmer weather that suits the mosquitoes, and more cases brought in by travellers, were the biggest risk factors. [10]

Why it matters. The emergency lets the county ask the state and federal government for help with spraying and warnings. [9] The study found no sign yet that the virus survives in Florida from one season to the next. [10]

NPR analysed federal records on 505,591 children in US foster care in 2025. [15] Only 60% were marked as disabled or not, and almost half of those had a disability. [15] Its reporting found disabled children stay in foster care longer and come out with the worst results. [15] One of them, Christian Williams, died at 15 of diabetes complications in a group home in Mesa, Arizona, after a staff member told police he was pretending. [15]

Why it matters. Researchers' estimates of how many children in foster care are disabled run from 25% to 80%, depending on how disability is counted. [15] The federal data alone cannot say how many disabled children are in care. [15]

Two Polish groups, Women Help Women and the Abortion Dream Team, opened a 22-compartment locker for abortion pills in Warsaw this week. [16] A woman collects her pills with a six-digit code. [16] Poland bans almost all abortions, and handing someone the pills is a crime punishable by up to three years in prison, though taking them is not. [16] The groups say a machine in between makes the law unclear. [16]

Why it matters. About 50,000 people contacted Poland's network of pro-choice groups last year for help. [16] Prime Minister Donald Tusk said in 2025 there was no majority in parliament to change the law. [16]

Ten staff at East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust, which runs hospitals in eastern England, were removed from duty or suspended. [17] The breach involved the medical records of Noah Woods, a three-year-old found dead in a pond in Brantham, Suffolk, in September. [17] The trust reported the breach to the Information Commissioner's Office, the UK data watchdog. [17] NHS England's chief executive, Sir Jim Mackey, has ordered every trust to strengthen protection of records. [17]

Why it matters. The trust found the breach only because it went looking, as the case was in the news. [17] The data watchdog says a series of recent cases paints an extremely worrying picture. [17]

A review published this week looks at psychedelic drugs for disorders of consciousness: coma, and the states where a brain-injured person is awake but shows little or no awareness. [26] Drugs such as psilocybin, from magic mushrooms, and LSD act on one serotonin receptor and change how brain areas link up. [26] In these patients the links between brain areas are weak, which is why the idea appeals. [26] The authors say the human evidence so far comes from pilot studies and single cases. [26]

Why it matters. No controlled trial has shown lasting recovery of awareness, and the right dose and safety are still unknown. [26] There are few treatments of any kind for these patients. [26]

Thirty adults with anxiety disorders took a four-week course of mindful attention, slow breathing and heart-rate feedback. [20] Heart-rate variability is the small change in time between heartbeats; more of it usually means the calming side of the nervous system is in control. [20] Scores for anxiety felt in the moment fell 18%, and scores for a person's usual level of anxiety fell 11.5%. [20] Heart-rate variability rose within sessions but did not change steadily across the four weeks. [20]

Why it matters. The study had no comparison group, so some of the fall could come from time passing or from expecting to feel better. [20] The authors say it needs a proper randomised trial. [20]

A Dutch study scanned 105 people with early Parkinson's disease, a brain illness that slows movement, and 37 healthy people on a powerful 7 Tesla MRI scanner. [22] Thirty-one of the patients had anxiety. [22] The worse the anxiety, the smaller the caudate, a deep brain area involved in movement and reward. [22] Anxious patients also showed changes in the shape of the thalamus and the amygdala, the brain's threat detector. [22]

Why it matters. Anxiety is common in Parkinson's, and little is known about what drives it in the brain. [22] The patients were scanned once, so it cannot show which change came first. [22]

Some people with Parkinson's struggle to turn over or move in bed at night, a symptom called nocturnal hypokinesia. [23] Researchers matched 44 patients who have it with 44 who do not and tracked their steps for five days with a wrist tracker. [23] Those with the night symptom walked fewer steps a day and walked backwards more slowly. [23] Some test differences faded once fear of falling was taken into account. [23]

Why it matters. The authors call the night symptom disabling and under-recognised. [23] The link with daily steps was the most robust finding. [23]

Researchers looked at 6,550 people aged 65 or over who take ten or more medicines, through their family doctors' records. [31] 83% took at least one drug that blocks acetylcholine, a chemical messenger the nerves and brain use. [31] One scoring tool put 50% of them at high risk from these drugs, while two other tools put about a quarter there. [31] Lorazepam, a sleeping and anxiety pill, and tramadol, a painkiller, contributed most. [31]

Why it matters. The answer to who is at risk depended on which tool was used. [31] The burden was highest in women, people with dementia and people on 15 or more medicines. [31]

A study of 39,468 US women in the Sister Study, run by the US National Institutes of Health, followed them after their child-bearing years. [30] Over more than half a million years of follow-up, 2,874 developed type 2 diabetes. [30] Women whose pregnancy history pointed to a higher tendency to miscarry had a higher risk. [30] That held even after allowing for gestational diabetes, the high blood sugar some women get in pregnancy. [30]

Why it matters. A woman's pregnancy history may carry early warning of diabetes years later. [30] The study shows a link, not a cause.

Researchers scored the diets of 23,794 US adults from a national health survey run from 2005 to 2018 on how closely they matched a Mediterranean diet. [29] People with higher scores had about 29% lower odds of having high blood pressure. [29] The link was stronger in women, in people without diabetes and in non-drinkers. [29]

Why it matters. Diet and blood pressure were measured at the same time, so the survey cannot show which came first. [29] The authors call for trials to test it. [29]

In a randomised trial, people with relapsing multiple sclerosis (MS), a disease in which the immune system attacks nerve coatings, ate a fasting-style diet, a ketogenic diet or a usual diet for nine months. [24] A ketogenic diet is very low in carbohydrate and high in fat. [24] A new look at the data found the keto group's gut bacteria shifted in ways that went with less damage on brain scans. [24]

Why it matters. The authors call the findings exploratory and say they need checking. [24] It adds to the idea that gut and brain affect each other, but does not show the diet treats MS.

Researchers found a protein called TIA1 fell in the hippocampus, a memory area of the brain, in mice under long stress. [21] Removing it from certain brain cells made the mice's depression-like behaviour worse. [21] TIA1 holds down another gene, Cacna2d1. [21] Blocking that gene, with genetics or a drug, reversed the extra low mood. [21]

Why it matters. It names a new target for depression research. [21] The work is in mice, and mice show depression only through behaviour tests.

Researchers compared the gut bacteria of 103 people with methamphetamine addiction and 80 people without it. [27] A set of 30 bacteria told the two groups apart in a separate test group, scoring 0.82 on a scale where 1 is perfect and 0.5 is a coin toss. [27] Over six months of stopping the drug, the 30 bacteria taken together did not change much. [27] One bacterium, Ruminococcus gnavus, went with more depressive symptoms early in withdrawal. [27]

Why it matters. Doctors have no objective test for this addiction, and the authors present the bacteria as a candidate marker. [27] It is a first step, not a test anyone can use yet.

Khat is a leaf people chew as a mild stimulant, and chewing it is common among university students in Yemen. [28] A survey of medical students at Thamar University found those who chewed every day had almost eight times the odds of sleeping under six hours. [28] The more days a week they chewed, the shorter their sleep. [28] Chewing had no link with exam results. [28]

Why it matters. The study is a single survey, so it cannot show what caused what. [28] Short sleep was the clearest cost the students carried.

Shoppers in Britain spent 34.8 million pounds on bacon made without nitrites in the year to 6 September, up 11.4%. [19] Nitrites are salts used to cure meat; they stop dangerous bacteria growing. [19] The UK Food Standards Agency says there is no evidence meat made without them is safer. [19] Eating about 50g of processed meat a day, two rashers, is linked to a 16% higher risk of bowel cancer, and no single ingredient has been shown to cause it. [19]

Why it matters. Shoppers are paying for a change the UK food regulator says has not been shown to make bacon safer. [19] Removing nitrites means the meat must be kept safe some other way. [19]

The Royal College of Nursing, the UK union for more than 500,000 nurses, ended its partnership with Teva UK. [18] Teva is one of the NHS's biggest suppliers of medicines. [18] The union said further checks found Teva operations that had faced legal sanctions. [18] Over the last decade Teva has been ordered to pay about 1 billion pounds in Europe and the US, over bribery, price-fixing and blocking rivals. [18] Pro-Palestinian nursing groups had campaigned against the Israeli company. [18]

Why it matters. Teva said it was disappointed and that healthcare was being politicised. [18] Campaigners now want the Royal College of Pharmacy to drop Teva too. [18]

Fifteen healthy volunteers had a 7 Tesla MRI scan before and up to four hours after a dye was injected into a vein. [25] The dye showed up within 30 minutes along veins at the top of the brain, then faded. [25] It reached the sheath around the optic nerve later. [25] The fluid-filled spaces themselves changed less and more slowly. [25]

Why it matters. Fluid moving in and out of the living brain is hard to study, and repeated scans of healthy adults like these are scarce. [25] Fifteen people is a small group.

Researchers recorded 624 single brain cells in three people with electrode grids in the superior temporal gyrus, a brain area that handles heard speech. [33] As the people listened to speech, cells tracking speech sounds lined up with the meaning of whole words. [33] That suggests the brain predicts what it expects to hear and uses it to shape the sounds. [33] Recordings from the brain's surface missed the effect. [33]

Why it matters. Recordings of single cells caught what the surface recordings missed. [33] Three people is a small group.

A study followed 2,164 children in Taiwan at ages three, four and five. [32] When a family read together more than usual, the child had less screen time the next year. [32] When screen time rose more than usual, shared reading fell the next year. [32] The study measured the same children three times, so it could see which came first. [32]

Why it matters. Both habits stayed fairly steady from year to year, and each still predicted less of the other. [32] The authors suggest helping families with both habits together. [32]

A Polish study compared 1,348 children born in three periods: 1992 to 1997, 2003 to 2008 and 2019 to 2022. [35] Children born in the two earlier periods sat up, stood and walked at younger ages than those born around the COVID pandemic. [35] Breastfed babies sat up a little earlier, and so did babies whose mothers had school rather than university education. [35] Parents reported the ages in questionnaires. [35]

Why it matters. It is one country and relies on parents' memories. [35] The study does not prove the pandemic caused the delay.

A Japanese trial gave 300 people four weeks of meals: matched to Japan's nutrient guides, the same with less carbohydrate and more fat, or meals short of nutrients. [34] Belly fat and the stress and sleep hormones measured did not differ. [34] LDL cholesterol, the kind that clogs arteries, fell in both nutrient-matched groups. [34] A test of biological age looked better only in a small group of older men. [34]

Why it matters. The main goals were missed, and the authors call the other results hypotheses. [34] Four weeks is too short to show any effect on disease.

Researchers in China followed 567 adults with cirrhosis, scarring of the liver, for 12 months. [37] One in five had a clear drop in quality of life. [37] The drop hit 40% of those whose liver was failing, against 12% of those whose liver still coped. [37] People who got more practical help from others were much less likely to decline. [37]

Why it matters. Support at home may matter alongside medical care in this illness. [37] The study shows a link, not that the help caused it.

Sally Williams told the BBC she spent almost 11 months in hospital, across eight admissions, as her mental health collapsed over three years. [38] She left her finance job and was separated from her teenage son. [38] Nobody linked it to perimenopause, the years of hormone change before periods stop, which commonly starts around 46. [38] She says hormone replacement therapy brought her back to life. [38]

Why it matters. Its symptoms include anxiety, mood swings and brain fog, which can be mistaken for other illnesses. [38] It is one person's account, not a study.

Letter-writers to the BMJ, a medical journal, discussed a Danish nationwide study of menopause hormone therapy. [39] It found hormone pills linked to more clots in the veins, strokes and heart attacks, and patches and gels overall were not. [39] The writers note far fewer women used patches, so some results were uncertain. [39] A Swedish study linked combined patch therapy with more clots. [39]

Why it matters. Choices about hormone therapy often turn on clot risk. [39] The letter argues that the whole treatment, not only the route, may set the risk. [39]

Felipe De Brigard, a philosopher and brain scientist at Duke University, has won an 800,000-dollar MacArthur fellowship. [36] He is only the second philosopher to win one in 30 years. [36] He studies how the brain rebuilds memories by filling gaps, using the same machinery it uses to imagine. [36] His experiments found the hippocampus is needed to imagine what might have happened to oneself. [36]

Why it matters. He studies why false memories form and why people dwell on choices they did not make. [36]