5 Healthyish Things, including receipts and red glasses

Okay, so Huberman says he swears by wearing red tinted glasses at night to reduce cortisol, relax, and sleep better. He recently announced a partnership with Roka, a high-end, performance-focused eyewear brand, and launched $165 Wind Down glasses. These seem to be a little controversial—there’s mixed science about bright light at night, and how much good a pair of red glasses would actually do you. Basically IDKID. Plus, Redditors say you can just buy glasses that do the same thing on Amazon for $10. 🤷🏼‍♂️ 

But this highlights to me the palpable tension between promoting products while trying to maintain a reputation for sharing unbiased, science-backed education. Health influencers like Huberman and Attia have gotten some flack for this lately. I can’t count how many products Jillian Michaels endorses. I mean I get why they do it—they make a lot of money and can (theoretically) make sure the products are to their liking. But I also think when someone you follow goes from being a trusted expert to capitalizing on the wellness and health market, it’s usually a recipe for skepticism. Maybe it’s different in other spaces, but trust in health seems particularly hard to earn and easy to lose.

When I ran my first company Greatist, we built a huge audience by publishing science-backed, expert approved content. And though there were many brands who wanted to partner with me/us back then (many of whom ended up super successful), I always felt there was a conflict of interest and a line we shouldn’t cross.

Anyway, my point is health influencers selling products should always make you think twice. Like I know I just asked for olive oil recommendations, but I’ll pass on Bryan Johnson’s. 😂

Some products really do improve sleep, and I’d argue a white noise machine is one of them. We have them in every bedroom, and they regularly help me, my wife, and my kiddos sleep better. (Shouts to our pediatrician who suggested it in the first place!)

I don’t even need to dive into the science. Living in a city is noisy, and white noise dulls those noises. Now it’s hard to sleep without it! My wife and I swear by this machine from LectroFan, but there’s also a White Noise app I use (on “fan”) when I’m in a pinch. If you haven’t tried white noise, maybe you should?

A new study claims cutting sugar during pregnancy and in the early years of life can have a big impact on long-term health. Eeeveryone’s been talking about it. 

What I love most about this study is how clever the researchers were. Instead of asking thousands of pregnant women to ditch sugar (which would be cruel), they looked at a unique slice of history in UK’s sugar rationing during WWII. They dug into health records from 60,000 adults who were conceived or born within that window of time and found they were 35% less likely to develop type 2 diabetes and 20% less likely to develop hypertension! People who did ultimately end up with these conditions didn’t develop them until later in life.

Of course, the idea that limiting sugar during pregnancy and early childhood leads to better health down the road makes a lot of logical sense.

I think a lot about what my wife and I are feeding our toddlers. We try to minimize sugar, but avoiding sugary snacks and foods is nearly impossible—especially when you’re busy and don’t have time to make everything from scratch (like, who does?). This study makes me want to do a better job.

Most receipts are printed on thermal paper, which contains BPAs—chemicals that are easily absorbed into the bloodstream and mess with your hormones. Studies show people who touch thermal receipts have higher levels of BPA in their system. 

While BPA is not something you want in your body, the question really is: How much BPA is actually dangerous? Most studies have people handling receipts for hours, which isn’t realistic for your average person. And even then they say they don’t have a high enough dose. So… touching a receipt for a hot second probably won’t make you infertile or give you cancer.

That said, I still try to avoid receipts as much as possible. It would be nice if companies would just… stop using BPA altogether. 🙄 The EU’s recent ban on BPAs will go into effect soon. Maybe in 40-50 years, we’ll see people are healthier without it.

This recently viral TikTok on the topic and this whole thing is probably just more fearmongering based off scant scientific evidence (at best). There’s a lot of that going on right now. 😑

@drtaniaelliott

Don’t touch this! ✋🏼 Most receipts use thermal paper containing bisphenols, or BPA, and they are easily absorbed into the bloodstream. ☠... See more

A once hyped primary care startup called Forward shut its doors abruptly this week—despite having raised $657M (not a typo) and $100M just 12 months ago. They were early to promote diagnostics (and at one point had almost ubiquitous ads touting all their cool scanning technology). More recently, they talked about building self-serve, AI-driven healthcare kiosks. Some smart people I respect have already shared their take: Jay Parkinson, Chrissy Farr, and Chris Hogg

My take: I interacted with Founder & CEO Adrian Aoun a few times—he invested a minor amount in my last startup—and he was, er, quite the salesperson. And I’m not sure that’s a compliment. I never understood Forward—mostly because I never saw or knew anyone that used it. 😬 Like ever. And I know people who regularly consume bovine colostrum powder!

Maaaybe they were “too early” given consumer health diagnostics and lab tests have never been more popular. And I find it tough not to champion and support big swings. But also maaaybe—just maybe—it was all a big scam. It’s really hard to see how it moved the space forward.

The Healthyish League

Building something in health? I love to help and love to recommend others who help, too. Here are a few of my carefully selected recommendations, all of which I’ve personally worked with (and some of which I have a formal relationship with): Herman-Scheer (branding & creative), Aequitas Partners (exec & board recruiting), Healthyish Content (my SEO & content agency), Perceptual Advisors (comms & public affairs), Right Side Up/Lantern/Matchnode (growth marketing), Verbose (embedded lifecycle marketing), Titan (exec coaching), and Lakehouse (pre-seed venture capital). Email me anytime for intros.