Health news

Turmeric is having a moment – High Street chain Holland & Barrett revealed it was its best-selling supplement across all categories last year, even more popular than multivitamins.

The golden-yellow spice, used for centuries in Indian cooking, is attracting attention for its potential anti-inflammatory effects; proponents claim it can help ease everything from joint pain to indigestion and prediabetes.

Much of the scientific interest centres on curcumin, the main active compound in turmeric. For instance, in May a major review found curcumin could reduce pain and improve joint function in people with osteoarthritis, and some effects were comparable to non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs such as ibuprofen, reported the journal Frontiers in Medicine.

‘Curcumin has been shown to reduce inflammation by blocking the activity of the enzymes that cause the body’s inflammatory response in conditions such as arthritis,’ says Anthony Booker, a reader in ethnopharmacology (how different cultures use plants for medicinal purposes) at the University of Westminster, and a leading turmeric researcher.

‘Many modern painkillers target pain by blocking these same enzymes. There is some evidence to suggest that curcumin can also lower blood sugar levels – possibly by making cells more responsive to insulin, so they clear more sugar from the bloodstream – and so it may have a use in the management of type 2 diabetes and in prediabetes [where blood sugar is higher than normal but not enough to warrant a diabetes diagnosis].

‘There is also early evidence for its use in the treatment of heartburn and digestive problems – potentially by reducing gut inflammation.’

Studies suggest beneficial doses of curcumin start from 160mg, but comparing products on shop shelves is not straightforward, as names are used interchangeably: some state the amount of turmeric root or powder they contain, while others list curcumin or total curcuminoids (which includes curcumin and two other compounds with a lesser anti-inflammatory effect).

For reference, there is roughly 100mg of curcumin in a teaspoon of turmeric powder. The European Food Safety Authority sets a daily safe limit of 210mg of curcumin for an average adult, which is roughly two teaspoons of turmeric powder – so an amount people who cook Indian food might easily use.

Turmeric, the golden-yellow spice used for centuries in Indian cooking, is attracting attention for its potential anti-inflammatory effects

Another challenge is that curcumin is fat-soluble and doesn’t dissolve in water, so much of it is broken down and excreted before it can be absorbed by the body.

To get round this, products are often made with black pepper extract (piperine) or with added fat, which helps its absorption.

‘There is evidence that piperine can increase absorption up to 20 times,’ says Anthony Booker. But boosting absorption by this much could mean a product exceeds the safe dosage directions, so always check the label, he adds.

‘My research also suggests that the quality of curcumin supplement can be variable – especially with products bought online.’

We asked him to assess some of the turmeric products on the market, which we then rated…

Budget tablets

Holland & Barrett Turmeric, £14.85 for 90 capsules, hollandandbarrett.com

The traditional way to take this type of turmeric is to add a teaspoon or two to full-fat milk with some black pepper and drink

CLAIM: 500mg turmeric per capsule, ‘supports joint health’. Take one a day.

EXPERT VERDICT: Plain turmeric at this dosage will only give about 25mg of active curcumin. While this is safe, it doesn’t reach the beneficial dose used in studies for arthritis, for example.

This also contains magnesium stearate and silicon dioxide (which stop the powder clumping) – and some people prefer to avoid these, as they see them as unnecessary chemical additives.

The traditional way to take turmeric is to add a teaspoon or two to full-fat milk with some black pepper and drink – or add to oil when cooking: this would be much cheaper and more effective as you would be getting closer to 200mg of curcumin – eight times the amount in this product. 3/10

High absorption 

Healthspan Opti-Turmeric, £14.99 for 30, healthspan.co.uk

CLAIM: Each capsule contains 500mg liquid curcumin, plus 20mg vitamin C, wrapped in a fatty capsule, ‘to make it 185 times better-absorbed than a standard tablet’. ‘Ideal for cartilage formation and immune support.’ Take one or two a day.

EXPERT VERDICT: This is a high-dose and relatively low-cost product with increased absorption properties – here the curcumin is wrapped in emulsifiers and fats, which makes it easier for the gut to absorb, so the science is sound.

This product uses a dosage similar to that used in clinical trials, so may well be effective – but always discuss taking a supplement with a healthcare professional if you have an existing medical condition, or take prescription medication, to ensure it doesn’t interact. 7/10

Juice

Fushi fresh-pressed turmeric juice, £26 for 500ml, fushiwellbeing.com

CLAIM: Freshly squeezed turmeric root, ‘boosts & defends immune system’. There’s 60g of turmeric root per 30ml serving.

EXPERT VERDICT: Studies show that 30ml of turmeric juice can contain anything from 30-120mg of curcumin, depending on the extraction process.

This is a relatively low amount and doesn’t reach the minimum therapeutic dose used in most trials of around 160mg.

Curcumin is also poorly soluble in water, so in this format much of it won’t reach the bloodstream.

Adding black pepper before you drink it might help – but all in all this is a very expensive way to get a pretty low dose of curcumin. 1/10

Oral drops

Hinnao Technology sublingual turmeric, £54.99 for 30ml, healf.com

Sublingual (absorbed through the soft tissue into the bloodstream) delivery can also be very effective in increasing absorption in people with gut issues

CLAIM: ‘Uses lipid [fat] technology to allow absorption through the mouth.’ Put 0.5ml in your mouth, hold for 60-90 seconds, then swallow. Turmeric extract 200mg per 0.5ml daily serving.

EXPERT VERDICT: This contains 200mg turmeric, of which 95 per cent is curcumin – so you get 190mg daily, which is a safe and therapeutic dose.

In theory, sublingual (absorbed through the soft tissue into the bloodstream) delivery can also be very effective in increasing absorption in people with gut issues such as Crohn’s disease, as it completely bypasses the gut.

But the specific product claims here about the timing have only been tested on a lab model simulating the mouth tissue. 7/10

Gummies

Novomins 4,000mg turmeric gummies, £19.99 for 60, boots.com

Gummies are popular, including for people who struggle to swallow pills, but the high added sugar needs to be considered

CLAIM: ‘With black pepper extracts to increase the bioavailability of turmeric and added vitamin D to support your immune system.’ Take two gummies a day.

EXPERT VERDICT: The information regarding the dose is quite confusing – consumers may well assume two gummies provide 4,000mg of 95 per cent pure curcumin, but the 4,000mg refers to turmeric root – what you are getting here is 200mg of pure turmeric extract, which is 95 per cent curcumin, and the amount of curcumin is decent. It also contains black pepper extracts, which will help its absorption.

The added vitamin D allows for the health claims, but it’s a fairly negligible amount at 1.25mcg per two gummies – the NHS recommends adults take a 10mcg supplement per day at this time of year.

Gummies are popular, including for people who struggle to swallow pills, but the high added sugar needs to be considered. 5/10

Premium capsules

BioCare MicroCell curcumin turmeric complex, £43.75 for 60, biocare.co.uk

CLAIM: 500mg curcumin per two capsules, plus 10mg ginger and 25mg pine bark, ‘to support inflammation and immune balance’. ‘Emulsified to make it 144 times better absorbed.’

EXPERT VERDICT: The curcumin here is emulsified – broken into tiny droplets and mixed with fat – said to help with absorption.

There is little evidence to suggest that this combination of compounds would be more effective than a pure turmeric extract. And it’s also very expensive. 6/10

Tea

Nutra Joint curcumin and piperine tea, £5.99 for 20 tea bags, nutratea.co.uk

CLAIM: Made with 50 per cent curcumin, 30 per cent green tea and 20 per cent piperine, ‘to help maintain normal joint mobility and flexibility’. Each tea bag contains 20-50g curcumin and can be reused up to three times a day.

EXPERT VERDICT: The absorption will be limited as curcumin isn’t water-soluble – although the added piperine will help a bit.

Obviously, re-using a tea bag up to three times, as the maker suggests, will result in a progressively lower dose on each subsequent use.

This is not the easiest way to take curcumin unless you particularly enjoy the taste. It’s also relatively expensive. 3/10

The belly button is probably best known as either a source of mystery fluff or the site of 1990s pop stars’ rebellious piercings.

But a new study suggests the navel should be taken more seriously – the particular scent of an individual’s belly button could reveal vital clues to their health.

Researchers analysed the odours captured on swabs that had been swept across people’s nostrils, belly buttons and outer ears.

Those body parts were chosen for testing based on the idea that they might be ‘odour reservoirs’ where deodorants, perfumes and other external chemicals were less likely to interfere with natural scent.

Using laser technology that identified patterns in the odour chemicals allowed them to tell who was in good health, and who had Parkinson’s disease, Covid-19 or mild cognitive impairment.

Samples from the belly button are a good source of body odour chemicals because they are ‘not disturbed by soap too often’, says lead researcher Dr Thorsten Graunke, an expert in digital sensory perception from the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits in Germany – who suggested the study could pave the way for a kind of ‘rough’ at-home screening for various illnesses.

Each of us is surrounded by a unique and invisible cloud of chemical gases, called volatile organic compounds, or VOCs.

‘The human body constantly sheds VOCs through normal metabolic processes,’ explains Dr Graunke. ‘Every time we exhale, sweat or shed microscopic skin cells, we release a unique cloud of these chemicals – collectively known as the human volatilome.’

Samples from the belly button are a good source of body odour chemicals because they are ‘not disturbed by soap too often’

The volatilome can change when someone has a disease or an infection. Stories of pets sensing an owner’s cancer before they had even noticed symptoms themselves are probably due to the animals’ more sensitive noses picking up on those changes, scientists say.

The new study, published in Scientific Reports, attempted to sample the volatilome by swabbing participants’ nostrils, belly button and the ear’s concha (just behind the opening of the ear canal).

Six participants were in good health, while six others were known to have Parkinson’s, Covid-19 or mild cognitive impairment. They focused on those conditions because earlier research found links with changes in body odours.

Each site was swabbed for around ten seconds. Then the swabs were put into sealed, Ziplock bags and frozen at -20C (-4F) to preserve the compounds. The samples were then tested with laser-based photoacoustic spectroscopy, which involves shining light of different wavelengths on the gases, which vibrate in response. Different chemicals create vibrations that give a distinct pattern.

The researchers were able to identify which illnesses participants had based on those patterns – with the clearest signals coming from nose and belly button swabs.

They also found the most important information could be captured using only a handful of wavelengths, which ‘could speed up measurements in future and simplify the setup,’ says Dr Graunke.

The swabs from the healthy controls and people with Parkinson’s disease or cognitive impairment were taken in an odourless hospital room. For infection-control reasons, the Covid patients took the samples themselves.

Does that suggest that one day, people could take the samples themselves at home? ‘Possibly!’ says Dr Graunke. ‘These swabs could be used as rough screening.

‘Our vision is to build a handheld device where swabs can be inserted,’ he says, while stressing that is ‘a long-term vision, not currently within reach’. This was only a small pilot study, he adds – the team is seeking funding to use the method in a larger group.

Professor James Logan, an olfactory science expert and founder of Digital Odour Technologies, a spin-out from London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, says: ‘I’m always excited to see studies like this because the more we can understand odour and use different methods to try and figure out what’s going on there, then the better we can use it.’

His company has developed a handheld device to detect VOCs in odours to spot if a patient has dengue or malaria.

In medicine, the main advantage of odour detection over traditional samples such as blood or saliva is that it is non-invasive, says Professor Logan.

‘Odour also tends to change at a very early stage of infection,’ he adds. Dogs trained to smell Covid-19 can detect the disease earlier than lateral flow tests.

The use of odour as a diagnostic tool is in its infancy, but examples include medical detection dogs that can detect imminent seizures, or dangerous swings in blood sugar levels in those with diabetes.

‘With the sector moving at pace, I think this will change soon and we will start to see machines that can smell and tell us when we are ill,’ says Professor Logan. ‘One day it will be as small as a smartwatch.’

A growing body of research suggests every disease will have a distinct odour, down to a very specific level, he says. ‘Some studies have shown you can tell the difference between two different types of the flu, for example.’

Belly button sampling makes sense, he adds. ‘Previous studies have looked at the armpits, because they tend to be very smelly. But people use deodorant, and the chemical compounds in the deodorant mask the disease-linked VOCs. Even when you stop using it for a while, there’ll still be remnants of the deodorant, and that can interfere with testing.

‘So somewhere around the abdomen area is quite good, because it’s less likely to be contaminated with other things.’

The drug firms behind blockbuster jabs like Wegovy, Mounjaro and Ozempic are facing at least 90 legal claims from patients who say the drugs left them with permanent vision loss.

Slimmers in the US say the injections caused a condition that cuts off blood supply to the optic nerve, often referred to as an ‘eye stroke’.

The appetite-suppressing drugs are thought to damage the tiny blood vessels that feed the back of the eye, although this has not been fully proven.

However the risk is recognised by the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA), who earlier this year issued a warning about the injections’ link to the condition – named non-arteritic anterior ischaemic optic neuropathy, or NAION.

Meanwhile research published in 2024 found users of semaglutide – the ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy – were around four times more likely to develop the problem than those taking other diabetes treatment.

However other experts have questioned the validity of the claims, arguing that there is little scientific evidence to prove the jabs cause the eye condition. 

The makers of Wegovy and Mounjaro are facing at least 90 legal claims from patients claiming the jabs gave them a condition that can cause permanent blindness

Just shy of 100 lawsuits have been filed against Novo Nordisk – the makers of Wegovy and Ozempic – since 2025 by personal-injury firm Weitz and Luxenberg, according to the Wall Street Journal (WSJ).

All of the patients are said to have developed NAION while using the drugs, known as GLP-1 agonists.

One claimant, 53-year-old Michelle Fennell, told the newspaper that she began experiencing blurred vision around six months after she started Ozempic.

At the time, she was using the injection for her type 2 diabetes, a disease the drug is approved to treat in the US and the UK.

Ms Fennell said her right eye began to feel heavy and her peripheral vision suddenly weakened. Her doctor diagnosed NAION two weeks later.

‘[The doctor] said right away, stop taking Ozempic,’ Fennell said. ‘I was shocked.’

NAION, which affects around 1,400 to 7,000 people in the UK every year, is an incurable condition that develops when blood flow to the optic nerve, which carries images from the eye to the brain, is reduced or blocked.

This deprives the nerve of oxygen, causing sudden, and often permanent, vision loss.

Studies have suggested that those most at risk of the condition include older people, smokers and those with diabetes and high blood pressure.

‘We have not had enough data yet to look at how the addition of GLP-1 medications compounds each of these risks,’ Drew Carey, associate professor of clinical ophthalmology and neurology at Johns Hopkins Medicine, told the BMJ.

‘But the best estimates thus far suggest a twofold increase in risk with these medications, and that typically only occurs in patients at high risk.’ 

Another US claimant, Jay Vandegriff, was also taking Ozempic for type 2 diabetes, having been prescribed the jab in 2023.  

Around a year later, the now 69-year-old began noticing changes to his vision, which he thought were a smudge on his glasses. 

After cleaning them, however, he realised the problem was with his eyes.

Soon after, he was diagnosed with NAION, which he says has taken two-thirds of the sight in his left eye.

‘It’s affecting every minute of every day,’ he told the WSJ. ‘I’d almost pay anything to get my eyesight back.’

Separately, several more claims have been lodged against Eli Lilly – the makers of Mounjaro – but these are said to be far fewer.

The current proceedings are in the US, but they follow a combined payout of more than £1.1million given to 27 Danish patients after they developed NAION following injections of Ozempic and Wegovy.

Novo Nordisk said it is not involved in those cases and maintains that the payouts do not prove the drugs caused the condition.

A spokesman also said the legal proceedings against it in the US lack merit, adding that it is strongly defending them.

‘There are no indications that we should really be worried about NAION,’ Dr Tina Vilsboll, senior medical officer at Novo and lead author on the study, told the WSJ. 

‘I do not see causality.’

In a statement to the British Medical Journal Liz Skrbkova, the drugmaker’s head of US media and stakeholder relations, highlighted the results of a company-funded analysis published in the British Journal of Ophthalmology earlier this year.

It found no increased incidence of NAION in patients taking its drugs when compared with those receiving a placebo.

However, separate research has found a link.

A large analysis published in JAMA Network Open last year found semaglutide and tirzepatide users were 76 per cent more likely to develop the condition compared to those taking other diabetes medicines. Researchers stressed, however, that the overall risk was low.

In an accompanying comment on the 2025 study, scientists wrote that the results could ‘theoretically be linked to rapid improvement in glycemia’, which is the term for blood sugar levels in the body.

Crucially, NAION is already up to 10 times more common in people with type 2 diabetes, affecting between 11 and 82 per 100,000 patients a year, according to the MHRA.

Experts say it is therefore difficult to separate the exact effects of the drugs from those of the disease they are often prescribed to treat. 

‘Figuring out whether the medication caused one person’s case is very difficult… and ultimately that’s what the courts are being asked to figure out,’ Kevin Gendreau, an obesity medicine expert at Signature Healthcare in Massachusetts, told the British Medical Journal.

‘[NAION] is something physicians and patients should be aware of, and it warrants further study. 

‘However, I don’t think it’s something that should cause all patients to panic.’ 

An Eli Lilly spokesman told the Daily Mail: ‘Lilly is aware of publications on the potential risk of NAION in patients prescribed certain GLP-1 medicines, including statements by leading consensus organizations. 

‘We encourage healthcare professionals to exercise their own clinical judgment to evaluate this external literature.’

The company said patient safety is its ‘top priority’ and that it is in ongoing discussions with regulators about safety issues, including eye problems. 

‘If anyone is experiencing side effects when taking a Lilly medicine, they should talk to their doctor or other healthcare professional,’ the spokesman added.

A Novo Nordisk spokesman said: ‘Novo believes the personal injury lawsuits filed in the U.S. are without merit and is vigorously defending them.’

The company said it is aware of reports linking NAION and semaglutide and is investigating them, but that a ‘causal relationship between semaglutide and NAION has not been established’.

‘Patient safety is a top priority for Novo and we take all reports of adverse events associated with our medicines very seriously, collaborating closely with health authorities and regulatory bodies worldwide,’ the spokesman added.

Medical misogyny is leaving women with serious illnesses undiagnosed for years, experts have warned, after a major study found that one in three women with autoimmune diseases have their symptoms dismissed as psychological.

Researchers at the universities of Cambridge and East Anglia found women were significantly more likely than men to have their symptoms blamed on stress or anxiety, rather than an underlying physical condition.

In some cases, the consequences of a missed diagnosis can be devastating.

One woman, speaking to the Daily Mail, revealed how doctors dismissed her swollen foot as a minor problem, only for her to suffer a life-threatening blood clot months later. She has been left with permanent lung damage.

‘It took something really dramatic to happen before doctors listened to me,’ said Sarah Bassra, 36, from Nottingham.

The findings, published in the journal eClinicalMedicine, are based on the experiences of more than 6,600 patients with autoimmune diseases – conditions in which the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy tissue.

Women were nearly 50 per cent more likely than men to have their symptoms attributed to a psychiatric disorder and 75 per cent more likely to be told they were caused by stress or anxiety.

By contrast, men were slightly more likely to be misdiagnosed with another physical illness.

After Sarah Bassra, 36, from Nottingham, collapsed at a festival, tests revealed the real reason she was suffering from pain in her toes and ankle

‘The differences between the sexes in misdiagnoses for people with autoimmune disease is stark,’ said Shaista Tayabali, study co-author and patient partner.

‘The fact that females reported higher rates of psychiatric misdiagnoses than males, yet reported lower misdiagnoses for other physical diseases, suggests that historical gender biases remain a challenging aspect of the diagnosis journey.’

Autoimmune diseases occur when the immune system mistakenly attacks healthy tissue instead of fighting off infections.

Common examples include rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, multiple sclerosis (MS) and type 1 diabetes.

Diagnosing these conditions can be difficult because early symptoms – including fatigue, pain, low mood and sleep problems – are often vague and can have many possible causes.

Symptoms may also affect different parts of the body, come and go, or be mistaken for hormonal changes in women.

The study found women faced longer delays between their first symptoms and diagnosis, sometimes lasting up to two years, and attended more medical appointments than men.

Dr Melanie Sloan, from the University of Cambridge, said: ‘Our findings highlight that psychological or mental health explanations can be given too soon.

‘This is the truth for both sexes, but our study suggests that females may be particularly vulnerable to these types of misdiagnoses.’

However, Dr Sloan acknowledged that autoimmune diseases can be particularly difficult to diagnose, especially when specific blood tests are needed to confirm the condition.

Professor David D’Cruz, a consultant rheumatologist at Guy’s Hospital in London, said it was important not to assume that psychological symptoms could never be linked to autoimmune disease.

‘People can have both autoimmune and psychiatric conditions, and it is increasingly understood that psychiatric symptoms can be part of an autoimmune disease, especially in diseases like lupus which can directly affect the brain,’ he said.

‘They can also be a very natural response to living with life-changing illnesses.’

He added: ‘The important message is that when symptoms persist, evolve or involve multiple systems, clinicians must be open minded and consider whether there is an underlying autoimmune disease that has not yet been recognised – and to listen to patients.’

For Sarah Bassra, 36, from Nottingham, the consequences of a missed diagnosis have been life-changing.

For years, she says, doctors repeatedly dismissed her symptoms despite a family history of antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), an autoimmune condition that increases the risk of dangerous blood clots.

Sarah’s symptoms began in June 2022 when she noticed her toes were red and feeling hot. Soon after, her ankle also became swollen and inflamed (pictured)

At 26, her extreme fatigue was blamed on a vitamin D deficiency. Later, joint pain led to physiotherapy and an offer of steroid injections, while bouts of vertigo were attributed to anxiety.

Then, in June 2022, she visited her GP complaining of pain and swelling in her foot, only to be diagnosed with plantar fasciitis – a common cause of heel pain.

‘They told me to get orthopaedic trainers and sent me home without so much as looking at my leg,’ Sarah said.

‘I explained that I had been on a couple of long-haul flights and thought that it could be a blood clot. But my GP looked at me as if I was crazy.’

Two months later, she was rushed to hospital after suffering a pulmonary embolism – a potentially fatal blockage in an artery in the lungs, usually caused by a blood clot travelling from the leg.

‘Even after suffering this horrendous event, they were still reluctant to test for Hughes syndrome, despite my dad having it,’ she said.

Also known as antiphospholipid syndrome (APS), the condition causes the blood to clot too easily, increasing the risk of strokes, heart attacks and pregnancy complications.

When Sarah was eventually diagnosed, she says she was not prescribed blood-thinning medication to prevent further clots.

It was only after she suffered a second pulmonary embolism in March 2023 that she received the treatment.

‘Before any of this, there were signs that something wasn’t quite right,’ she said.

‘I just feel like someone should have looked through my records and pieced it together.’

Sarah has since been told her lungs will never fully recover from the damage caused by the clots.

‘I’m not surprised at all that the researchers have found such a high proportion of women are dismissed,’ she said.

‘I believe if a man had presented with my symptoms, they would have been treated much sooner.

‘And I think it’s really sad that I now have to bring my partner with me to GP appointments to get my health taken seriously.’

Sally sat down in my surgery looking baffled. 

With her youngest off to university, she had decided to take a fresh look at her own health, and a private blood test had led to a diagnosis she never saw coming: liver disease.

‘But I don’t drink,’ she said. ‘Not a drop.’

I hear this all the time. Most of us think liver disease only happens to heavy drinkers. Alcohol still matters. It is the deadlier cause, doing serious harm more quickly, but it is not the most common type.

In the UK, that title belongs to fatty liver disease, now officially called metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease, or MASLD.

It affects around one in four adults, according to the British Liver Trust, and numbers are climbing alongside rising obesity, type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure and high cholesterol.

When we take in more energy than we burn, the excess is stored, and some of it ends up in the liver.

Being over 50, being overweight or inactive and polycystic ovary syndrome (PCOS, recently renamed PMOS) all raise the risk. Sally ticked several boxes.

When it comes to tackling fatty liver disease, it’s what’s on your plate that counts, says Dr Philippa Kaye. There is growing evidence that some foods are far easier on the liver than others – and can even reverse some of the damage

It is usually silent and often found by chance. Left unchecked, the fat triggers inflammation and then scarring, which can lead to cirrhosis – permanent damage to the organ that can result in life-threatening complications.

But here’s the good news: caught early, reversible, and with the right changes the damage can start to undo itself within months.

The single most effective treatment is weight loss, and you don’t need to fit back into your wedding dress. Losing 5 to 10 per cent of your body weight reduces liver fat, while 10 per cent or more can improve scarring or reverse the condition entirely.

Exercise helps too, cutting liver fat even before the scales move. Aim for 150 minutes a week.

For more advanced disease, there are prescription medicines that can tackle the condition – and there is now even evidence that the weight-loss drug semaglutide, also known as Wegovy, can heal some liver scarring.

But what’s on your plate really counts. There is growing evidence that some foods are far easier on the liver than others – and can even reverse some of the damage.

These are the tips I give every patient.

Start with cutting out sugary drinks. Fizzy drinks, energy drinks, sweetened coffees and large glasses of fruit juice are loaded with sugars such as sucrose and fructose, which the liver breaks down into fat.

Losing these from your everyday diet is one of the quickest wins there is.

Coffee, on the other hand, deserves a special mention. Studies consistently link two to three cups a day with less liver fat and less scarring. 

It’s not concrete evidence just yet and for some people it may increase anxiety.

And if you do drink coffee, skip the syrups and sugar.

Next, the white stuff. White bread, white pasta, white rice, pastries and biscuits are rapidly broken down into sugar.

A better option is to switch to porridge oats, brown rice and wholemeal bread, which release energy slowly and come with fibre. Fill up on beans, lentils and chickpeas too. They are cheap, filling and packed with fibre and protein.

Then look at the type of fat you are consuming. Research suggests saturated fat, found in butter, cream, fatty meat, cakes and pastries, piles fat on to the liver more readily than other fats.

Cook with olive oil instead, snack on a small handful of unsalted nuts such as walnuts, and eat oily fish, for example salmon, mackerel or sardines twice a week. Their omega-3s – healthy unsaturated fats – have been shown to help reduce liver fat.

Make red meat an occasional treat and keep processed meats such as bacon, ham, sausages and salami to a minimum. Chicken, fish, eggs, tofu and pulses are better everyday choices.

Tackle ultra-processed food head-on too. Ready meals, takeaways, crisps, packaged snacks and sugary cereals combine refined carbs, sugar and saturated fat with little fibre, which is exactly the mix your liver struggles with. 

Cooking simply from scratch, even a few nights a week, makes a difference.

Pile on the fruit and vegetables: leafy greens, broccoli, peppers, berries and apples.

If this sounds familiar, it’s because it is essentially the famous Mediterranean diet. That is the eating pattern with the strongest evidence for fighting against fatty liver, and the same one that protects your heart, brain and waistline.

And while fatty liver disease isn’t triggered by alcohol, there is good evidence that drinking it can worsen the condition.

With a fatty liver, every drink forces an already struggling organ to work harder. 

Stay well within 14 units a week – that’s four to six glasses of wine or six pints of beer – but ideally drinking as little as possible. Quitting smoking can also help ease the pressure on the liver too.

This isn’t just advice for those with a diagnosis. With a quarter of adults affected, millions of Britons have fatty liver disease without knowing it.

Sally has already started making changes and will have regular checks. I’m hopeful her next blood test will look very different. We’ve all heard about eating for a healthy heart, and it turns out your liver wants exactly the same thing.

Every year, around 4,000 Britons will be hit by invasive aspergillosis, a severe fungal infection caused by a mould that can lurk in compost heaps, rotting leaves or even pillows and duvets.

Untreated, it is almost always fatal. Even when treatment is available, between a third and a half of patients will die within weeks – it is often spotted late, and usually occurs in patients whose immune systems are damaged and cannot help drugs fight the infection. Sometimes the Aspergillus mould that causes the infection is resistant to treatment.

Little wonder, then, that patients and doctors are excited about the arrival of a new medication, which has been decades in the making.

But there are also fears that pesticides used in farming to fight fungi create ‘superfungi’ that are resilient to medicine – rendering the drugs ineffective before they even hit shelves.

The drug, Olorofim, targets an enzyme that moulds need to grow and replicate. In a trial it worked as well as current drugs but with half the side-effects.

Following those results, the manufacturer is preparing submissions for medical regulators. If approved, Olorofim will be the first new treatment in over 20 years for invasive aspergillosis, a condition where Aspergillus mould spreads into lungs and other organs.

‘We desperately need new treatments, particularly for patients whose infections are resistant to existing drugs or who cannot tolerate them,’ says Lisa McNeil, chair of the Aspergillosis Trust. ‘Having another option can mean hope when existing treatments are limited.’

Lindsey Collins, 38, is one of them. She was diagnosed with an invasive aspergillosis infection in her brain shortly after giving birth to her son, Noah, in 2020.

Lindsey Collins, 38, was diagnosed with an invasive aspergillosis infection in her brain, which led to a series of strokes and a cardiac arrest

She’d had an emergency caesarean after developing pre-eclampsia (dangerously high blood pressure in pregnancy) alongside a chest infection.

After the delivery, she was put in an induced coma to help her body fight the infection – but had a series of strokes and a cardiac arrest.

As Lindsey recovered, a scan revealed masses in her lungs and on her brain, eventually diagnosed (following a biopsy) as Aspergillus fungi. The strokes left her temporarily paralysed.

‘I had to learn how to walk again. By the time I finally got to hold Noah for the first time he was nine weeks old,’ Lindsey recalls. ‘The journey through it was very, very hard – and now I had this other thing on top of it.’

But it was only three years later that she learned how bleak her prognosis really was. ‘The doctor said, “You have up to five years, and we’ll be kind of lucky if we can push it after that”,’ she says.

Now nearing six years since her diagnosis, the conversation hangs over Lindsey, a single mum who lives with her parents in Cork, Ireland.

‘I’m not ready to go,’ she says. ‘But I have prepared for Noah. I got him books on how to understand that I was gone, and where I had gone. I’ve tried to get things in order, but it’s so hard.’

Lindsey has had chronic chest infections for the past six years.

She says: ‘I can’t help but wonder every morning, is this my last day? Will I see Christmas, and the joy it brings Noah?’ she asks.

Her symptoms, such as poor memory and extreme fatigue, meant she had to give up her job as a carer for adults with disabilities. She says: ‘Before I was pregnant with Noah, I was such an active person. I was constantly out. I was working 12-hour shifts.’

Thanks to treatment with potent antifungals, some of the masses on her brain have shrunk – but a large mass at the front of it remains. So the prospect of an alternative drug becoming available is ‘fantastic’, says Lindsey.

The potential problem with Olorofim is that a fungicide called ipflufenoquin, used on crops, targets the same enzyme. When fungus is exposed to an antifungal drug or a fungicide, it gives that fungus the chance to develop resistance to the chemical.

‘The fungus that we get infected with typically comes from the environment – it lives on grasses, soil and things like that,’ says Professor Rebecca Drummond, a specialist in fungal immunology at the University of Birmingham.

‘If they are picking up drug resistance in the environment, then before your patient has even been given a medication, they can be infected with a drug-resistant strain.’

The threat is not purely theoretical, but has played out before with other antifungal drugs known as azoles – one of the most widely used because they are cheap, can be given in various formulations including orally and work against a variety of fungi (Lindsey is being treated with an azole, Cresemba).

A scan of Aspergillus fungi. The mould can lurk in compost heaps, rotting leaves or even pillows and duvets

Lindsey’s symptoms, such as poor memory and extreme fatigue, meant she had to give up her job as a carer for adults with disabilities. She has had chronic chest infections for the past six years

Already, Professor Drummond says, there is ‘quite good evidence that some of the drug-resistant infections that we see in patients [were] acquired in the environment because of agricultural use of antifungal drugs’.

Indeed, resistance to azoles used in farming to protect cereal crops from Aspergillus is a growing problem.

And a study published in the journal Nature Microbiology in 2024 showed that exposing Aspergillus mould to ipflufenoquin led to the development of strains resistant to Olorofim.

David Denning, a professor of infectious diseases in global health at The University of Manchester, who founded the company behind Olorofim, says being faced with a patient whose fungal infection cannot be cured with existing drugs is ‘awful’.

‘There’s the invasive ones, which kill people in the space of a week or two – and then there’s the chronic ones, which just get worse and worse over weeks or months,’ he says. ‘Both of those situations are dire. I’ve seen many patients who have died due to resistant fungi who could have been saved if we had new drugs.’

Most people breathe in hundreds or thousands of Aspergillus spores daily with no ill-effects, he adds – ‘just living your life, walking around, going to bed with a bit of Aspergillus in your pillow and the duvet [where they thrive in the moist, warm conditions] – we are all exposed to this’.

But if someone’s immune system is weakened, such as cancer patients, or they have a lung condition such as cystic fibrosis or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease then they are particularly vulnerable.

Lindsey does not know how or where she picked up the fungal infection, although she fears that renovations in hospital while she was an inpatient might have released spores into the air.

Drug-resistant fungal infections in general are an increasing concern. For example, Candida auris is resistant to many drugs and has caused outbreaks in hospitals globally, including in the UK.

When it comes to antifungal drugs, ‘we don’t have a huge number of options’, says Darius Armstrong-James, a professor of infectious diseases and medical mycology at Imperial College London. ‘If a new one becomes available, then we want to do everything we can to preserve it.’

But it is not as simple as banning fungicides. Globally, some 10 to 23 per cent of crops are lost to fungal infections each year.

‘What we’re talking about is the balance between food security by protecting crops against preserving critical drugs for human use,’ says Professor Armstrong-James.

He was one of 130 experts who wrote to a parliamentary inquiry on antimicrobial resistance last year warning that the UK was ‘lagging behind’ other countries which had specific frameworks in place to assess those risks.

Ipflufenoquin is used on crops such as apples, pears and almonds in Canada, Australia, US and Japan, with EU approval pending. While it’s not used in the UK, Professor Denning believes it ‘very likely’ that resistant fungi would find their way here.

‘There’s a need to protect food resources – the challenge is that many of these fungicides are used in specialised crops,’ he says. ‘You wonder what the equation is, with almonds or almond milk, versus patients who are dying of untreatable fungal infections.’

Separately, Lindsey worries that illnesses in pregnant women are overlooked – she felt her chest infection was dismissed. ‘I’m sure that if I didn’t have the complications I had, this [fungal infection] would have been avoided.

‘People who work in healthcare should always have awareness, understanding and patience.’

Meanwhile, she takes much delight in seeing her ‘caring and lovable’ son flourish, adding: ‘I would like very much to see the man Noah grows up to be.’