We all enjoy a good slushie every now and then. While they do not add any great nutritional value to our meal, they are a delightful snack made with shredded ice and sugar. To make them more accessible to people who cannot or do not wish to have sugar, there are many sugar free options to pick from. However, a recent study has revealed that sugar-free slushies containing glycerol, which is a sugar alcohol used to maintain their icy texture, can cause severe health problems in young children. The study was published in the journal Archives of Disease in Childhood, it explains that having these sugar free slushies can lead to children having a condition called "glycerol intoxication syndrome". In this condition there is a rapid drop in blood sugar, reduced consciousness, and a buildup of acid in the blood.

Rapid Onset of Symptoms

Kids who drank slushies with glycerol got sick very quickly. Within an hour, they started showing serious symptoms. Their blood sugar would plummet, sometimes dangerously low. Many became confused or lost consciousness, and some even had seizures. Doctors studied 21 children who got sick from these drinks between 2018 and 2024. Most of these kids were very young, seven years old or younger. By the time they got to the hospital, many were in bad shape, either unconscious or barely awake. This quick reaction time makes it especially scary, as parents might not realize the slushy is the cause right away. It's important to recognize these signs fast.

Why is Glycerol Harmful?

According to WebMD Glycerol is a type of naturally occurring alcohol, and it's used in lots of food products. You might find it in protein bars, diet foods, and even sugar-free candies. In slushies, it plays a key role in keeping the drink icy. Usually, slushies use tons of sugar to stop them from freezing completely. But because people are trying to cut back on sugar, companies are using glycerol instead. This is especially true in places with "sugar taxes," where sugary drinks cost more. So, to make sugar-free versions, they add glycerol. This switch means more kids are being exposed to this ingredient, which can be harmful to them.

What Does Glycerol Damage Children's Health?

The study explains that little kids are more at risk from glycerol because their bodies are still growing and developing. Their tiny bodies and young metabolisms might not be able to handle glycerol as well as adults' bodies can. This means that even a small amount can cause a big problem. Also, the amount of glycerol in a slushy can vary, and it's hard to know exactly how much is safe. Factors like how fast they drink it, if they've eaten recently, or if they've been exercising can also make a difference. Even the standard size of a slushy drink can be too much for a small child. This makes it hard to give a safe dose.

Health authorities in the UK and Ireland have already started warning about glycerol in slushies. They suggest that kids under four shouldn't have them at all, and older kids should only have one at most. But doctors are worried that these warnings might not be enough. They point out that it's hard to know how much glycerol is actually in each drink, making it difficult to give safe advice. Parents are being told to be very careful and consider avoiding these drinks altogether for young children. In the US, glycerol is approved for use in food, but parents should still be aware of the potential risks. More research is needed to understand the full impact.

Metformin is a safe and effective drug used by type 2 patients for the last six decades to control their blood sugar levels and improve the way the body handles insulin.

A recent study showed that metformin can also be crucial in reducing the risk of vision loss in people over the age of 50, known as age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

The observational study, published in the BMJ Open Ophthalmology, showed that metformin can cut down the cases of AMD by nearly 40 percent in people with Type 2 diabetes over five years.

“We have found a significant association between metformin use and a reduction in the incidence of intermediate AMD by 37 percent in people with diabetes over 5 years. Previous epidemiological studies of metformin and AMD have used secondary data on AMD,” said corresponding author Nicholas A. V. Beare, from the University of Liverpool, UK.

“Given metformin’s anti-aging therapeutic effects, the reduction in risk is plausible and warrants prospective clinical trials,” he added.

Also read: Metformin Controls Blood Sugar With Help From Brain Neurons, Finds Study

Metformin And AMD

While currently there is no specific treatment option for AMD — a common cause of blindness in high-income countries — scientists have shown interest in metformin as a candidate drug for treating AMD and reducing its progression.

It is because of metformin's antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, antiangiogenic, and antifibrotic effects. Metformin is also postulated to delay ageing and ageing-related diseases.

Previous research has also identified metformin as a potential treatment for all stages of AMD. Researchers also noted that the common diabetes drug is readily accessible and has a strong safety profile.

How Metformin Improves AMD

The BMJ study analyzed more than 2,500 participants aged 50 or above who attended retinopathy screening in 2011.

All participants had Type 2 diabetes and gradable fundus photographs — high-quality retinal images.

Individuals prescribed oral metformin had a 37 percent lower risk of intermediate AMD by five years. The results are consistent with known biological mechanisms, given metformin’s potential favourable effects on AMD progression, researchers reported, the researchers said.

The team, however, acknowledged limitations such as a lack of proper data regarding the dose, duration of prior use, or compliance with metformin use.

Further, there were only a relatively small number of participants developing advanced AMD – an inevitability in population-based studies. They urged for a clinical trail to prove metformin's potential in treating AMD.

Also read: World Sight Day: 10 Tips To Help Prevent Vision Loss In Elderly

What Is AMD?

Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) is a disease of the retina. It happens when a part of the retina called the macula is damaged. It results in the loss of sharp, straight-ahead vision.

The condition commonly affects adults over 50, and causes

• blurry vision,
• dark spots,
• distorted straight lines.

While AMD rarely causes total blindness but affects central vision, making reading and driving difficult. It is of two types:

• Dry Age-Related Macular Degeneration
• Wet Age-Related Macular Degeneration

Harry Potter star Daniel Radcliffe has quit smoking after 20 long years. The reason: his two–year–old son with girlfriend Erin Darke.

Speaking to media outlet Vulture, the 36-year-old English actor shared that after becoming a father, he was inspired by intrusive thoughts about his mortality, which enabled him to quit the deadly habit after two decades.

"I smoked for 20 years pretty heavily, and I was never even thinking about quitting, and then shortly after having my son, the intrusive thoughts of my own death really helped as an incentive to quit," Radcliffe was quoted as saying.

Radcliffe also shared how a book -- The Easy Way to Quit Smoking, by Alan Carr -- helped him decide to quit smoking.

"It may not work for everybody, but it really worked for me," noted the star, currently starring in the Broadway play Every Brilliant Thing.

Earlier this month, the actor spoke with WSJ Magazine and shared that from being on “cigarettes all day”, he's transformed into a fitness freak.

How Does Smoking Affect Our Body?

Smoking can affect all organs in our body. While lung cancer and tuberculosis are the most prominent ones, smoking can seriously increase the risk of several chronic diseases. These include:

• Heart Disease
• Asthma
• Reproductive Health
• Vision Loss
• Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease
• Cancers of the liver, stomach, and colon.

While quitting tobacco is important, it is a difficult task, with some people finding it harder to quit than others. It may be important to seek help quitting.

Also read: Cigarettes And The Female Body: The Hormonal Toll We Don’t Talk About

What Happens When You Stop Smoking?

• In just 20 minutes of stopping, your blood pressure and heart rate begin to normalize.
• Within a few weeks, your lung function improves.
• Over time, the risk of heart disease and cancer also decreases dramatically.

These strategies have shown varying levels of success in aiding smokers to quit permanently. In addition, alternative methods like e-cigarettes and mindfulness-based techniques have gained traction in helping reduce smoking addiction.

Science-backed Methods To Help You Quit Smoking

Behavioral Support

Quitting smoking isn’t just about resisting cravings. Often, behavioral support through counseling or therapy is crucial for tackling the psychological aspects of addiction. Behavioral therapy involves working with a trained professional to identify triggers, develop coping strategies, and create a tailored quit plan. Research shows that combining counseling with other quit methods can significantly increase success rates.

Prescription Medications

Some medications, such as varenicline (Chantix) and bupropion (Zyban), have been shown to help people quit smoking by reducing cravings and withdrawal symptoms. Experts suggest that varenicline works by blocking the effects of nicotine in the brain, while bupropion is an antidepressant that helps manage withdrawal symptoms. Both medications are generally more effective when combined with behavioral therapy.

Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT)

Nicotine replacement products, such as nicotine patches, gums, lozenges, and nasal sprays, deliver controlled amounts of nicotine to ease withdrawal symptoms. According to experts at Harvard Health, NRT can double the chances of quitting by alleviating physical cravings while the person works on overcoming the psychological addiction.

About 10.6 percent –15 percent of India's population suffers from some form of mental health conditions, with 15 percent of the adult population also requiring active intervention.

To enable researchers to gather as well as systematically document data on patients with major forms of mental illness, neuroscientists in India have developed CALM-Brain — a digital repository of data on brain structure and function from a range of psychiatric disorders.

CALM-Brain contains data from over 2,000 participants from 900 families across the country.

CALM-Brain will help clinicians and researchers

• to understand the onset of neuropsychiatric disease
• check progression
• decode underlying biological changes
• provide better diagnosis
• plan personalized treatments for patients.

“CALM-Brain was conceived as a method to assemble data from multiple scales of analysis of brain structure and function on a single platform. We believe that the application of modern methods of data analysis to this dataset will help bridge the gap between these scales of analysis,” said Prof. Raghu Padinjat, CBM co-ordinator at CBM-NCBS, in a statement.

Also read: World Happiness Report 2026 Flags Social Media Harms On Adolescents' Mental Well-being

What Is CALM-Brain?

CALM-Brain is the result of collaborative efforts of researchers at the Rohini Nilekani Centre for Brain and Mind (CBM) — a partnership between the National Institute of Mental Health and Neuro Sciences (NIMHANS) and the National Centre for Biological Sciences (NCBS) - TIFR.

CALM-Brain is India’s first-of-its-kind repository of clinical, neuroimaging, behavioral, genetic, and other datasets on disorders such as:

• addiction,
• bipolar disorder,
• dementia,
• obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
• schizophrenia.

• Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (fMRI)
• Near Infrared Spectroscopy (NIRS)
• electroencephalogram (EEG)
• observations of cognition
• eye-tracking
• genetic analyses of blood samples
• clinical assessments.

The dataset is also linked to a biorepository of stem cells, which can be used to perform biological research in psychiatry to understand the origins of such severe mental illnesses.

“The primary goals of the project are to identify biological markers of severe psychiatric illnesses, which cut across traditional diagnostic frameworks. In addition, we will try to identify fundamental biological mechanisms of the disease and medication response,” said Prof. Y.C. Janardhan Reddy, CBM coordinator at CBM-NIMHANS.

Burden Of Mental Illnesses In India

Mental wellness is a major health and economic concern in India. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates India’s economic loss due to mental health conditions to be USD 1.03 trillion (2012-2030).

Recently, health experts and policymakers, as part of the government-led Post-Budget Webinar series, highlighted the growing burden of mental and neurological disorders in India and also stressed the urgent need to strengthen institutional capacity to meet emerging healthcare demands.

"One in seven Indians is affected by mental health disorders, while several states continue to face a treatment gap ranging from 70 to 90 percent," the experts said.

They added that "neurological and mental health conditions are among the leading contributors to disability-adjusted life years (DALYs)" among citizens.

To address the rising burden, the government aims to launch NIMHANS-2 — first announced by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman during the Union Budget 2026-27 — to deliver specialized care for mental health and neurological disorders in north India.

"In addition, the Central Institute of Psychiatry, Ranchi, and the Lokopriya Gopinath Bordoloi Regional Institute of Mental Health, Tezpur, will be upgraded as regional apex institutions to strengthen mental healthcare services in the eastern and north-eastern regions," FM Sitharaman said.