(NEW YORK) — Long-term alcohol use has been linked to higher risks of colorectal cancer, according to a study published Monday in the journal Cancer.
Researchers found that those with heavy lifetime alcohol consumption have up to a 91% higher risk of developing colorectal cancer compared with those who drank very little. That risk significantly increased with consistent heavy consumption, whereas those who quit drinking may have demonstrated decreased risk of precancerous tissue.
“The longer someone drinks, the longer their colon and rectum are exposed damage and impaired repair, both major mechanisms of cancer,” Dr. Lynn M O’Connor, section chief of colon and rectal surgery at Mercy Medical Center and St. Joseph Hospital in New York, told ABC News.
The study followed more than 88,000 adults with no prior history of cancer. Participants reported their alcohol use beginning in early adulthood and were followed for nearly a decade to track cancer outcomes.
Compared with those who averaged one drink or less per week over their lifetime, those who consumed over 14 drinks a week had a 25% higher risk of developing colorectal cancer. The link was even stronger for rectal cancer, where one’s risk nearly doubled.
Rectal cancer is “often more difficult to treat and more involved clinically, which makes screening and early identification all the more important,” Dr. Jeffrey Farma, a colorectal cancer specialist, told ABC News.
The results come as colorectal cancers are on the rise, especially in younger people.
“We’re seeing an uptick in rectal cancers. If alcohol affects the lower part of the colon differently —we need to understand why,” Dr. Fola May, a GI specialist and associate director of the UCLA Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Equity, told ABC News.
In the study, researchers found the highest risks among people who drank heavily at every stage of life. Those who consistently exceeded recommended drinking limits across each stage of adulthood had a 91% higher risk of colorectal cancer compared with lifelong light drinkers or those with gaps in heavy drinking.
“These numbers are not guarantees, but signals to do something before it’s too late,” May said. “Colorectal cancer is one of the few cancers we can actually prevent or catch early, but fewer than 70% of eligible people get screened.”
The study also looked at adenomas —polyps that can develop into cancer. While heavy drinking was not strongly linked to adenoma risk, those who quit drinking had significantly lower odds of developing nonadvanced adenomas compared to light drinkers.
“These are modifiable risks. The choices people make over time matter, and the body can respond when those risks are reduced,” Farma said.
The results align with a growing body of evidence linking alcohol, a well-recognized carcinogen, to colorectal cancer.
Colorectal screening is recommended for all adults starting at age 45 according to the United States Preventative Services Task Force. Screening tools include annual stool tests, CT scans every five years, or colonoscopies every 10 years.
“Everyone should be screened. It saves lives, and people are dying unnecessarily when they put it off,” May said.
Those who may be at higher risk may need to be screened at an early age or more often than typically recommended.
“If you’ve had prolonged heavy drinking and you develop symptoms like bleeding or persistent changes in bowel habits, you need to be evaluated — even in your 30s,” Farma said. “That’s how we catch this early and save lives.”
Tyler Beauchamp, MD, is a pediatric resident at UNC Children’s Hospital and a member of the ABC News Medical Unit.
(NEW YORK) — From robotic surgery performed 7,000 miles away to the first blood test to help diagnose Alzheimer’s disease, 2025 has been a year full of medical breakthroughs.
Scientists discovered a brain implant to give some patients back their independence, prevented others from needing to take opioids and made a discovery that could help solve the organ shortage crisis.
Here are seven of the biggest innovations in the health and science space this year.
ALS patient is 1st to control iPad by thought with implantable brain sensor
A patient with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) became the first person in the world to control an iPad entirely by thought, neurotech company Synchron announced earlier this year.
The patient, Mark Jackson, from western Pennsylvania, controls the tablet without using his hands or voice command but rather with an implantable brain-computer interface (BCI) that translates his thoughts into actions.
At the time, Jackson told ABC News he doesn’t have use of his arms so the BCI helps him watch TV shows, listen to audiobooks, browse social media and send text messages to his children.
BCIs are sensors implanted in the brain and translate brain signals into actions outside of the body. The BCI that Jackson is using was developed by the company Synchron, which involves a device implanted into one of the veins within the brain in a minimally invasive procedure.
“This is really an exciting field, because I think the opportunities are boundless,” Dr. Leah Croll, a neurologist at Maimonides Medical Center in New York City, told ABC News. “I think that we’re going to see, moving forward, not only using BCIs to control other electronic devices, but also using them to give patients back movement, to give patients back language, really bodily functions that they weren’t able to do after whatever neurologic insult happened to them.”
Croll said it’s important, going forward, to consider legal and ethical considerations such as privacy and data storage.
She also encouraged more research and clinical trials to generate data on how patients can be protected in both research and real-world settings.
“There’s so much we haven’t figured out legally and ethically when it comes to storing personal, private data from your brain, and how is that used, and how do we manage that responsibly,” she said. “There’s a lot of bio-ethical minds at work as to how we deal with this issue and how do we make it so that a patient isn’t sort of signing away the rights to their entire brain and inner world and manage something responsibly for them that’s helpful and not harmful.”
First pill for obstructive sleep apnea may be around the corner
The first oral pill for obstructive sleep apnea (OSA) could soon be available after a late-clinical showed positive results, according to pharmaceutical company Apnimed Inc.
The drug, AD109, showed “clinically meaningful and statistically significant reductions” in airway obstruction after 26 weeks, the company said in a press release in July.
OSA is a sleep disorder in which the airways become narrowed or blocked while sleeping, causing breathing to pause.
The investigational once-daily pill is a neuromuscular modulator that stabilizes upper airway muscles and prevents them collapsing, improving oxygenation.
OSA patients treated with the medication saw a nearly 50% reduction in the severity from baseline at week 26, compared to 6.8% of those in the placebo group.
The reduction was “significant” at the end of the study period, which concluded at 51 weeks. At the end of the trial, nearly 23% of participants saw “complete disease control.”
More recent trial data published in October found that a meaningful number of patients achieved complete disease control and experienced significant improvements in oxygenation measures.
First non-opioid medication in more than 20 years approved by FDA
Earlier this year, the FDA approved a new type of non-opioid pain medication to treat moderate to severe acute pain, the first of its kind on more than 20 years.
Suzetrigine, also known by the brand name, Journavx, is manufactured by biotech company Vertex Pharmaceuticals and doesn’t have addictive properties, unlike opioids often used for this type of pain.
“It’s significant in light of all the concerns about the opioid epidemic and addiction substance use disorder,” Dr. Jianguo Cheng, a professor of anesthesiology and medical director of the Cleveland Clinic Consortium for Pain at Cleveland Clinic, told ABC News.
In two clinical trials, tested on adults between ages 18 and 80, Journavx was found to reduce moderate to severe acute pain for adults from baseline by about 50% in 48 hours.
The average time to meaningful pain relief ranged from two to four hours, compared to eight hours in the placebo group, according to the trial.
Cheng, who was not involved in the clinical trials, said the studies demonstrated efficacy of the drug not compared to not only placebo, but also to weak opioids.
“Its efficacy is as good as a weak opioid. So why that is important?” Cheng said. “Because not all patients need opioids, and not all patients need a strong opioid. … If most of them do need a weak opioid, and if this can replace the weak opioid, that can be a big deal.”
Although gene-edited pig kidneys have been seen as a way to help ease the shortage of organs available for those on transplant waiting lists, many of the organs have been rejected not long after transplant surgery.
“Until 2021, we had never put one of these gene-edited pig organs into a human … so it was a bit of a mystery when we started doing the pig-to-human transplants, about what we were going to encounter,” Dr. Robert Montgomery, director of the NYU Langone Transplant Institute, told ABC News.
Last month, a team at NYU Langone Health published a study in which they discovered immune reactions that may explain why these organs get rejected.
The team collected two months of data from a patient who was brain dead and had a genetically engineered pig kidney transplanted into them. The family had donated the patient’s body to science.
The team learned that pig organs were being rejected due to an immune system reaction from specific antibodies — which recognize and attach themselves to foreign substances so they can be removed from the body — and from T cells, which are white blood cells that help the body fight off germs and other unfamiliar invaders.
‘So you have this very coordinated immune response that involves antibodies and white cells, and it seems to happen somewhere between two and four weeks after the transplant,” said Montgomery, lead author of the study. “Now the good news on that front is that we can detect when it’s coming before rejection happens, and we can begin to respond, and we have very good therapeutics that can block the rejection and prevent it from causing damage.”
After rejection, the team used an FDA-approved drug combination to successfully reverse it, with no signs of permanent damage or reduced kidney function.
In a second study, Montgomery and his team looked at the body’s immune response to the pig organ in greater detail. By measuring levels of biomarkers in the blood, they were able to spot an attack up to five days before it would be visible in bodily tissue.
Montgomery said the findings could lead to a future where gene-edited pig organs are a realistic alternative to human organs.
“The pig organ can really replace a human organ and do all the things that a human organ can do, and it’s really just a matter of overcoming the immunosuppression and preventing rejection,” he said. “I think it’s going to happen … and people will be receiving xenotransplants on a regular basis. It’s going to be normalized, and it’s going to be something that will benefit thousands, first, and then millions of people around the world.”
FDA clears 1st blood test to help diagnose Alzheimer’s disease
In May, the FDA cleared the first blood test to help diagnose Alzheimer’s disease.
The test, manufactured by Fujirebio Diagnostics, is for those aged 55 and older who are already exhibiting signs and symptoms of the disease, according to the federal health agency.
The new blood test works by measuring the ratio of two proteins — pTau217 and β-amyloid 1-42 — which are found in human plasma, a component of blood. That ratio is then linked to the presence or absence of amyloid plaques in the brain to determine whether a patient is showing signs of Alzheimer’s disease.
In a clinical study, more than 91% of nearly 500 cognitively impaired patients who tested positive on the blood test had their results confirmed by other diagnostic tools.
“Essentially, it does provide a first quantitative measure of an Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis,” Dr. Jeffrey Savas, an associate professor in the department of neurology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, told ABC News. “This is very important to identify patients which could be good candidates for some of the emerging therapeutics.
Savas said the test is rapid, highly accurate and less expensive or invasive compared to previous diagnostic tests.
Because many Alzheimer’s patients need to wait months to see a specialist, the test can allow primary care providers to start the diagnostic process.
“Many neurological research centers have huge backlogs of patients, and there’s not enough physicians or nurses to really see the patients in a timely manner,” Savas said.
“Having this quick diagnostic test, which could be taken in other medical settings, should pave the way for quicker, more effective opportunities and chances for being treated in a timely manner.”
In October, the FDA cleared a second blood-based test called Elecsys pTau181, made by Roche.
Groundbreaking remote robotic surgery
A patient living in Angola with prostate cancer underwent surgery this year to cut the cancer out, but the doctor performing the surgery was 7,000 miles away in Orlando, Florida.
The patient was the first in a groundbreaking human clinical trial approved by the FDA to test transcontinental robotic telesurgery.
A team at OrlandoHealth operated on the patient via a multimillion-dollar robot with enhanced visuals and nimble controls.
Using a robot allows for the procedure to be less invasive, more precise and typically comes with a faster recovery time.
The team has said underserved areas in the U.S. and around the world could benefit from the technology by having a surgeon perform an operation even if they are not nearby.
1st-ever gene fix for rare deadly disease saves baby’s life
A baby with a rare and life-threatening metabolic disorder underwent a personalized treatment involving a first-of-its-kind type of gene-editing.
KJ Muldoon was diagnosed as a newborn with carbamoyl-phosphate synthetase 1 deficiency as a newborn. The disorder affects a bodily cycle that causes deadly levels of ammonia to build up in the blood, which can lead to severe and permanent brain damage.
If left untreated, it will typically result in the death of the patient, according to the National Organization for Rare Disorders.
The treatment for KJ involved the powerful gene-editing tool CRISPR, which allows scientists to precisely slice and repair faulty genes. Using CRISPR, the team was able to create a treatment tailored to the baby’s specific genetic mutation.
In June, KJ went home after spending the majority of his life at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. Earlier this month, he reached a big milestone: taking his first steps ahead of Christmas.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters in the Oval Office of the White House on December 15, 2025 in Washington, DC. Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
(WASHINGTON) — The Trump administration announced new federal dietary guidelines on Wednesday, encouraging Americans to limit highly processed foods and to reduce refined carbohydrates.
The guidelines also recommend eating whole foods like fruits and vegetables, incorporating healthy fats, prioritizing protein-rich meals and consuming full-fat dairy with no added sugars.
The new Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which are updated every five years, come as Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has made nutrition policy a cornerstone of his Make America Healthy Again agenda.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Tylenol caplets are displayed on September 22, 2025 in San Anselmo, California. The Trump administration will reportedly link use of the painkiller acetaminophen during pregnancy to autism during a White House press conference today. (Photo Illustration by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton sued the makers of Tylenol, Johnson & Johnson and Kenvue, claiming that they deceptively marketed the over-the-counter medication to pregnant women despite alleged links to autism and other disorders.
“Big Pharma betrayed America by profiting off of pain and pushing pills regardless of the risks,” Paxton said in a statement on Tuesday. “These corporations lied for decades, knowingly endangering millions to line their pockets. … By holding Big Pharma accountable for poisoning our people, we will help Make America Healthy Again.”
This is the first lawsuit from a state government since President Donald Trump claimed last month that Tylenol use during pregnancy is linked to an increased risk of autism, despite limited evidence to suggest an association.
Johnson & Johnson sold the drug for decades and its consumer health division spinoff, Kenvue Inc., has been selling the drug since 2023.
In a statement, Kenvue pushed back on the attorney general’s claims, saying it is “deeply concerned by the perpetuation of misinformation on the safety of acetaminophen and the potential impact that could have on the health of American women and children.”
“Acetaminophen is the safest pain reliever option for pregnant women as needed throughout their entire pregnancy. Without it, women face dangerous choices: suffer through conditions like fever that are potentially harmful to both mom and baby or use riskier alternatives. High fevers and pain are widely recognized as potential risks to a pregnancy if left untreated,” the statement read. “We will defend ourselves against these baseless claims and respond per the legal process. We stand firmly with the global medical community that acknowledges the safety of acetaminophen and believe we will continue to be successful in litigation as these claims lack legal merit and scientific support.”
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
