'Ozempic users aged backwards by more than 3 years in new trial'

 An astonishing new trial suggests that Ozempic may help users not only drop pounds but also turn back time.

In the first trial to directly measure the impact of semaglutide on aging, half of the participants were given a weekly injection of Ozempic while the other half received a placebo for 32 weeks.

“Those on semaglutide drug became, on average, 3.1 years biologically younger by the end of the study,” diagnostic researcher Varun Dwaraka reported.

The placebo group showed no significant change in biological age over the same period.

Researchers believe these powerful anti-aging qualities are related to Ozempic’s effect on fat distribution and metabolic health.millaf – stock.adobe.com

While everyone knows their chronological age, medical experts often speak in terms of biological or “phenotypic” age, which measures factors like metabolism, inflammation, and organ function.

Researchers note that the anti-aging effects of GLP-1 varied across the body’s systems. The most dramatic improvements were to the brain and inflammatory system, where the drug, originally developed to treat diabetes, appeared to delay biological aging by nearly 5 years.

The teams also noted significant improvement in the heart and kidneys.

“The drug may not only slow the rate of aging, but in some individuals partially reverse it,” Dwaraka said.

Researchers believe these powerful anti-aging qualities are related to Ozempic’s effect on fat distribution and metabolic health. In essence, excess fat around the body’s organs promotes the release of pro-aging molecules.

Obesity causes low-grade chronic inflammation, which is when the body’s natural chemical response to an irritant or injury remains active long after the threat has passed.

GLP-1 drugs indirectly reduce inflammation through weight loss. The meds can also activate specific T cells — white blood cells key to the immune system — which can have anti-inflammatory effects.

“The drug may not only slow the rate of aging, but in some individuals partially reverse it,” a researcher on the study said.Ilzer/peopleimages.com – stock.adobe.com
By reducing excess fat and inflammation, two hallmarks of epigenetic aging, the drug effectively slows the cruel march of deterioration.

The use of GLP-1 medications has proliferated in recent years. A recent KFF health poll revealed that 12% of US adults have taken an Ozempic-like drug at some point.

Despite the promising results, Dwaraka said caution and patience are called for.

“Prescribing it more broadly as an anti-ageing therapy is premature,” he said.

However, he and his team are hopeful their research will inspire further studies and support the repurposing of existing drugs to treat age-related problems, as these established medications are more likely to be fast-tracked for approval and come without the risk of unforeseen side effects.

“Semaglutide may well emerge as one of the most promising candidates in this space,” Dwaraka concluded.

GLP-1 drugs like Ozempic and Wegovy have been linked to a host of benefits beyond diabetes management and weight loss, from reduced dementia risk and decreased cancer risk to addiction treatment.

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https://nypost.com/2025/08/10/health/ozempic-users-aged-backwards-by-more-than-3-years-in-new-trial/

NJ electric bills tripled this summer — and could cost Dems the state

 When my friend Rebecca in Highland Park, NJ, opened her PSE&G gas and electric bill last month, she almost fell out of her seat: It had tripled. 

It’s now costing her more than $1,000 a month to keep her modest home running.

“It’s been creeping up for months, in spite of the fact that nothing about our house has changed,” she told me. “In years past, it was averaging about $300 a month.”

“I don’t know how we’re expected to absorb these new bills,” she posted on Facebook.

Her neighbor Felix Urman wondered the same as he ticked off his household costs for me. 

“Property taxes are up 6.3%,” he said — on top of what had already been the nation’s highest. 

“Car insurance up 15%. Home insurance up 17%. Health insurance up 19%. 

“I don’t know how non-dermatologists are living in New Jersey,” he concluded.

That question — how are we expected to live here? — is why the solidly blue Garden State is rapidly turning purple.

Affordability and taxes, at 54% and 43% respectively, have become the defining issues in New Jersey’s tightening governor’s race. 

The latest survey, released this week, showed Democratic Party nominee Mikie Sherrill leading Republican Jack Ciattarelli by just 6 percentage points.

Those who ranked affordability as their primary issue were split over which candidate is better equipped to handle it: 36% of them named Sherrill, while 34% chose Ciattarelli. 

But on taxes, Ciattarelli holds a commanding lead. When asked which candidate would do a better job lowering them, 50% picked the Republican, compared to just 15% who went for the Democrat.

It’s clear New Jersey residents have lost confidence in their Democratic lawmakers when it comes to tax policy.

Once they realize that Democrats’ bungled energy policies are to blame for their exploding utility bills as well, it could blow November’s race wide open.

“They took generation off before they brought generation on,” one energy expert told me, pointing to the state’s aggressive shutdown of coal-powered plants under Democratic Gov. Phil Murphy and the closure of the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant in 2018. 

The result? A shrinking energy supply, at a time when demand is exploding.

Dan Lockwood, a spokesperson for PJM Interconnection, the regional grid operator, explained the problem plainly to the New Jersey Monitor. 

“These higher prices are the result of a loss in electricity supply caused primarily by decarbonization policies that have led to an uptick in generator retirements,” Lockwood said.

On top of that came “an unprecedented spike in electricity demand,” he added, due to burgeoning AI data centers and the increasing use of “green” technologies like electric vehicles and appliances.

In short: the state is using more electricity than ever before, after legislators systematically dismantled the infrastructure that used to provide it.

And the New Jersey lawmakers who championed these green policies as bold and forward-thinking left regular families to foot the bill. 

Adding insult to injury, they apparently thought a $30 rebate would make a difference. 

“If you just opened your July electric bill and noticed a $30 ‘credit,’ don’t be fooled — it’s not relief,” state Assemblyman Alex Sauickie snarked last week in Central Jersey Newswire. 

“It’s a failed rebate scheme from Gov. Phil Murphy and the Democrat-controlled Legislature. It was designed to distract you.” 

“That’s not help,” Sauickie scoffed. “That’s an insult . . . a Band-Aid over a bullet hole.”

No one prepared the grid for this transition. No one told Rebecca or Felix that their bills would quietly triple while they were busy chauffeuring kids to camp and grocery shopping for dinner. 

The policymakers pushed the policies, but didn’t build the safety net, or the replacement energy sources, first.

Instead, families face a double squeeze. Their bills are rising, and so are the taxes funding the very lawmakers who forced costs up. 

Voters are rightly asking: What am I getting in return for this crushing cost of living?

The answer, so far, is not much.

Rebecca’s story is hardly unique. Families across the state are considering relocating, cutting their budgets to the bone, or simply skipping utility payments and hoping for the best. 

That’s not how it should be in one of the wealthiest states in the country.

This isn’t about politics, it’s about survival. And as New Jersey’s election heats up, candidates who ignore the pain of middle-class families do so at their peril. 

The bills are real. The frustration is growing.

And the demand for accountability is rising along with the utility costs.

Voters are watching, and they’re not buying the excuses anymore.

Bethany Mandel writes and podcasts at The Mom Wars.

https://nypost.com/2025/08/10/opinion/new-jerseys-insane-electric-bills-could-cost-dems-the-state/

Vance: ‘You are going to see a lot of people get indicted’ over Russiagate

 Vice President JD Vance said in an interview Sunday that “a lot of people” are about to get indicted over the Obama administration’s machinations on so-called Russiagate.

Without divulging specific names of who will get charged, Vance pointed to recent disclosures from Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard as ironclad evidence that there had been “an aggressive violation of the law” revolving around Russiagate.

“I absolutely want to see indictments,” Vance told Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” in a pre-taped interview. “Of course, you’ve got to have the law follow the facts here.”

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Vice President JD Vance called for people to get indicted over Russiagate.Getty Images

“You don’t just indict people to indict people. You indict people because they broke the law,” he went on. “If you look at what Tulsi and Kash Patel have revealed in the last couple of weeks, I don’t know how anybody can look at that and say there was an aggressive violation of the law.”

“I absolutely think they broke the law. And you’re going to see a lot of people get indicted for that,” he later added.

Last month, Gabbard began unveiling a tranche of documents about the Obama administration’s investigation of Russian meddling in the 2016 election.

Among the disclosures was the declassification of a 2020 House Intelligence Committee report crafted by Republicans that found there was insufficient evidence that Russia favored President Trump in 2016.

Gabbard also divulged material showcasing that top intelligence bosses had evidence that Russia did not hack 2016 voting systems in a way that allowed them to change the election outcome.

“What they basically did is they defrauded the American people in order to take Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign talking points and turn them into intelligence,” Vance said, accusing the Obama-era intelligence apparatus of “lying about what the intel said.”

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Vice President JD Vance accused the Obama-era intelligence community of helping the Clinton campaign.James Messerschmidt

“They would take something that supported a Hillary Clinton campaign talking point, and they would overemphasize it and exaggerate it,” the vice president continued. “They took anything that actually contradicted that narrative, and they buried it deep.”

Following the revelations from Gabbard, the Justice Department formed a “strike force” to begin assessing whether there were any criminal violations in what had been uncovered.

Last week, US Attorney General Pam Bondi moved to open a grand jury to probe Obama administration officials. Grand juries are used to determine whether or not to hand down indictments.

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The vice president said the Russiagate debacle bogged President Trump down during his first term.NATHAN HOWARD/POOL/EPA/Shutterstock

Vance broadly argued that “they actually laundered Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign talking points through the American intelligence services.” He did not specify names.

Former CIA director John Brennan and former DNI James Clapper have hit back at Gabbard, pointing to a 2020 bipartisan Senate Intelligence Committee report, which noted the panel “heard consistently that analysts were under no politically motivated pressure to reach specific conclusions.”

Clapper and Brennan also inked an op-ed insisting that the 2017 Intelligence Community report that was at the center of Gabbard’s ire never described “collusion” between Trump.

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President Trump is set to meet with Russian tyrant Vladimir Putin next week.Getty Images
They also stood by their claims that the Kremlin preferred him in the 2016 election.

A spokesperson for former President Barack Obama issued a rare statement rebuffing Gabbard.

“The bizarre allegations are ridiculous and a weak attempt at distraction,” spokesperson Patrick Rodenbush said last month. “Nothing in the document issued last week undercuts the widely accepted conclusion that Russia worked to influence the 2016 presidential election but did not successfully manipulate any votes.”

https://nypost.com/2025/08/10/us-news/jd-vance-you-are-going-to-see-a-lot-of-people-get-indicted-over-russiagate/

After tensions with U.S., Canada expected to maintain plans to buy up to 88 new F-35As

 At a time when the F-35 fighter is facing rejection from both Spain and India due to trade disputes with the United States, Canada may be the one to give the Lockheed Martin-built platform a new boost, as its most recent defense review supports plans to proceed with the purchase of up to 88 new stealth fighters for the country’s Air Force. In doing so, it appears that the doubts raised in March of this year are being left behind—when Ottawa launched its own reassessment of the acquisition, originally approved in 2023, in response to the controversial foreign policy of President Donald Trump.

The news was reported by Reuters, which claimed to have consulted two Canadian officials who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the importance of the program, the future of which will depend on the decision of the current government led by Mark Carney. According to the report, the presentation in defense of the F-35 does not issue a formal recommendation to proceed with the purchase, but it does rule out potential attempts to reduce or split into phases the number of fighters to be acquired.

It is worth recalling that Canada is already legally committed to securing the necessary funding for the arrival of the first 16 F-35 stealth fighters. However, the remaining 72 aircraft needed to complete the fleet were under review by the Canadian government. This is a significant point—especially given that Prime Minister Carney had campaigned on opposing the U.S. ally’s tariff offensive, and had voiced concerns over Canada’s strong dependence on Washington for its defense capabilities—rhetoric that has softened in recent weeks.

Added to these issues is another factor that has affected other U.S. military programs: cost increases. Along those lines, it’s useful to recall that the agreement finalized in early 2023 involved an investment of around $14 billion to complete the purchase of the fifth-generation fighters. However, according to recent reports from Canadian oversight agencies, that figure may have risen by as much as 45% from initial estimates. The same reports also highlighted concerns over a shortage of available pilots.

In the absence of further clarification for now, the Canadian defense ministry has made its intentions clear regarding the desire to proceed with the purchase of new aircraft to modernize the country’s fighter fleet. As stated by the office of Minister David McGuinty: “In all defense procurement decisions, our government will prioritize the defense of Canada and its sovereignty, while also supporting Canadian industry wherever possible. We are committed to acquiring what the Air Force needs, while ensuring economic benefits for Canadians and the responsible use of taxpayer dollars.”

https://www.zona-militar.com/en/2025/08/08/after-tensions-with-the-u-s-canada-is-expected-to-maintain-its-plans-to-purchase-up-to-88-new-f-35a-stealth-fighters/

Azerbaijan says energy cooperation with Ukraine won't be derailed by Russian strikes

Azerbaijan's president on Sunday condemned Russian air strikes on Azerbaijani oil and gas facilities in Ukraine but said energy cooperation between the two countries would continue.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev spoke with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy by phone.

"During the conversation, both sides condemned the deliberate airstrikes by Russia on an oil storage facility owned by Azerbaijan's SOCAR in Ukraine, as well as other Azerbaijani facilities and a gas compressor station transporting Azerbaijani gas to Ukraine," Aliyev's press service said in a statement.

"They emphasized their confidence that these attacks would not hinder energy cooperation between Azerbaijan and Ukraine."

Earlier this week, Russia struck an oil depot owned by SOCAR and a gas pumping station used to import liquefied natural gas from the U.S. and Azerbaijan in Ukraine's southern Odesa region, according to sources and Ukrainian officials.

In July, Ukraine pumped a test volume of Azerbaijani gas through the Transbalkan route for the first time and announced plans to significantly increase gas imports from Azerbaijan.

Ukraine's infrastructure and energy facilities are frequently targeted by Russian forces, which have stepped up their drone and missile attacks on Ukrainian cities and towns in recent months.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/azerbaijan-says-energy-cooperation-ukraine-145138469.html