Canada’s recent federal election reversed a trend of declining voter turnout, increasing by more than six percentage points over 2021. Elections Canada reported a turnout of almost 70 per cent, the highest level in 32 years.
The predominant consensus as to why turnout surged this year is the increased stakes at play amid United States President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to Canadian sovereignty and his imposition of heavy tariffs on Canadian goods.
To better understand these trends, I investigated turnout by social status since the 1960s in new research published in the Canadian Journal of Political Science.
I found that people at lower socio-economic levels are significantly less likely to vote than the rest of the population. This was not always the case.
Since the 1980s, these individuals have become much less likely to vote than their higher socio-economic counterparts. This has opened up a large turnout gap for each demographic group.
The voter turnout gap between the bottom and top third of income earners has increased roughly 12 percentage points since 1980 and between non-degree and degree holders by roughly seven percentage points.
Electoral participation
These large turnout gaps are being driven by the demobilization of lower status individuals, as middle-income earners and the middle class have tended to vote at rates much closer to the upper class and top third of earners.
What could be driving the class turnout gap and demobilization of lower socio-economic individuals?
Prevailing evidence points to the resource model of political participation, whereby individuals with jobs, a higher income and education are more likely to have access to a wider range of resources (particularly money, networks, time and skills), which better facilitates their participation in politics.
But people must also be motivated to participate by interest groups and political candidates and parties.
Failure to prioritize the economy
A crucial way political parties attempt to mobilize voters is through their platforms. Using data form Comparative Manifesto Project, an international research program, I show that over time, parties in Canada have devoted increasing attention to socio-cultural issues compared to economic issues, especially since the 1980s.
This reduced focus on economic issues has tended to align with both a decline in overall turnout as well as the decrease in voter turnout of lower status individuals. Could there be a connection?
When I examine economic preferences by socio-economic status in Canada, it is revealing that lower status individuals care a lot about economic issues; they’re significantly more likely to favour economic redistribution than the rest of the population.
Therefore, it’s not surprising that I found lower voters are more likely to cast ballots when political parties devote greater attention to economic issues.
This research suggests that Canada’s party system has failed to adequately prioritize economic issues to keep lower socio-economic people engaged in voting. It’s not surprising these groups check out of politics, especially when there is mounting evidence across the country that legislators favour higher status voters.
Political disengagement of large social groups is a fundamental problem that deeply undermines democracy and representative government.
A growing class gap in electoral participation means that the elevated position in society of the privileged few can magnify political and social inequalities in a never-ending loop. Socio-economic inequality fosters political inequality, which then fosters socio-economic inequality, and so on in a pervasive self-reinforcing cycle.
Politicians should take note
The 2025 federal election was the first in many years where the economy and pocketbook issues were in the spotlight, which very likely played a role in the uptick in turnout to buck recent trends. In the coming months, once the data is available, I will test this assumption through further research.
However, parties should take note if they want to increase the electoral participation of lower status groups, especially with rising inequality and a cost-of-living crisis showing little signs of abating.
Matt Polacko receives funding from Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (SSHRC), and Fonds de recherche du Québec – Société et culture (FRQSC).
These groups and their home takeovers are a significant contributor to homelessness. Home takeovers force people out of housing and into homelessness, deepening cycles of poverty, housing instability and trauma.
Consequently, some groups have figured out that expanding or exporting their operations into smaller Canadian communities like Thunder Bay can be immensely profitable. Smaller cities often bring less competition, significantly drive up drug prices and provide these newly arrived dealers with greater anonymity from law enforcement.
Organized drug trafficking networks have significant resources but even so, moving into a new community to set up shop within the criminal underworld is no easy task.
One reason is that smaller communities often have some established players in the informal drug economy who may not be willing to step aside or share their client base with the newly arrived urban dealers.
In a home takeover, out-of-town drug traffickers prey on low-income residents in social housing units and those who are otherwise marginalized. They forcefully take over their residence, and convert them into “trap houses.”
In other words, people’s residences become the base from which these groups produce and sell drugs and operate their business. These trap houses shield the drug traffickers from police and other authorities by reducing their need to sell drugs in public spaces.
Residents often have no choice but to accept these groups into their residence. Our research participants reported that out-of-town drug traffickers use a range of violent, coercive and manipulative tactics to gain initial access to their homes, including providing free drugs, forcing drug repayments, violence and extortion.
As one of our participants said, resisting a home takeover is almost impossible because drug traffickers can always find a way into their homes and will retaliate if they can’t get in:
“…they find their way in. There’s always a way in, and there’s always a weak point.”
Drug traffickers often prey on seniors or newly housed individuals, often within days or weeks of them moving in:
“When a homeless person gets pulled off the street, and they get given [a housing unit]… [the drug traffickers] reach out anywhere between six and eight weeks, and then it becomes a trap [house].”
Homelessness and housing insecurity
Residents whose homes have been taken over are left with little to no recourse.
Reporting takeovers to police or housing authorities is rarely an option. Many residents fear eviction, criminal charges or that dealers will retaliate with violence toward them or their family and friends. As one participant put it:
“If you call the cops, you’re probably dead.”
Given these fears, they see abandoning their home as the only way to escape this dire situation.
By not reporting to their housing authority or police, their homelessness and need for new housing remain undocumented. Critically, many former residents are often precluded from joining other housing support waiting lists.
Even after moving and somehow managing to get a new residence, several of our participants became homeless once again after their new place was also taken over.
Risk for homelessness
Home takeovers should be treated as a serious risk factor for homelessness.
Social housing providers can help by creating pathways for residents to report these takeovers safely, protecting them from legal consequences, and by moving people quickly into a new residence if needed, without penalizing them.
Police also play a critical role. They must treat residents experiencing home takeovers as victims, not as suspects, and build trust with the victimized individuals assuring them that they can be protected from retaliation if they speak up.
Addressing home takeovers is not only about limiting drug trafficking — it is also about protecting people’s homes, reducing homelessness and strengthening community safety.
Marta-Marika Urbanik receives funding from Killam Trusts and the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Carolyn Greene receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Katharina Maier receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Matthew Valasik does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Source: The Conversation – France – By Julia Moutiez, Doctorante en Architecture et Enseignante à l’École d’architecture de Paris Val-de-Seine, Université Paris Nanterre – Université Paris Lumières
As the 2024 Olympic Games drew near, the promise of being able to swim in the Seine turned into a media countdown: first as part of the official sporting events and then for the general public. As bids for the Olympic and Paralympic Games have become less and less popular due to the staggering costs involved and the difficulty of justifying them in terms of benefits for local communities, allowing Parisians to swim in the river flowing through Paris was heavily promoted ahead of last summer’s Games.
This kind of media framing, however, has overlooked current and historical realities. River bathing was widely practised over the last few centuries, and in the Seine, it has survived to the present day despite bans on swimming. Additionally, the practice does not only include recreational or sporting dimensions – it is also climate-related, at a time when rising temperatures suggest that compliance with the Paris Agreement will be a difficult, if not impossible task.
A centuries-old bathing tradition
While bathing in the Seine in 2024 was sometimes presented as a novel project, it is key to remember that swimming in Paris is a centuries-old practice. Traces of bathing facilities have been found in the capital dating back to the 13th century. However, the practice is difficult to document in detail as such traces are few, except in cases of major pieces of infrastructure. Over the centuries, swimming continued for hygiene, refreshment and leisure purposes, gradually spreading beyond the city limits.
It was not until the 17th century that the first documented boom in bathing practices in the Seine took place, as evidenced by the introduction of the first prohibitions on bathing and the emergence of the first facilities specifically designed for river bathers. Whether for washing, relaxing or socialising, these facilities were primarily set up to keep bathers safe from the current, and to conceal their nudity on the riverbanks. From the end of the 18th century onwards, these facilities became more complex: additional services were added to improve the comfort of swimmers and the first swimming schools appeared on the Seine.
At the end of the 19th century, floating baths became increasingly popular on the Seine and the Marne outside Paris, while the first-heated swimming pools were built in the capital.
A long-standing practice despite bans
Bans on swimming in the Seine have been numerous over the centuries, though they never completely eradicated the practice.
Historians Isabelle Duhau and Laurence Lestel trace the first restrictions back to the 17th century, when the provosts of merchants and aldermen expressed concern about public nudity on the banks of the river. Until the end of the 19th century, restrictions on swimming in the capital were always based on concerns about nudity. A second reason, that of hindering navigation, appeared in an ordinance of 1840. This was regularly amended until the prefectural decree of 1923, which is still in force today and prohibits bathing in rivers and canals throughout the former département (administrative unit) of the Seine.
However, these bans did not put an end to swimming. After 1923, bathing establishments continued to operate. They even experienced a boom in the interwar period, especially in the suburbs. Photos show that swimming was quite popular during heatwaves.
It was not until the second half of the 20th century that swimming in the Seine became less common, mainly due to the spread of public swimming pools, which offered a more artificial and controlled environment for this form of leisure.
And it was not until 1970, with the ban on swimming in the Marne, that the issue of water quality was raised, even though water quality was already being measured and questioned before then.
Indefatigable bathers
Even today, however, there are still occasional, activist, or even regular swimmers taking to Paris’s waterways. Sporting competitions have brought athletes to the Seine, for example in 2012 for the Paris triathlon, and in a more gradual way in recent years.
In amateur sports, cold-water swimmers also began training in the canals a few years ago, despite the ban. To deal with the risks posed by water temperatures, and possibly police surveillance, these swimmers set their own safety rules: they watch out for each other from the bank and wear life jackets and caps so they are always clearly visible. To date, none of these swimmers has ever been fined by the police.
In recent years, others have also taken a dip for more political reasons. In 2005, members of the Green Party (including its future leader Cécile Duflot) swam in the Seine on World Water Day to raise awareness about how polluted it was.
Diving in the Seine to raise awareness about river pollution also isn’t a new idea. It’s actually the trademark of the NGO European River Network, founded in 1994 and known for its Big Jump events, annual group swims calling for better water quality. Around the same period in the Paris region, the Marne Vive union was created to make the river swimmable again and protect its flora and fauna. In association with local elected officials, it has also been organising Big Jumps since the early 2000s.
In recent times, members of the Bassines Non Merci collective also took dips in Paris to protest against the appropriation of water resources, ahead of planned demonstrations against schemes for large agricultural water reservoirs in the Poitou region.
Other activists have also taken action to make Parisian waterways more suitable for swimming again. The Laboratoire des baignades urbaines expérimentales (Laboratory for Experimental Urban Swimming) organized collective “pirate” swims and shared them on social media and in the press to get local authorities to take up the issue.
Finally, despite the general ban on swimming throughout Paris, it should be noted that swimming is, once again, permitted under certain conditions in the Bassin de la Villette and the Canal Saint-Martin in the summer. For several years, the city has been organising its own collective swimming events, which are supervised and limited in terms of space and time. This is one of the paradoxes of urban swimming in Paris: on the one hand, public authorities are making efforts to improve water quality, in particular by opening sites where people can swim; on the other, they are reinforcing the general ban on swimming in the Seine, for example through more prominent signposting.
The many European versions of urban bathing
Looking at urban swimming practices in Europe, there are many cities where residents already bathe within city limits. These include Basel, Zurich, Bern, Copenhagen, Vienna, Amsterdam, Bruges, Munich and others. That said, putting together a comprehensive list remains tricky because of differences in how urban regulations are applied across Europe, where swimming might be allowed, tolerated, banned, or just accepted.
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In these different cities, the widespread practice of swimming may have been a goal, or it may be a byproduct of water sanitation policies. Copenhagen, for example, isn’t crossed by a river but by an inlet. In the 1990s, the city renovated its aging sanitation system and restored the port, in particular to prevent overflowing. It is also building on national policies, implemented since the 1970s, aimed at preserving water quality and aquatic biodiversity.
These developments, carried out by separate departments and for sometimes different purposes, gradually improved the water quality in the Danish capital, which then sought to highlight the new environmental standards it had achieved. The initial focus was on developing water-based leisure activities. Ideas included areas for fishing and wildlife observation, and plans for an aquarium and the development of canoeing. Ultimately, the focus shifted to a swimming area inaugurated in the early 2000s called Harbour Bath. The site was initially intended as temporary but was made permanent due to its success. Some 20 years later, urban swimming has become an asset that Copenhagen is keen to promote, for example by distributing maps of swimming areas to tourists.
The links between open water swimming and improved water quality are varied. The practice may be used to raise awareness of the need to improve water quality, or to gain support from the general public and elected officials for sanitation projects.
In Europe, numerous directives aimed at preserving biodiversity and water quality have prompted municipalities to clean up the waterways running through areas under their jurisdiction. In this context, then Paris Mayor Jacques Chirac pledged in 1988 to swim in the Seine following reports of the return of numerous fish species, indicating an improvement in the river’s condition. In this video, however, Chirac was not claiming to make the Seine swimmable again for all Parisians. Rather, he was just trying to demonstrate that its water quality had improved.
River bathing in the age of global warming
Another motivation is becoming increasingly important in the creation of urban waterways: providing people with access to cool places in the face of increasingly frequent heatwaves.
Another motivation for allowing swimming in urban waterways is becoming increasingly important: providing people with access to cool places during frequent heatwaves. Paris is particularly vulnerable to climate change due to its dense landscape. A recent scientific study ranks it as one of Europe’s most dangerous cities in the event of a heatwave.
The urban heat-island effect is particularly strong in Paris, and the city’s housing is not well suited to cope with heatwaves. Waterways are seen as a potential solution to the problem of cooling off outside the home. But riverbanks are often very exposed to the sun, which means that only direct contact with water can effectively cool the body – at least to a certain extent. Paris has therefore set up temporary swimming areas, initially in the form of removable pools, before allowing direct access to canals. The Bassin de la Villette, for example, is part of the city council’s Parcours Fraîcheur (Cooling Route) plan, and is also included in its heatwave plan.
Swimming in the Seine was also mentioned in 2015 in the city’s adaptation strategy, in the context of a general overhaul of municipal water policies that was initiated with the decision to take over Eau de Paris, the company responsible for the city’s water supply and wastewater collection.
A decade later, and after the success of the Paris Olympics where swimmers competed in the Seine, the future of swimming in Paris is still uncertain. But one thing is clear: rarely has the subject of urban bathing generated so much discussion, interest, and media coverage.
Julia Moutiez ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d’une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n’a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.
James Zug, the preeminent historian of the game, writes about how, in the winter of 1901, 32 men competed at the club in the first squash tournament on American soil. Many other Philadelphia clubs followed, leading to a local squash culture that spread to high schools and colleges.
The United States Squash Racquets Association, now US Squash, was founded in Philadelphia in 1904, later moved to New York City, and in 2021 relocated its offices back to Philly.
I’m a sports psychologist who works with elite professional squash athletes and also writes about the game. As the former athletic director at Drexel University, I helped introduce varsity squash to the school and also assisted in starting a nonprofit community program called SquashSmarts for Philly public school students.
I believe squash is one of Philly’s best-kept secrets, as many Philadelphians do not know our city is host to an Olympic training high-performance center, the U.S. Squash Hall of Fame and youth development programs known as urban squash.
In this Feb. 11, 2014, photo, squash coach Sakora Miller directs kids at SquashSmarts, a nonprofit dedicated to teaching the sport to Philly kids. AP Photo/Matt Rourke
A feast for the brain
Squash originated from the older game of racquets, which was played in London’s prisons during the 19th century.
The vulcanization of rubber by Charles Goodyear in 1839 enabled the creation of a squeezable rubber ball that maintained its original shape after being “squashed” against the wall. The British Commonwealth, through its worldwide military, social and political influence, promoted and grew the game internationally and set standardized rules and courts.
Watching professional squash today feels like being in gym class and science class at the same time: The sport showcases incredible athleticism and celebrates the laws of mathematics.
Squash is best understood in terms of its form and its essence.
The form of squash includes the ancient proportions of the cella of the Parthenon, which held the sacred statue of Athena holding Nike, the goddess of victory. An international squash court is 32 feet by 21 feet, and this ratio of approximately 1 to 1.5 establishes a sense of geometric order. With all walls and angles in play, and emphasizing elements such as time, velocity and space, squash allows for an amazing spectacle of creativity, elegance and speed. It is a feast for the brain.
Mental aspects of the game
But the essence of squash is mental, and the three aspects I find especially intriguing are mindfulness, playfulness and fairness.
Mindfulness: Mindfulness involves not dwelling on the past or worrying about the future. This is easier said than done, especially when a player is exhausted and struggling. The competitive squash player must focus on the moment and anticipate the next. This requires processing information in real time and practicing mindfulness to avoid distractions.
Playfulness: When I was a young athlete, I gave a B effort in practice and an A effort during competition. I had it all wrong.
I now understand that intense, disciplined practices are the foundation for tomorrow’s world-class athlete. There are no shortcuts. Psychologist Angela Duckworth advocates that excellence is 66% grit – which she decribes as a combination of passion, effort and perseverance – with the other 34% being innate talent.
For high-performance athletes, it is beneficial to be a neurotic perfectionist in practice, but not during competition, when they need to be situationally aware. Performance coach Brian Levenson writes about the pro athlete being the opposite of a perfectionist when competing, shifting to being playful, intuitive, confident and adaptable instead.
In other words, practice like a pro, play like a kid.
The author, right, with Simon Rösner, Germany’s highest-ever-ranked player at No. 3, in a postmatch cooldown at the U.S. Open Squash Championships in Philadelphia. Courtesy Eric Zillmer
Fairness: One intriguing aspect of squash is the two competitors share the same space. This requires respect for your opponent as well as the game.
At its best, squash resembles a dance between two foes, with the winner graciously allowing their opponent to leave the court first.
US Squash has made sportsmanship and character a key initiative as the sport grows in popularity at all levels of play. While the art of deception, such as head fakes or varying your swing timing, is a valued tactical skill, blocking the opponent, whether subtle or overt, is not.
One of Philadelphia’s most passionate amateur players was the longtime U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter. In 2021, the Arlen Specter US Squash Center, located on the campus of Drexel University, opened and was named in his honor.
The Specter Center is a state-of-the-art training facility and home to Team USA, the administrative center for US Squash, the home for the U.S. Open, and a hub for the U.S. junior and senior national teams, as well as urban squash.
The inclusion of squash in the 2028 Olympics is a milestone for the increasingly international sport. Currently, eight nationalities are represented among the top 10 male and female pro players, although in recent years Egypt has dominated both the men’s and women’s game.
Two U.S. women who are ranked in the world Top 10 are Team USA’s best chances to win gold: Amanda Sobhy, who went undefeated at Harvard, and Philly’s own Olivia Weaver.
If you want to catch them in action before the 2028 games, both will compete at the U.S. Open Squash Championship at the Arlen Specter US Squash Center from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25, 2025.
US Squash has a major national facility in Philadelphia, the Arlen Specter US Squash Center. Courtesy US Squash
Eric Zillmer serves as an unpaid advisor to the following non-profit boards. 2010-present Advisory Board, Philadelphia SquashSmarts; 2019-present PHL Sports Congress, Vice Chair Advisory Board; 2020-present Philadelphia Convention & Visitors Bureau (PHLCVB) Board of Directors; and 2025-present US Squash Board of Directors.
Small local organizations called Active Clubs have spread widely across the U.S. and internationally, using fitness as a cover for a much more alarming mission. These groups are a new and harder-to-detect form of white supremacist organizing that merges extremist ideology with fitness and combat sports culture.
Active Clubs frame themselves as innocuous workout groups on digital platforms and decentralized networks to recruit, radicalize and prepare members for racist violence. The clubs commonly use encrypted messaging apps such as Telegram, Wire and Matrix to coordinate internally.
Following their arrests, Active Club Canada’s public network went dark, Telegram pages were deleted or rebranded, and the club went virtually silent. Nippak was granted bail under strict conditions, while Althorpe remains in custody.
Rundo previously founded the Rise Above Movement, which was a violent, far-right extremist group in the U.S. known for promoting white nationalist ideology, organizing street fights and coordinating through social media. The organization carried out attacks at protests and rallies from 2016 through 2018.
An actor reconstructs how British broadcaster ITV News infiltrated and secretly filmed inside Active Club England, documenting its recruiting process, activities and goals.
‘You need to learn how to fight’
Active Club messaging glorifies discipline, masculinity and strength – a “warrior identity” designed to attract young men.
“The active club is not so much a structural organization as it is a lifestyle for those willing to work, risk and sweat to embody our ideals for themselves and to promote them to others,” Rundo explained via his Telegram channel.
“They never were like, ‘You need to learn how to fight so you can beat up people of color.’ It was like, ‘You need to learn how to fight because people want to kill you in the future,’” a former Active Club member told Vice News in 2023.
These cells are deliberately small – often under a dozen members – and self-contained, which gives them greater operational security and flexibility. Each club operates semi-autonomously while remaining connected to the broader ideology and digital network.
Figures connected to accelerationist groups – organizations that seek to create social chaos and societal collapse that they believe will lead to a race war and the destruction of liberal democracy – played a role in founding the Active Club network. Along with the Rise Above Movement, they include Atomwaffen Division and another neo-Nazi group, The Base – organizations that repackage violent fascism to appeal to disaffected young white men in the U.S.
Brotherhood as a cover
By downplaying explicit hate symbols and emphasizing strength and preparedness, Active Clubs appeal to a new generation of recruits who may not initially identify with overt racism but are drawn to a culture of hypermasculinity and self-improvement.
Anyone can start a local Active Club chapter with minimal oversight. This autonomy makes it hard for law enforcement agencies to monitor the groups and helps the network grow rapidly.
Potential members first see propaganda on encrypted apps such as Telegram or on social media. The clubs recruit in person at gyms, protests and local events, vetting new members to ensure they share the group’s beliefs and can be trusted to maintain secrecy.
However, precise membership numbers remain difficult to ascertain. Some groups call themselves “youth clubs” but share similar ideas and aesthetics and engage in similar activities.
Active Club members view themselves as defenders of Western civilization and masculine virtue. From their perspective, their activities represent noble resistance rather than hate. Members are encouraged to stay secretive, prepare for societal collapse and build a network of committed, fit men ready to act through infiltration, activism or violence.
Hiding in plain sight
Law enforcement agencies, researchers and civil society now face a new kind of domestic threat that wears workout clothes instead of uniforms.
Active Clubs work across international borders, bound by shared ideas and tactics and a common purpose. This is the new white nationalism: decentralized, modernized, more agile and disguised as self-improvement. What appears to be a harmless workout group may be a gateway to violent extremism, one pushup at a time.
Art Jipson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
As the lead instructor for American Government 1101 at Georgia State University in 2021, Evans had watched his students over the years show up with fewer facts and more conspiracy theories. Gone were the days when students arrived on campus with dim memories of high school civics. Now they came armed with bold, often misleading beliefs shaped by hours spent each day on TikTok, YouTube and Instagram.
One example of misinformation making the rounds back then was an anonymously posted video that more than half of teens in a national survey said provided “strong evidence” of U.S. voter fraud. The video was actually shot in Russia, crucial context that could be gleaned by entering a few choice keywords into a browser.
Ignoring the problem of online gullibility felt irresponsible – even negligent. How could the course deliver on its aim of helping students become “effective and responsible participants in American democracy” if it turned a blind eye to digital misinformation? At the same time, a major overhaul of a course that enrolls more than 4,000 students each year – with 15 instructors teaching 42 sections in person, online and in a hybrid format – would create a logistical nightmare.
In fall 2021, he reached out with a question: Could aspects of the curriculum be incorporated into American Government 1101 without turning the whole course on its head?
My team and I thought so.
Teaching informed citizenship
Evans’ challenge was hardly unique to his campus.
For Generation Z, born between 1997 and 2012, social media – especially YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and Snapchat – has become their source of information about the world, eclipsing traditional news outlets. In a survey of more than 1,000 young people ages 13 to 18, 8 in 10 said they encounter conspiracy theories in their social media feeds each week, yet only 39% reported receiving instruction in evaluating the claims they saw there.
We built our Civic Online Reasoning program to address this gap.
When we launched the program in 2018, digital literacy was a catchall that included everything from editing and uploading videos to cyberbullying and sexting. “Checking the credibility of sources” was just one criterion among many buried in a list of desired outcomes.
We narrowed the focus of our program to skills essential to being an informed citizen, such as “lateral reading” − that is, using the full context of the internet to judge the quality of a claim, identify the people or organizations behind it and assess their credibility. Rather than fixate solely on the message, we taught students to vet the messenger: What organizations stand behind the claim? Does the source of the claim have a conflict of interest? What are the source’s credentials or expertise?
Across six hours of instruction – two hours less than the average teen spends online each day – students nearly doubled in their ability to locate quality information compared to a control group. We thought it wouldn’t be a huge leap to extend our approach to college classrooms.
In a version of this program modified for Evans’ course, we designed six short modules that could be used asynchronously, meaning that students could complete them on their own time, regardless of course format. Unlike information literacy lessons that soar above the particulars of any one discipline, our modules were closely tied to course content.
In a unit on the executive branch, for instance, students examined an Instagram video that falsely claimed President Joe Biden wanted Americans to pay more at the gas pump. In a module on the judiciary, they watched a video on TikTok about Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court confirmation, posted by a partisan, left-leaning organization.
A look at the program in action.
We created videos that pulled back the curtain by deconstructing tactics common in political campaigns – quotes ripped from context, videos spliced and selectively edited, and corporate-funded websites that masquerade as grassroots efforts.
We also taught students how to check facts like the pros. The main strategy was lateral reading – searching across the internet to see what other, more credible sources say about an organization or influencer. We challenged common assumptions too, such as that Wikipedia is always unreliable. Not true, especially for “protected pages,” indicated by a padlock icon at the top of an article, which prevent editorial changes except those made by established Wikipedians. Another is the belief that a dot-org website has passed rigorous tests that qualify it as a charity, which is never true. Dot-org has always been an “open” domain that anyone can register, no questions asked.
These lessons took just 150 minutes in total over the semester, and instructors didn’t need to change a thing; they just listed the lessons on the course schedule.
Positive outcomes, modest effort
Did this approach work for Evans and his American Government 1101 students?
Across two semesters in one academic year, 3,488 students took a test at the beginning of the course and again at the end. It included items such as one in which students evaluated a website that claimed it “does not represent any industry or political group” but is actually backed by fossil fuel interests.
In June, Evans, two co-authors and I uploaded a preprint of a journal article, which hasn’t yet been peer reviewed, that documents the experiment and its results. We found that from the beginning to the end of the semester, students became a lot smarter at identifying shady sources and more confident in evaluating where information comes from. Students’ scores showing how well they were able to do this improved by 18%. Even better, 80% said they “learned important things” from the modules.
Not bad for an easily adopted addition to the course.
These results add to other studies we’ve conducted, such as one in a college nutrition class and one in a rhetoric and writing intro course, that similarly showed how educators can improve students’ digital literacy – and their awareness of misinformation – without causing a major disruption to the curriculum.
And I believe it’s needed. A chasm separates the approved content that appears on students’ reading lists and the massive amount of unregulated, unverified and unreliable content they consume online.
The good news? This intervention could work in any subject where misinformation runs wild: history, nutrition, economics, biology and politics. Findings similar to ours from other college campuses buoy our confidence in the approach.
These changes don’t require waiting for a big revolution. Small steps can go a long way. And in a world flooded with misinformation, helping students learn to sort fact from fiction might be the most civic thing we can do.
Sam Wineburg received funding from the William & Flora Hewlett Foundation for this research. He is a board member of the not-for-profit Digital Inquiry Group (inquirygroup.org), which now operates the Civic Online Reasoning curriculum.
That drive – to both repeal environmental regulations and cast doubt on science – reflects the Trump administration’s approach to environment policy.
Deregulation has long been a key theme in Republican environmental policy. The conflict between the obligation to protect public health and the desire to boost markets traces back to Ronald Reagan’s presidential administration. Reagan’s perspective that government is not a solution to problems, but is the problem instead, set the stage for Republican administrations that followed.
Reagan argued that the growth of government spending and business regulation had stymied economic prosperity. Environmental regulations were a prime target.
Forty years later, America is seeing many of the same concepts in the Trump administration. However, its strategy could have a greater effect than Reagan ever envisioned.
Slashing budgets and staffing
There are many ways to kneecap government agencies: Instituting massive budget cuts, cutting staff with critical functions and appointing leadership whose goal is limiting the reach and effectiveness of the very agencies they direct are just a few.
Trump’s EPA budget plan for 2026 includes a draconian 50% cut from the previous year and the lowest budget proposal, when adjusted for inflation, since Reagan. Staff cuts in just the first six months of the second Trump administration put the agency’s total employment at 12,448, down from 16,155 in January.
Both cut EPA’s budget, but that alone does not reduce an agency’s effectiveness.
Politicizing EPA leadership
When the EPA was founded in 1970 during the Nixon administration, it represented a bipartisan consensus: After decades of auto exhaust, polluted waterways and smog-filled air, environmental protection had become a national policy priority.
But industries that EPA regulated argued that the costs of implementing the agency’s mandates were too high. That created tension between economics and science and enforcement.
As part of his “government is not the solution” approach, Reagan issued an executive order shortly after taking office in 1981 requiring federal agencies to submit all proposed rules to the White House Office of Management and Budget before making them public. In Reagan’s eyes, this approach centralized power in the White House and was a way to eliminate burdensome regulations before the agencies announced them to the public.
He also appointed an EPA administrator who shared his anti-government perspective. Anne Gorsuch Burford was a lawyer and state legislator from Colorado, where she routinely voted against toxic waste cleanup and auto pollution controls.
Once in Washington, she appointed several people to the EPA’s leadership team with direct ties to industries the EPA regulated. An example was Rita Lavelle, head of the EPA’s toxic waste programs, who was later convicted of perjury for lying to Congress about when she knew her former employer, a defense contractor, was disposing of toxic waste at a now notorious dump site.
These appointments were an example of regulatory capture by the industries EPA was in charge of overseeing. Anne Gorsuch Burford was held in contempt of Congress for not turning over records related to the Superfund cleanup of the same hazardous waste site, which led to her resignation. The Superfund program to clean up toxic waste dumps was new and one of EPA’s largest programs at the time.
The scandals, broken staff morale, stripped budgets and fights over policy discredited the agency.
Going after government scientists
Anne Gorsuch Burford’s deregulation efforts weren’t fully successful, in part because EPA staff experts rallied to preserve science and regulatory functions. They leaked materials about delays in the Superfund site cleanup to sympathetic congressional staff, who in turn found support from Republican and Democratic senators.
That history may have influenced the Trump administration’s strategy toward the federal bureaucracy’s staff experts, who Trump calls “the Deep State.”
EPA employees and supporters held a rally in Philadelphia on March 25, 2025, to call attention to the impact of the Trump administration’s job cuts. AP Photo/Matt Rourke
Trump’s head of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, has been clear about targeting bureaucrats. He said in 2023: “We want their funding to be shut down so that the EPA can’t do all of the rules against our energy industry because they have no bandwidth financially to do so. We want to put them in trauma.”
There is a clear focus today on EPA programs that don’t align with the administration’s views. Programs related to environmental justice for low-income communities are in the line of fire. The appointment of people from the chemical, fossil fuel and corporate industries to high-level regulatory and legal positions raises questions about regulatory capture – whether their focus will be more on the health of the industries they oversee than on the health of the public.
The first Trump administration had a focus on reforming permitting and bureaucracy. While appearing radical at the time, the revamping of scientific boards to include more industry representatives, the undoing of power plant rules and the lessening of enforcement hobbled but did not completely undo the agency.
The second Trump administration, in actively supporting fossil fuel “energy dominance,” is taking steps to not just eliminate regulations but to ensure future administrations can’t bring the regulations back, by using a complex set of legal arguments related to the regulation of greenhouse gases.
At the same time, the administration is trying to discredit scientific research to downplay the risks of a warming planet.
EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announces plans in March 2025 to reconsider dozens of regulations that affect the fossil fuel industry and human health.
The Reagan administration, while it also pushed for deregulation and expanded permitting of oil, gas and coal leases, embraced some elements of environmental protection. Reagan designated more than 10 million acres as protected wilderness and signed the Coastal Barriers Resources Act, which helped protect 3.5 million acres of shoreline from development. When Reagan signed the Montreal Protocol in 1988 to help protect the ozone layer, he cited scientific data showing the growing risks of ozone-depleting substances.
When Congress doesn’t push back
There is another critical difference between the first and second Trump administrations: The current Republican-controlled Congress is consenting to almost every request the president makes.
Congress has a constitutional responsibility to be a check on the executive branch, and a bipartisan Congress has long taken an active role in oversight and investigation involving environmental issues.
In 2025, however, Congress has approved most of Trump’s demands, including voting to repeal much of the Inflation Reduction Act, a package of pro-environment spending it had just passed two years earlier and that included many projects in Republican districts.
In an irony of history, Anne Gorsuch Burford’s son Neil Gorsuch now sits on the Supreme Court. His vote when those cases come before the court may be the ultimate Reagan legacy on the Trump EPA.
Barbara Kates-Garnick does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
Il peut exceptionnellement arriver qu’un taux d’alcoolémie élevé ne soit pas dû à une consommation d’alcool…Nikamo/Shutterstock.com
Le « syndrome d’auto-brasserie » est une affection très rare et très peu documentée, impliquant la production d’alcool par des bactéries intestinales, qui entraîne l’intoxication des individus concernés. Au-delà des quelques cas cliniques décrits, des scientifiques se demandent si un phénomène similaire ne pourrait pas être impliqué dans certains cas de stéatose hépatique non alcoolique, une maladie aux causes multiples, beaucoup plus courante.
Imaginez : vous êtes agent de police, et vous remarquez une voiture qui zigzague dangereusement sur la chaussée. Vous arrêtez le conducteur : il est manifestement ivre. D’une voix pâteuse, il jure pourtant n’avoir pas touché une goutte d’alcool de la journée. Le croiriez-vous ? Probablement pas.
Pourtant, en 2024, un citoyen belge a été acquitté après avoir été verbalisé pour conduite en état d’ivresse à trois reprises en quatre ans. Son emploi dans une brasserie pouvait nourrir les soupçons, mais il affirmait n’avoir rien bu. Selon les trois médecins qui l’ont ausculté, il aurait souffert d’un syndrome d’auto-brasserie dont il ignorait l’existence.
Les personnes atteintes de ce syndrome très rare (une revue de la littérature scientifique de langue anglaise publiée en 2020 a révélé que seuls 20 cas avaient été identifiés depuis 1974, ndlr) hébergeraient dans leurs intestins des microbes produisant des quantités anormalement élevées d’alcool lorsqu’ils décomposent les sucres. En 2016, à New York, une femme avait, elle aussi, été acquittée après un diagnostic identique. Son taux d’alcoolémie atteignait quatre fois la limite légale.
Bien que le syndrome d’auto-brasserie soit exceptionnel, certaines des espèces bactériennes qui y sont associées pourraient être impliquées dans une autre maladie beaucoup moins rare, la stéatose hépatique.
Les quatre stades de la stéatose hépatique non alcoolique. wowow/Shutterstock
En 2019, notamment, des médecins ont identifié un patient souffrant à la fois du syndrome d’auto-brasserie et d’une MASLD sévère. L’analyse de ses selles a révélé la présence de la bactérie Klebsiella pneumoniae. Il s’est avéré que la souche isolée produisait quatre à six fois plus d’alcool que celles habituellement rencontrées chez des individus sains.
Sur 43 autres patients atteints de MASLD, 61 % hébergeaient une souche de K. pneumoniae produisant des quantités inhabituellement élevées d’alcool. En revanche, parmi les 48 personnes en bonne santé servant de témoins, seuls 6 % étaient concernées.
Les chercheurs ont également constaté que K. pneumoniae n’était que légèrement plus abondante dans l’intestin des malades que chez les témoins. C’était la quantité d’alcool produite qui différait. Ils se sont alors demandé si cet excès pouvait réellement engendrer la stéatose.
Une microbrasserie dans l’intestin ?
Pour vérifier si ces bactéries étaient bel et bien responsables de la situation des malades, les scientifiques ont mené des tests sur des animaux de laboratoire. Ils ont nourri des souris saines avec la souche hyper-alcoologène de K. pneumoniae. En un mois, les rongeurs ont développé une stéatose mesurable, qui a évolué en cirrhose au bout de deux mois. La progression de la maladie reproduisait fidèlement celle observée lorsque les souris étaient gavées d’alcool pur.
En outre, le transfert de microbiote provenant de souris ou d’humains atteints de MASLD dans des souris saines a également déclenché des lésions hépatiques.
Enfin, les chercheurs ont traité le microbiote de souris atteintes de MASLD avec un virus ciblant uniquement Klebsiella, pour détruire ces bactéries. Le transfert du microbiote ainsi débarrassé de Klebsiella dans des souris saines n’a provoqué chez ces dernières aucune maladie.
Les microbes présents dans l’intestin produisent des substances pouvant influencer l’humeur et la santé – pour le meilleur comme pour le pire. T. L. Furrer/Shutterstock
Ces résultats suggèrent que certaines souches de K. pneumoniae fabriquent des quantités excessives d’alcool, capables d’induire une stéatose hépatique. Ils laissent aussi espérer que certaines formes de stéatose liées à Klebsiella puissent être traitées par antibiotiques. En effet, l’administration à des souris atteintes d’imipénem, un antibiotique de la famille des bêtalactamines, de la classe des carbapénèmes, a inversé l’évolution de la maladie.
Puisque K. pneumoniae transforme le sucre en alcool, un simple test sanguin mesurant l’alcoolémie après ingestion de sucre pourrait permettre de diagnostiquer cette forme particulière de stéatose. Les chercheurs ont montré que des souris hébergeant ces bactéries devenaient ivres et voyaient leur taux d’alcool sanguin grimper après avoir consommé du sucre.
Il faut souligner que l’on ignore encore l’ampleur de ce phénomène. Si Klebsiella est fréquemment présente dans l’intestin humain, on ne sait pas pourquoi certaines personnes hébergent des souches productrices de grandes quantités d’alcool.
Plus largement, ces travaux illustrent une fois encore le rôle du microbiote dans la régulation de l’humeur et du comportement. Comme pour la conductrice new-yorkaise acquittée, le simple fait de consommer un dessert très sucré pourrait, dans de rares cas, entraîner chez certaines personnes une ébriété sans qu’elles n’aient consommé d’alcool. Le salarié belge, quant à lui, tente de réduire sa production intestinale d’alcool en suivant à la fois un régime alimentaire spécifique et un traitement médicamenteux, selon les déclarations de son avocate. Reste à savoir si ces individus développent une tolérance accrue à l’alcool, de par leur exposition continue.
Cet article, initialement publié le 30 septembre 2019, a été actualisé en 2024 pour inclure les éléments sur la décision de justice belge.
Bill Sullivan ne travaille pas, ne conseille pas, ne possède pas de parts, ne reçoit pas de fonds d’une organisation qui pourrait tirer profit de cet article, et n’a déclaré aucune autre affiliation que son organisme de recherche.
Sauter des repas pour pouvoir consommer davantage d’alcool sans craindre d’augmenter ses apports caloriques… Cette très mauvaise idée est en train de prendre de l’ampleur, au point d’inquiéter le corps médical, et d’avoir donné naissance à un néologisme : la « drunkorexie », ou « alcoolorexie ».
La « drunkorexie » (ou « alcoolorexie ») est un néologisme formé à partir des mots drunk (de l’anglais, être ivre) et anorexie. Il est apparu pour la première fois, il y a une quinzaine d’années, dans un article du New York Times, « Se priver de nourriture, un cocktail à la main ». Tout en précisant que ce terme n’avait rien de médical, la journaliste Sarah Kershaw l’employait pour décrire comment certaines personnes adoptaient des comportements de jeûne volontaire afin de limiter la prise de poids liée à leur consommation d’alcool.
Depuis, le phénomène a fait l’objet de recherches plus approfondies. Il soulève des enjeux majeurs de santé mentale et interroge sur le rôle des normes esthétiques et de la pression sociale. Explications.
Quels sont les risques associés à la drunkorexie ?
Ces comportements poursuivent deux objectifs principaux : éviter la prise de poids liée à la consommation d’alcool ou atteindre un état d’ivresse plus rapide. Ils peuvent être adoptés à différents moments, que ce soit en amont de la consommation (par anticipation), pendant celle-ci (notamment lors de soirées festives) ou après, dans une logique de compensation a posteriori.
Si la drunkorexie peut être perçue comme un comportement ponctuel ou stratégique, ses conséquences sont loin d’être anodines. Elle est tout d’abord associée à une consommation d’alcool plus fréquenteet plus intense, ainsi qu’à des épisodes d’ivresse plus sévères, exposant les jeunes à des prises de risques accrues, tant sur le plan physique que social.
Par ailleurs, les effets de la drunkorexie ne se limitent pas à l’alcool. Plusieurs études montrent qu’elle s’inscrit souvent dans un tableau plus large de troubles alimentaires, présents y compris en dehors des contextes festifs. À terme, ces comportements pourraient favoriser l’installation durable de troubles du comportement alimentairechez certains jeunes adultes.
Sur le plan psychologique, ce type de comportement semble également refléter une fragilité émotionnelle plus profonde. Dépression, anxiété, détresse psychologique, difficultés de régulation des émotions, antécédents de maltraitance ou insécurité dans les relations proches, sont fréquemment rapportés chez les jeunes concernés.
Enfin, les conséquences cognitives de la drunkorexie restent encore peu documentées, mais certaines hypothèses méritent d’être explorées : quel impact ce comportement peut-il avoir sur la mémoire, sur les capacités de raisonnement ou sur la réussite académique, lorsque l’alcool est consommé de manière répétée dans un contexte de restriction alimentaire ?
À ce jour, il n’existe pas de données épidémiologiques nationales permettant d’estimer précisément combien de personnes sont concernées par la drunkorexie. Les études disponibles portent généralement sur des populations ciblées (lycéens, étudiants, jeunes adultes) et indiquent des prévalences comparables, avoisinant la moitié des personnes consommatrices d’alcool.
Il n’existe pas encore de données permettant de décrire précisément l’évolution de la drunkorexie sur le long terme. Les études longitudinales sont difficiles à mettre en œuvre : elles demandent du temps, sont coûteuses et exposées à une perte importante de participants au fil du temps. En France, une étude de cohorte sur cinq ans, suivant des étudiants recrutés en première année à l’Université puis réévalués après deux et quatre ans, est actuellement en cours et devrait apporter des éléments nouveaux sur la dynamique de la drunkorexie chez les jeunes adultes.
Les réseaux sociaux jouent probablement un rôle clé dans la diffusion et la banalisation de la drunkorexie. Les plateformes comme Instagram, TikTok ou Snapchat exposent les jeunes à un flux constant d’images valorisant la minceur, la musculation ou certaines pratiques festives, créant ainsi un double impératif : afficher un corps conforme aux normes esthétiques tout en participant aux codes sociaux de la fête et de l’alcoolisation.
Dans cet environnement, la drunkorexie peut apparaître comme un compromis pour concilier ces deux injonctions, renforcée par le partage d’expériences, de conseils ou de défis en ligne.
Ces comportements apparaissent le plus souvent dans des contextes festifs, où la consommation d’alcool est normalisée, voire encouragée. Chez les jeunes, ils sont rarement perçus comme problématiques. Au contraire, ils sont souvent intégrés à une routine associée aux soirées, renforcés par le sentiment de « faire comme tout le monde », ce qui participe à leur banalisation.
La drunkorexie est ainsi décrite comme une pratique courante, parfois automatique, dans les situations de forte consommation d’alcool. Elle peut aussi répondre à une volonté de se conformer aux normes du groupe, d’obtenir une forme d’approbation sociale ou de renforcer le sentiment d’appartenance.
Les adolescents et les jeunes adultes évoluent dans des contextes où les normes sociales autour du corps et de la consommation d’alcool sont particulièrement marquées. L’idée qu’il faut être mince ou musclé pour être valorisé socialement coexiste souvent avec une pression à participer aux soirées et à consommer de l’alcool de manière excessive.
Si un proche semble adopter des troubles alimentaires avant ou après avoir bu de l’alcool et des signes de drunkorexie, il existe différents dispositifs d’aide.
Au-delà de la prise en charge individuelle, limiter la progression de la drunkorexie suppose des actions collectives et de santé publique, visant notamment à renforcer la prévention chez les plus jeunes, dès le collège et le lycée, en intégrant à la fois l’éducation sur les risques liés à l’alcool et la sensibilisation aux troubles alimentaires. Le repérage précoce de la drunkorexie passe par la formation des professionnels de santé et des acteurs du milieu éducatif à mieux identifier ces comportements.
Des campagnes de prévention ciblées, conçues pour répondre aux réalités des publics concernés, en tenant compte de l’âge, du sexe et des contextes psychosociaux, pourraient contribuer à réduire l’adoption de ces pratiques. Enfin, une réponse politique plus stricte, visant à une meilleure régulation des messages véhiculés sur les réseaux sociaux, en particulier ceux associant minceur et ivresse, pourrait réduire l’attractivité de la drunkorexie auprès des jeunes.
RITZ Ludivine a reçu des financements de l’IRESP et la Société Française d’Alcoologie et d’Addictologie.
At the 2025 American Society of Clinical Oncology meeting, researchers from Inova Schar Cancer Institute reported that a surprising number of dedicated marathon and ultramarathon runners had precancerous growths in their colons. Among 100 athletes aged 35 to 50, 15% had advanced adenomas – lesions that can develop into bowel cancer – while 41% had at least one adenoma.
The study is small and not yet peer-reviewed, but the signal is strong enough to have capturedglobal attention. Here’s what the findings really mean, why experts urge caution in interpreting the results, and what runners should watch for.
At first glance, it seems counterintuitive. Decades of evidence show regular exercise lowers cancer risks, including bowel cancer, and improves outcomes after a cancer diagnosis. This study doesn’t overturn that science. Instead, it suggests a narrow group of young, very high–volume endurance athletes might face unique bowel stress that could increase their odds of developing precancerous changes over time.
The Inova study deliberately excluded people with known genetic conditions or bowel disease to focus on runners who otherwise seemed low risk. Yet their screening found more advanced lesions than expected for that age group – a pattern outside experts, commenting in the New York Times, described as worth investigating, not a final answer.
How might heavy endurance training contribute to bowel changes? One theory focuses on temporary blood flow reductions to the gut during prolonged, intense exercise. Distance runners are familiar with runner’s colitis – cramping and occasional bleeding after long runs. Repeated cycles of low–oxygen stress, inflammation and tissue repair in the bowel could, theoretically, encourage adenoma development in susceptible people.
The Inova team highlighted this mechanism based on observations and runners’ reports of gut symptoms, though the study didn’t directly measure blood flow, oxygen or inflammation markers. It also didn’t isolate other lifestyle factors that might matter, such as dehydration strategies, anti–inflammatory drug use, specific nutrition practices, or very low body fat levels.
Just as important is what this study doesn’t establish. It doesn’t prove marathons or ultramarathons cause bowel cancer. It doesn’t show most young–onset bowel cancers occur in runners – doctors not involved in the study emphasised that most younger patients with these cancers aren’t endurance athletes. And it doesn’t address whether more moderate exercise carries similar risks.
The comparison point – the expected rate of advanced adenomas in the late 40s – comes from broader population studies, not from a matched control group. That makes the observed difference notable but still preliminary.
The research is clinically grounded, but its size and design mean it should be seen as a starting point for larger studies rather than a basis for changing general exerciseguidance.
Still, there are practical lessons for endurance athletes and doctors. First, persistent blood in stool, changes in bowel habits, unexplained stomach pain, or iron–deficiency anaemia shouldn’t be dismissed as “just running”.
In a community where gut complaints are common and often normalised, it’s easy to miss warning signs. The lead oncologist argued that young runners with bleeding after long runs should be offered screening – a stance grounded in the fact that colonoscopy can remove precancerous lesions and prevent cancers developing. This is more cautious than current guidelines for average–risk adults but aligns with individualised, symptom–driven care.
Recent conferences highlighted data showing structured exercise after bowel cancer treatment improves long–term outcomes, underlining that physical activity remains one of the most powerful, low–cost tools in cancer prevention and care. This runner study doesn’t contradict that larger story. It flags a potential exception at the extreme end of training that needs careful attention, not panic.
If future research confirms a link, what might change? Screening recommendations could evolve for a clearly defined group of high–volume endurance athletes, perhaps starting colonoscopy earlier than the current age–45 threshold for average–risk adults.
Athletes and coaches might adapt training, nutrition and recovery to protect gut health – paying attention to hydration, heat stress, gradual progression, and avoiding unnecessary anti–inflammatory medication around long efforts.
Sports medicine and gastroenterology clinics might work together on protocols for evaluating gut bleeding in runners, narrowing the gap between “common” and “concerning” symptoms. But these steps depend on replication in larger, diverse groups and understanding which components of endurance life – intensity, duration, heat, altitude, nutrition – matter most.
For now, a balanced message serves the public best. Endurance running is a profound source of meaning and health for many people, and quitting running isn’t the lesson from a single small study.
The key is keeping the proven benefits of exercise in view while being clear–eyed about potential risks at extremes. Listen to your body’s signals, especially bleeding. Treat red–flag symptoms as medical, not merely athletic. And discuss personal risk factors and family history with your doctor.
As science probes this signal further, the likely outcome isn’t a blanket warning but more nuanced guidance: who might need earlier screening, when to investigate symptoms, and how to train hard with the gut in mind.
The study’s real contribution may be cultural as much as clinical: it gives runners and doctors permission to ask a question they’ve too often waved away, and to catch dangerous lesions before they become cancers.
Justin Stebbing does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.
