The Medical Advisor

Harvard medical student Nick Norwitz, who holds a doctorate in physiology from Oxford, recently embarked on a personal health experiment that captured public attention. In just one month, he ate 720 eggs—an average of 24 per day—and observed an 18 percent drop in his LDL cholesterol levels, commonly called “bad cholesterol.” He wasn’t advocating an extreme egg diet, which would not be a wise long-term way to eat. Nor was the science behind this experiment revolutionary—research has already shown that dietary cholesterol doesn’t significantly impact blood cholesterol for most people. Still, the story went viral. Many interpreted it as a green light to enjoy more eggs. However, the full takeaway of the experiment went beyond diet. Norwitz’s experiment highlights a growing trend in the scientific community, where individuals and researchers alike are turning to personalized, real-world experiments, often called N=1 studies, to answer pressing health questions. Eating two dozen eggs a day ...

Introduction  Eggs are among the healthiest foods out there, but not all eggs are created equal, and sorting through the egg labels to identify the highest quality eggs can be a confusing affair. Health conscious consumers know to look for designations like "organic," "free-range," "pastured" and "cage-free,"1 but while you may think many of these are interchangeable, they're actually not. In some ways, these labels are little more than creative advertising. Updates: The featured video (below), "Egg Crackdown," a CBC Marketplace report by investigative reporter Asha Tomlinson, investigates the marketing of supermarket eggs and visits egg producers to get a firsthand look at what the company's label actually means.  A 2025 study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition investigated how eggs, cholesterol, and saturated fat interact to influence low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol...