OpenAI launched GPT-5.4 Mini and Nano, two faster and cheaper models designed for high-volume AI workloads.
The models trade a bit of accuracy for speed and cost, targeting tasks repetitive and easy tasks like customer support, and automated workflows.
Developers can now run hybrid AI systems where a flagship model plans tasks while smaller models handle the bulk of the work.
OpenAI isn’t slowing down. Less than two weeks after launching GPT-5.4—itself released just two days after GPT-5.3—the company dropped two more models on Tuesday: GPT-5.4 Mini and GPT-5.4 Nano.
These aren’t stripped-down versions of the flagship model—they’re purpose-built machines designed for the kind of work where waiting half a minute for an answer is not an option.
OpenAI calls them its “most capable small models yet,” saying that GPT-5.4 Mini is more than two times faster than GPT-5 Mini. If you’ve ever watched a coding assistant think for 45 seconds before editing three lines of code, then you understand the appeal of a fast model.
We’re introducing GPT-5.4 mini and nano, our most capable small models yet.
GPT-5.4 mini is more than 2x faster than GPT-5 mini. Optimized for coding, computer use, multimodal understanding, and subagents.
So why would anyone release a less accurate model on purpose? The short answer: because accuracy isn’t always the bottleneck. If you’re running a customer service chatbot that answers the same 200 questions all day, then you don’t need the model that scored best on PhD-level chemistry exams. You need the one that responds in under a second and costs a fraction of a cent per reply. That’s the space these models are built for.
But it doesn’t mean these models are dumb or unreliable. On coding benchmarks, GPT-5.4 Mini scored 54.4% on SWE-Bench Pro—a test that measures a model’s ability to fix real GitHub issues—compared to 45.7% for the old GPT-5 Mini and 57.7% for the full GPT-5.4.
On OSWorld-Verified, which tests how well a model can actually operate a desktop computer by reading screenshots, Mini hit 72.1%, just shy of the flagship’s 75.0%—and both clear the human baseline of 72.4%. GPT-5.4 Nano, meanwhile, scores 52.4% on SWE-Bench Pro and 39.0% on OSWorld—lower than Mini, but still a major leap over previous Nano-class models.
“GPT-5.4 marks a step forward for both Mini and Nano models in our internal evaluations,” Perplexity Deputy CTO Jerry Ma said after testing both. “Mini delivers strong reasoning, while Nano is responsive and efficient for live conversational workflows.”
Instead of routing every single task through an expensive flagship model, you can now build systems where the big model plans and coordinates while smaller models handle the actual grunt work in parallel—searching a codebase here, reading a document there, or processing a form somewhere else. As we saw in our GPT-5.4 vs. Grok 4.20 comparison, where the model sits in the workflow matters as much as which model you pick.
GPT-5.4 Mini runs at a rate of $0.75 per million input tokens and $4.50 per million output tokens via the API. GPT-5.4 Nano is even cheaper: $0.20 per million input tokens and $1.25 per million output tokens—a price point that makes running a huge amount of queries per day financially realistic for startups. For context, Nano is roughly four times cheaper than Mini on inputs.
For regular ChatGPT users, GPT-5.4 Mini is available today to Free and Go users via the “Thinking” option in the plus menu. Paid subscribers who hit their GPT-5.4 rate limits will automatically fall back to Mini. GPT-5.4 Nano, however, is API-only for now—OpenAI is clearly positioning it as a developer tool, not a consumer one.
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READING, Mass. (AP) — Just before St. Patrick’s Day, an Irish pub appeared one night beneath a basketball hoop in a suburban Massachusetts driveway.
Neighbors packed around the bar as music played and Guinness flowed — inside a tiny pub that had been towed in for the night.
Instead of heading out to celebrate the holiday, the bar had come to them.
“The Wee Irish Pub” was delivered by Tiny Pubs, a small business run by brothers Matt and Craig Taylor, who build miniature Irish pubs on wheels for holidays, weddings and backyard parties across New England.
Decorated with antique signs, church pews, an electric fireplace and a bar crafted from the front panel of an 1864 piano, the pubs recreate the feel of a traditional Irish pub — but are just small enough to fit in a driveway.
A neighborhood pub that brings people together
“It’s really just a time to forget about whatever’s going on in the world,” said Mark Cote, who hosted the pub in his Andover driveway last Friday. “That’s what pubs are supposed to be — for people coming together and having fun.”
Around 20 people from five families — whose children grew up together — squeezed into the roughly 20-foot-long (6-meter) space for Cote’s annual holiday party, creating what he said felt like a real neighborhood bar.
The idea began during the COVID-19 lockdown, when the Taylor brothers — retired from careers in corporate finance — found themselves missing their favorite Irish pubs.
The first version went up in Matt Taylor’s driveway in Reading, 12 miles (19 kilometers) north of Boston.
“When we were building the pub in this neighborhood, neighbors thought a pub was going to be living here full time,” he said. “We had to kind of settle them down a little bit.”
They worked until about 1 a.m. the night before their first rental. Matt said he worried the windows might crack when they first towed it down the highway, but it went smoothly.
What began as a pandemic project has since grown into a small business with four bars, including two Irish pubs, booked most weekends throughout the year.
Building an authentic Irish pub
The brothers wanted the tiny bars to feel like real Irish pubs — not themed party props.
“We have Irish friends who told us, ‘You better not have leprechauns and stuff in there,’” Craig Taylor said. “So we said, ‘No — it’s going to be authentic.’”
They visited Irish pubs around New England while designing the interior, settling on classic colors like jasper green and Irish cream.
Nearly every detail inside has a story, including the bar built from the front panel of an 1864 piano and church pews salvaged from a local church for seating.
A pair of horseshoes from a farm in Ipswich hang above the door for luck: pointed down when guests enter and up when they leave.
A hymn rack holds a book of Irish surnames where visitors mark their family names, sometimes with a dollar bill on the page, sparking conversations about ancestry.
There are packages of Scampi Fries — a popular pub snack imported from Ireland — and a corkboard with patches from police and fire departments, a tradition common in pubs where first responders gather.
Craig Taylor said one sign they got it right is when guests begin pointing things out inside — the Scampi Fries, a family name, a familiar song — moments when the experience shifts from something novel to something personal.
For weddings, bachelor parties — and even celebrations of life
Guinness has rented the Taylors’ pubs for weeks at a time. They’ve also been used by a state senator during South Boston’s St. Patrick’s Day parade. The pubs have even been rented for celebrations of life after funeral services.
Jarred Guthrie of Swampscott said his family has rented the original version for years now as part of a longtime annual St. Patrick’s celebration.
The party draws about 125 people, Guthrie said, with an Irish band playing inside the house while guests move between rooms, the pub and the waterfront yard overlooking the ocean.
Guests crowd inside to take turns playing bartender, telling stories and breaking into songs — sometimes traditional Irish tunes or Gaelic lyrics that Guthrie said you rarely hear outside family gatherings.
“People feel emboldened,” he said. “There’s a lot of singing that happens in that pub. It’s a place where people naturally come together.”
Like Christmas morning
Before each event, the brothers personalize the space with custom posters often designed with a family crest naming the host as the pub’s temporary “proprietor.”
“It’s a special thing for a lot of people to be able to come into an authentic Irish pub,” Matt Taylor said. “Maybe they’re not able to get back to the old country, so it’s meaningful to them.”
The parties go on, despite rain, heat or snow. Each pub is equipped with both heat and air conditioning for all seasons.
The Taylors wait until everything is ready — lights low, music on, taps flowing — before letting guests into a mini pub.
Craig Taylor said when people step inside for the first time, “it’s like Christmas morning.”
He said that moment often feels like stepping into another place, one tied to memories of family, tradition and Ireland itself.
“People say you’re like Santa Claus,” Craig Taylor said. “You’re delivering joy every day.”
And when the night winds down, they aren’t in a hurry to take the pub away.
“We never want to kick anybody out of an Irish pub,” Matt Taylor said.
So instead of picking it up late at night, they return the next morning.
Craig Taylor said when he asks hosts how long the party lasted, the answer is often the same: “Like, three in the morning.”
When he and his brother show up to take the pub away, “there’s sometimes people sleeping on the pew,” he joked.
United States Senator Chris Murphy and House Representative Greg Casar are set to introduce legislation to rein in prediction markets after bettors cashed in on geopolitical conflicts, including the joint strikes the US and Israel launched against Iran and the abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro.
On Tuesday, the two lawmakers announced their intent to introduce the Banning Event Trading on Sensitive Operations and Federal Functions (BETS OFF) Act, which would prohibit wagers on “government actions, terrorism, war, assassination, and events where an individual knows or controls the outcome”.
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“Our legislation is pretty simple. It simply says that these markets cannot allow people to make bets on government decision-making and frankly on other instances where there is one single individual who controls and knows the outcome of a market,” Murphy told reporters.
The bill comes amid a slate of legislation to put guardrails on prediction market platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket, which allow users to wager money on the outcomes of real-life events.
Already, bets on the platforms have been placed on US military strikes and monetary policy.
“What happens to us spiritually when every moral question in this country becomes a market? Don’t we lose something? Don’t we rot a little bit inside when the question of famine in Gaza isn’t a question of what is right and what is wrong, but whether you can make money or lose money?” Murphy added.
“I think it’s really important that there are certain matters that are not monetised by prediction markets.”
Making a profit on war?
Critics have pointed to the trends on the online betting platforms that suggest links between upcoming government actions and increases in the number of bets made.
For example, in the hours leading up to the US-Israeli attack on Iran in late February, 150 new accounts appeared on Polymarket and made wagers on the then-looming strikes.
Of those accounts, 109 made more than $10,000, and one made more than half a million dollars, according to Casar and Murphy.
As Al Jazeera previously reported, one Polymarket user, known as Magamyman, made more than $500,000 with a wager that Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, would be out of power. That bet was placed only hours before the February 28 strike.
That echoes what happened in the lead-up to the January 3 attack to topple Maduro.
A trader profited from the attack by predicting Maduro’s ousting only hours before US forces abducted him. The payout, in that case, was $400,000.
On Polymarket, in particular, users can wager anonymously, raising questions about whether government officials might be profiting from insider knowledge.
At Tuesday’s news conference, Murphy alleged that the recent bets on the Iran war and the Venezuela attack must have come either from the White House or someone close to the administration.
“It seems pretty clear what happened. People inside the White House — or those close to the White House with knowledge of the attack that was imminent — cashed in,” the Connecticut senator said.
Casar, who represents parts of San Antonio and Austin, Texas, suggested that the prospect of profiting from online bets could even influence government decisions.
“We shouldn’t be living in a country where someone is sitting in the situation room, making decisions on whether to invade or to bomb, decisions about war and peace, life and death — that those decisions could be driven by the fact that they have hundreds of thousands of dollars riding on the decision,” Casar added.
Al Jazeera followed up with Murphy’s office to ask if the lawmakers had proof that the White House or someone close to the White House made the bets, but the office has yet to respond.
The White House, meanwhile, pushed back on allegations that President Donald Trump or his officials were involved in the high-stakes bets.
“The only special interest guiding the Trump Administration’s decision-making is the best interest of the American people,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle told Al Jazeera in a statement.
The president’s son is actively involved in the prediction markets, however.
In August 2025, Donald Trump Jr joined Polymarket’s board. The venture capital firm 1789 Capital, which lists Trump Jr as a partner, backed Polymarket only a month after the Department of Justice dropped its investigation into the platform.
Trump Jr is also a strategic adviser to Kalshi. He joined in January 2025, only months before the Commodity Futures Trading Commission withdrew an appeal to block a federal court decision allowing Kalshi to offer bets on US elections.
A wave of legislation
Concerns about prediction markets extend far beyond bets on government actions, though.
The legislation Murphy and Casar have proposed would also ban bets on outcomes that can be controlled, including the results of award shows.
“The people who benefit in these markets are always the powerful,” Murphy said. “The people who know who know who is going to perform at the Super Bowl, the people who know what words the president is going to use in a speech are very powerful people.”
Casar added that he is not opposed to gambling in general, but that he and Murphy are simply trying to ensure a level playing field.
“I think we should have the ability for folks to go to a casino and play a poker game or play a game of roulette, but we have rules that say the house cannot rig the poker game,” Casar said.
“When people get on their phone and see these prediction markets, they expect that there are rules to make sure the game isn’t rigged against them.”
Their legislation is part of a slate of bills and regulatory pushes to increase oversight across the entire prediction market industry.
Just this month, Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal introduced legislation that would establish federal consumer protections for the prediction market industry, including through age verification for usage and a ban on advertisements targeting underage users.
Senators Jeff Merkley and Amy Klobuchar, both Democrats, also put forward legislation that would bar elected officials from profiting from prediction markets.
And lawmakers in Minnesota are pushing to ban prediction markets altogether, as a violation of state gambling laws. Arizona, meanwhile, filed criminal charges against Kalshi on Tuesday, citing similar reasons.
“I hope we take a comprehensive look at the way that prediction markets are rigging our entire economy and government actions,” Murphy said.
Neither Kalshi nor Polymarket, the two largest prediction market platforms, responded to Al Jazeera’s request for comment.
Suddenly, “CBS Evening News” is back where executives at the news division behind the show hoped never to return.
Viewership for the program has once again dropped below 4 million, a critical demarcation point that previously spurred alarm at the Paramount Skydance news division. CBS News recently scrapped a version of “CBS Evening News” anchored by Maurice DuBois and John Dickerson after the program shed audience and fell below 4 million viewers on many weeknights.
The overall audience for the program for the five days ended March 13 stood at nearly 3.83 million, according to data from Nielsen, and at 468,000 among viewers between 25 and 54, the demographic most coveted by advertisers.
In contrast, ABC’s “World News Tonight,” long the leading program among the three broadcast-network evening news shows, won an average of nearly 8.48 million, according to Nielsen, along with 1.03 million in the demo. NBC’s “NBC Nightly News” captured an average of 6.51 million overall in the same period, and 946,000 in the demo.
CBS News “retitled” the Friday broadcast of “Evening News,” so its results are not included in the tabulations.
One reason Dokoupil was moved from a perch on “CBS Mornings” to become anchor of the show is because CBS News executives worried they were falling further behind ABC’s “World News Tonight” and NBC’s “NBC Nightly News” with Dickerson and DuBois, who led a show that focused more heavily on enterprise stories and news features than it did on breaking headlines. Now those concerns are poised to rise anew.
Quarter to date as of March 12, “CBS Evening News” has shed 15% of its viewership in the critical 25-to-54 demo, the audience coveted by advertisers in news programming, over the year-earlier period. In comparison, NBC’s “NBC Nightly News” is up 8% in the demo, while ABC’s “World News Tonight” is off 4%.
When Norah O’Donnell ended her tenure at “CBS Evening News” in 2024, she left with an audience of nearly 5.4 million. Dokoupil’s first five days, from January 5 to January 9, won an average of nearly 4.17 million, according to data from Nielsen — and in a subsequent week, he even nabbed an audience of 4.6 million.
The slide in audience comes after CBS News took Dokoupil around the nation and into the Middle East just after the conflict erupted between Iran and the U.S. and Israel. Dokoupil was the only one of the so-called “Big Three” evening-news anchors to get so close to the battle.
Dokoupil has gained traction over the years during his time as a co-anchor on “CBS Mornings,” won the notice of both former CBS News President Susan Zirinsky and current CBS News Editor in Chief Bari Weiss. He has demonstrated a proclivity for developing interesting features, and, more recently, for taking on author Ta-Nehisi Coates on whether his writing expressed antipathy for Israel.
CBS News executives ascribe some portion of the viewership results to changes tied to the recent shift to Daylight Savings Time, according to a person familiar with the matter. And they have been encouraged by results that show Dokoupil’s “Evening News” gaining viewers when compared to broadcasts of the show from earlier in the season. The show’s viewership is up 7% in viewers and up 10% among viewers between 25 and 54 when compared to the average viewership of the current season to date.
“Cinnabon has made the decision to terminate its collaboration with ‘The Bachelorette’ and ‘The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives,’” a spokesperson for the company told Entertainment Weekly on Tuesday. “Recent developments and allegations surrounding the lead cast member led us to reassess this collaboration as it no longer aligns with our brand values.”
A source told Varietythat the Draper City Police Department in Utah is investigating the allegations from Paul and Mortensen after a recent incident. Season 5 of “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives” has been paused due to the investigation. The pause is likely to be relatively brief, the source added, and production is expected to resume soon with little impact on the Season 5 release timeline.
On March 9, Cinnabon unveiled a new Swirled Soda, which was “inspired by the viral beverage trend popularized” by the cast of “Mormon Wives.” The company carried cup sleeves and packaging themed around “The Bachelorette” and “Mormon Wives.”
Paul has led the cast of “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives” since its debut in 2024. She also stars in Season 22 of “The Bachelorette,” which debuts on ABC on March 22 and is currently in New York City promoting the season ahead of a premiere event in Los Angeles this weekend. The investigation will not impact the release schedule or promotional campaign for “The Bachelorette.”
This is not the first time Paul and Mortensen have been in such a dispute. In Season 1 of “The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives,” Paul was arrested for allegedly hitting, choking and throwing metal chairs at Mortensen, with one of the chairs allegedly hitting one of her children from a previous relationship. She pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated assault. The charges of domestic violence in the presence of a child, child abuse and criminal mischief were dismissed. Paul’s arrest and probation caused major delays in filming between the first and second episodes of “Mormon Wives” Season 1.
Share on PinterestA federal judge has overturned HHS Health Secretary RFK Jr.’s changes to the childhood vaccination schedule. Matthias Bein/picture alliance via Getty Images
A federal judge has struck down childhood vaccination recommendations implemented earlier this year by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
The judge also blocked HHS Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s appointments to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices.
Medical professionals praised the judge’s ruling, saying vaccinations are vital in preventing diseases in children.
A federal judge has overturned new childhood vaccination policies implemented earlier this year by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
U.S. District Judge Brian Murphy ruled that federal health officials under the leadership of HHS Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. had acted unlawfully when they issued new childhood vaccination recommendations in January.
Those guidelines reduce the number of childhood vaccinations, indicating vaccination against 11 diseases instead of the 16 diseases recommended under prior guidelines. The HHS policies also downgraded childhood immunization recommendations for other diseases, including rotavirus, influenza, and hepatitis A.
In his ruling, Murphy said that previous childhood vaccination recommendations had been made through “a method scientific in nature and codified into law through procedural requirements.”
The judge said that HHS officials had “disregarded those methods and thereby undermined the integrity of its actions.”
Murphy also ruled that Health Secretary Kennedy’s appointments to the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) were not lawfully constituted, and blocked Kennedy’s 13 appointees to the panel.
The plaintiffs in the case argued that the committee had become dominated by people aligned with Kennedy’s anti-vaccine views and was constituted in violation of the Federal Advisory Committee Act’s mandates that it be fairly balanced and free of inappropriate influence.
After the ruling was issued on March 16, ACIP meetings scheduled for this week were postponed. The panel was scheduled to discuss potential changes to recommendations regarding COVID-19 vaccines.
In addition, the judge had put a hold on votes taken by ACIP members since June. That includes a December decision by the panel to roll back recommendations that newborns receive a first dose of the hepatitis B vaccine within 24 hours of birth.
The Trump administration is expected to appeal Murphy’s ruling.
The lawsuit challenging the HHS childhood vaccination recommendations was brought by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) and other major medical groups.
“Today’s ruling is a historic and welcome outcome for children, communities, and pediatricians everywhere,” said Andrew Racine, MD, AAP president, in a statement.
This decision effectively means that a science-based process for developing immunization recommendations is not to be trifled with and represents a critical step to restoring scientific decision-making to federal vaccine policy that has kept children healthy for years,” Racine continued.
Medical professionals said the judge’s ruling was an important action and the correct decision.
“The judge’s ruling brings light and focus to the reality that the changes to the vaccine schedule were made by individuals who are not experts in vaccinations, science, or public health and the changes were not based upon any new data, evidence, or scientific basis,” said Graham Tse, MD, a pediatrician and chief medical officer of MemorialCare Miller Children’s & Women’s Hospital in Long Beach, CA.
“The judge’s ruling is everything that pediatricians and family practice physicians and the AAP have been waiting to hear,” said Danelle Fisher, MD, a pediatrician at Providence Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, CA.
“There was absolutely no reason to downgrade recommendations on vaccines. The ones who will suffer are the children. Someone needed to stand up to this administration and help our kids,” she told Healthline.
Tse said the judge’s ruling, if upheld on appeal, will send a clear message to parents and other community members.
“I would hope this brings back a single recommended vaccination schedule, supported by all states and the federal government, for the United States,” he told Healthline. “When there are vaccine schedule disagreements and variability across agencies, groups, and states, it leads to confusion, fear, anxiety, and ultimately decreased vaccine acceptance.”
The AAP recommends that children receive vaccinations for 18 different diseases from birth through age 18.
These inoculations include protection against:
Medical professionals point to recent measles outbreaks as an example of what can happen if children aren’t vaccinated. There are now more than 1,300 confirmed measles cases in the United States in 2026. There were only 285 in all of 2024.
“Vaccines prevent many diseases that used to be the scourge of childhood, causing vast amounts of illness, deaths, and suffering,” said William Schaffner, MD, a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University in Tennessee.
“Vaccines have made infancy, childhood, and adolescence much safer than when I grew up, so maintaining a comprehensive infancy and childhood vaccination program across the country is critical, lest we turn back the clock to the bad old days,” he told Healthline.
Schaffner said that widespread vaccination is needed to protect immunocompromised children who can’t be inoculated.
“By all participating in vaccination, we create healthier communities as well as protected individuals,” he said.
“Vaccines are one of the easiest ways to ensure the health of children and the community,” noted Tse. “Vaccines are one of the simplest, safest, and easiest ways to protect your children and others from infections and diseases that have significant and severe consequences.”
“These diseases can cause illness and death. If we can prevent needless suffering, why wouldn’t we?,” said Fisher.
Share on PinterestReducing inflammation could help lower heart failure risk in people with excess belly fat. Milena Magazin/Getty Images
Researchers say extra abdominal fat is strongly associated with an increased risk of heart failure.
Excess belly fat contributes to systemic inflammation, which endangers cardiovascular health.
The researchers recommend that medical professionals measure waist circumference and inflammation to identify people at risk for heart-related conditions.
A new study reports that excess belly fat is more strongly associated with an increased risk of heart failure than a person’s overall body weight or their body mass index (BMI) measurement.
The researchers say that systemic inflammation is a key factor in the link between abdominal fat and heart disease risk. They estimate that one-quarter to one-third of the association is explained by inflammation.
These findings suggest that reducing inflammation is a potential treatment strategy to reduce the risk of heart failure in people with excess abdominal fat.
The researchers said they hope their analysis will encourage new approaches to heart health monitoring.
“This research helps us understand why some people develop heart failure despite having a body weight that seems healthy,” said Szu-Han Chen, the lead author of the study and a medical student at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Taiwan, in a statement.
“By monitoring waist size and inflammation, clinicians may be able to identify people with higher risk earlier and focus on prevention strategies that could reduce the chance of heart failure before symptoms begin,” Chen continued.
This new research follows a scientific statement published by the American Heart Association (AHA) in May 2025.
In that statement, medical professionals explained that inflammation in the body can disrupt a person’s immune system, damage blood vessels, and lead to the buildup of scar tissue in the heart.
Experts not involved in the study told Healthline that this new research is important.
“This study reinforces an important concept in cardiology: where fat is stored in the body may matter more than total body weight alone,” said Kevin Shah, MD, a cardiologist and program director of Heart Failure Outreach at MemorialCare Heart & Vascular Institute at the Long Beach Medical Center in California.
“One practical takeaway from this study is that clinicians and patients may want to pay more attention to waist circumference and central obesity, since those measures may reveal cardiovascular risk even in individuals whose BMI appears normal,” Shah said.
Mir Ali, MD, a bariatric surgeon and medical director of the MemorialCare Surgical Weight Loss Center at Orange Coast Medical Center in California, agreed.
For their study, the researchers analyzed data from nearly 2,000 African American adults enrolled in the Jackson Heart Study who lived in three counties, both urban and rural, near Jackson, MS.
The participants did not have a diagnosis of heart failure at the time they entered the study between 2000 and 2004.
Participants’ ages ranged from 35 to 84, with an average age of 58. About 36% were female. The subjects were studied for a median of nearly 7 years through December 2016.
Researchers assessed the participants’ body fat by using measures such as overall weight, BMI, waist circumference, and waist-to-height ratio. Blood samples were used to measure high-sensitivity C-reactive protein, a commonly used marker of inflammation.
The researchers reported that 112 participants developed heart failure during the follow-up period. They noted that elevated waist circumference was associated with increased heart failure risk, whereas high BMI was not.
They also found that higher waist circumference and waist-to-height ratio were associated with an increased risk of heart failure. They further reported that participants with higher inflammation levels were more likely to experience heart failure.
The researchers noted that they did not have access to participants’ heart failure subtypes, so their study reported on overall heart failure risk.
Experts said that, even though this study was limited to African American participants in one part of the country, the findings are pertinent to the nation’s population as a whole.
“I believe these results can be extrapolated to other populations as previous research has demonstrated similar findings across different groups,” Ali said.
“We should be cautious about over-generalizing the findings,” said Shah. “However, the biological mechanisms linking visceral fat, inflammation, and cardiovascular disease are well established across many populations, so the results are likely relevant more broadly, even if additional studies in diverse groups are needed.”
Experts say that excess belly fat contributes to heart health risks in several ways.
“Visceral fat is metabolically active and releases inflammatory molecules that can contribute to insulin resistance, high blood pressure, and vascular dysfunction,” Shah said. “Over time, chronic inflammation can damage blood vessels and place stress on the heart muscle, eventually increasing the likelihood of developing heart failure.”
“Belly fat envelops and impairs the function of internal organs,” said Ali. “Furthermore, obesity increases the body’s inflammatory response, which is theorized to stiffen the heart muscle and impair its pumping mechanism.”
Shah and Ali agreed that tracking abdominal fat is important. However, they said BMI measurements shouldn’t be totally disregarded either.
“BMI remains a reasonable tool for assessing obesity levels and associated health risks,” said Ali. “While it is not perfect — as it does not account for body composition or fat distribution — it is simple to calculate and remains the standard used by practitioners and insurance companies to classify obesity.”
“BMI is still a useful screening tool because it is easy to measure and helps identify people at risk for obesity-related disease,” said Shah. “However, BMI does not capture fat distribution, which is why measures like waist circumference or waist-to-height ratio can sometimes provide additional insight into cardiovascular risk.”
It’s estimated that more than 900,000 people die from cardiovascular disease every year in the United States. That accounts for almost one-third of all deaths annually in the country.
Heart disease is listed as the number one cause of death for males, females, and people of most racial and ethnic groups.
A number of factors are considered to be contributors to increased disease risk. Among them:
It’s estimated that 40% of U.S. adults have obesity. The percentages are similar for males and females. Among age groups, the obesity prevalence is highest for people ages 40 to 59.
Obesity is associated with an increased risk of a number of diseases and conditions, including cardiovascular disease and stroke.
Healthline’s 7-day heart health reset offers tips for adopting simple lifestyle behaviors that can support long-term heart health.
Experts say there are daily habits that can help people lose weight and reduce abdominal fat.
“General weight loss is the most effective way to reduce abdominal fat and the resulting inflammation,” said Ali. “It is important to note that you cannot ‘spot-reduce’ fat. While abdominal exercises strengthen muscles, the body burns fat from across the entire body. Significant changes to diet and lifestyle are necessary for meaningful weight loss,” he continued.
Shah recommended implementing several daily routines. These include:
regular exercise
a diet rich in whole foods, fiber, nuts, fruits, and vegetables
avoiding sugar and ultra-processed foods
quality sleep
“The most effective strategies focus on improving overall metabolic health,” he said.
Horizon Worlds, Meta’s first pass at a metaverse, will be inaccessible via virtual reality headset after June 15, 2026. The company shared plans to separate Horizon Worlds from Quest VR platform and focus exclusively on the smartphone version of the app in February, and now in a new post on its community forums, Meta detailed when the VR version of Horizon Worlds will be deprecated.
By March 31, Meta says individual Horizon Worlds and Events will no longer be listed in the Quest’s Store and headset owners will be unable to visit worlds like “Horizon Central, Events Arena, Kaiju and Bobber Bay.” Then, after June 15, the app will be removed from Quest headsets and worlds will be completely unavailable to visit in VR. From that point on, the easiest place to visit Horizon Worlds will be in the Meta Horizon app for iOS and Android.
Additionally, Hyperscape Capture, a recently added beta feature that allows Quest headset owners to capture, share and visit each other in detailed 3D scans of real-life locations, is also being removed from Horizon Worlds. Meta says users will still be able to capture and view Hyperscapes, “but sharing, inviting, and co-experiencing Hyperscapes with others will no longer be supported.”
While Meta’s original blog detailing its 2026 VR strategy left open the possibility that a committed Quest owner might still be able to access some part of Meta’s original VR metaverse, that apparently was never the company’s plan. Meta saw enough “positive momentum” focusing on supporting the mobile version of Horizon Worlds in 2025 that it made sense to completely abandon the VR one in 2026. While that seems to run contrary to Meta’s positioning as a “metaverse company,” it does reflect where the company is spending the most money and seeing the most (relative) success: AI and smart glasses.
WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Senate’s stalled crypto market structure bill is making progress behind-the-scenes, the chairman of the body’s Banking Committee said Tuesday.
Senator Tim Scott, who heads the banking panel overseeing the market structure bill, said at the Digital Chamber’s DC Blockchain Summit that lawmakers may see a new draft of at least stablecoin language as soon as this week.
Stablecoin yield has been the most publicly debated issue in the market structure bill, but lawmakers have remained engaged, Scott said.
“I believe that this week we will have the first proposal in my hands to take a look at,” he said. “If that actually happened before the end of this week, and I think that it will, we’ll at least know that the sketch looks like the person. If that’s the case, I think we’re gonna be in much better shape.”
He credited Democratic Senator Angela Alsobrooks, Republican Senator Thom Tillis, and the White House’s Patrick Witt for their efforts on yield.
Other outstanding issues have also been negotiated, particularly over the past month, he said, pointing to concerns lawmakers had about U.S. President Donald Trump and his family’s crypto projects, the lack of bipartisan commissioners at the major regulatory agencies and know-your-customer regulations.
“I think we’re very close to landing the plane on the ethics issue, on quorum,” Scott said. “We know that that’s a big issue for our friends on the other side of the aisle, so we’re fixing that as well. I think we’re moving forward with some [nominations], which is great news that we were able to get some out of the other side. I think the issue of DeFi is something that [Senator] Mark Warner’s held on tightly, AML [anti-money laundering] being a very important part. So I think we’re working on that issue.”
Subnautica 2 has weathered the storm and has rescheduled its early access release. IGN reported today that the sequel to the underwater survival game will begin early access on PC and Xbox in May, although a more specific date was not provided.
The news comes a day after a judge ruled that former Unknown Worlds Entertainment CEO Ted Gill should be rehired at the game studio. That decision capped off a dramatic year for the team behind Subnautica, which was acquired by Krafton in 2021. The studio and its new owners entered a legal battle because the purchase of Unknown Worlds included a promise of an up to $250 million payout from Krafton if the team met certain performance goals by the end of 2025. In July of that year, however, Krafton fired several studio leaders and then delayed the sequel’s early access launch. The court case has raised questions about which side was trying to either secure or avoid making that multi-million payment.
With yesterday’s ruling, a rep from Krafton said that “we are evaluating our options as we determine our path forward.” It’s unclear if that path, or the other litigation still underway over the project, will create further delays to the planned early access date.
