Bodies can be weird. They leak, smell, twitch, swell, produce sounds and do baffling things, often at the worst possible moments. When something feels embarrassing, frightening or just plain confusing, more people than ever are turning to social media for help, where misinformation and bizarre health “hacks” abound.

Which is exactly why we have launched Strange Health, our new video podcast. In the series, I team up with Dan Baumgardt, a practising GP and lecturer in health and life sciences at the University of Bristol, to take on viral health claims, wellness trends and bodily mysteries. Each episode starts with something that sounds alarming or too good to be true and asks a simple question: what does the evidence actually say?

We kick off with a January classic: detox culture.

Every year, juice cleanses, teas, activated charcoal capsules and liver “resets” promise to flush out the excesses of Christmas. But according to Professor Trish Lalor, a liver researcher at the University of Birmingham, this idea rests on a fundamental misunderstanding of how the body works. As she explains in this article, your body already has a perfectly good detox system and, for most healthy people, detox products are unnecessary. Some can even cause harm.

Trish is also the expert guest on the very first episode of Strange Health. She joins us to unpick detox myths, explain how the liver really processes alcohol and so-called toxins, and outline what genuinely helps this remarkable organ recover. It is evidence-led, curious and refreshingly sceptical. If you have ever wondered whether detoxing is doing anything at all, this episode is a very good place to start.

Europe is facing an uncomfortable geopolitical puzzle as Donald Trump revives threats linked to Greenland. Economists Jun Du and Oleksandr Shepotylo from Aston University identify five potential options for Europe, from diplomatic resistance to economic countermeasures, and explain why none of them come without significant political or strategic costs. It all rather adds to the weight of this article on why we should all be students of American studies.

Deep in the Amazon rainforest, an unexpected discovery has revealed just how ingenious animal survival strategies can be. Adrian Barnett, senior lecturer in behavioural ecology at the University of Greenwich, describes how a monkey species uses precision rather than force to access food, conserving energy and protecting its teeth.