Fox & Friends sent its team to a downtown New York City spa to do something millions of Americans scroll past every day but rarely investigate: put two of the internet's hottest wellness trends under a doctor's scrutiny. The verdict from Fox News senior medical analyst Dr. Marc Siegel was more measured than the hype, and more encouraging than the skeptics might expect.
The segment was part of the show's newly launched Wellness Week, a series built around separating real health benefits from social-media noise. Host Kayleigh McEnany framed the problem plainly, as Fox News reported:
"The internet is jam-packed with millions of these trends that are promising you a healthier, younger and more energized life. But it's hard to tell what's a real hack or just hype."
That's a fair summary of the problem. Influencers pitch red light panels and ice baths as cure-alls. Mainstream medicine often dismisses them outright. Ordinary people, the ones actually spending money, are stuck in the middle. Wellness Week set out to give them something closer to a straight answer.
The team visited La Reserve Esthetics and Wellness in downtown Manhattan, where a spa employee walked them through the basics of red light therapy. The treatment, marketed for inflammation, muscle recovery, weight loss, anti-aging, and collagen production, works by exposing the body to specific wavelengths of LED light.
The spa employee described the mechanism in simple terms:
"The way that it works for our body is we're able to absorb the heat and the warmth from those red-light therapy light bulbs and give our body the space to help with recovery, help with cell production."
Dr. Siegel clarified the science. The devices use LED light that is "close to infrared light" and, he said, "safer than sunlight." With consistent use, he said, the therapy can "promote healing of the skin and more collagen." But he added an important caveat: users should expect to wait three or four weeks of regular sessions before noticing any visible results.
That timeline matters. In an era when dubious products are marketed with miracle claims, the fact that a credentialed doctor set realistic expectations, rather than hyping instant results, is worth noting. Red light therapy appears to have genuine, if modest, benefits. It is not a scam. It is also not magic.
The second treatment Fox & Friends explored was hot-cold contrast therapy, and the numbers alone tell you this isn't for the faint of heart. Adam Klotz started in a sauna heated to 190 degrees Fahrenheit, stayed for 15 to 20 minutes, and then plunged into an ice bath where the water sat between 46 and 48 degrees.
Klotz called the experience "a rush" and "definitely a shot of life." He went further:
"It clears your mind and... really improves my mental mood."
That's a personal testimonial, not a clinical finding. But Dr. Siegel brought data. He cited a long-term study from Finland, a country where sauna culture is a way of life, that found the practice "decreases mortality (death rate) by about 40% to 50%" when used regularly.
A 40-to-50 percent reduction in mortality is a striking claim. Siegel did not name the specific Finnish study, and the segment did not detail the study's methodology or sample size. Those are fair questions for anyone evaluating the number. But the direction of the evidence, from a country with generations of real-world sauna use, is hard to ignore.
Siegel did not give contrast therapy a blank endorsement. He issued a clear caution: "You better make sure you're in good shape" before attempting it. He elaborated with a direct recommendation aimed at viewers thinking about trying it themselves:
"I want it to be people who have seen their doctor first and know that their heart is in good shape."
That kind of advice, consult your physician before extreme temperature exposure, is common sense. But it is also the kind of common sense that gets buried on social media, where a 22-year-old fitness influencer dunking into an ice tub rarely mentions cardiac risk. The gap between what gets clicks and what keeps people safe is exactly the space Wellness Week is trying to fill.
The warning is especially relevant given growing public interest in how health data and physical stress interact with real medical risk. Wearable devices track heart rate in real time, but they don't replace a cardiologist's clearance.
Americans are spending more of their own money on wellness treatments that sit outside traditional medicine. Some of those treatments, red light therapy and contrast therapy among them, appear to have genuine science behind them. Others are pure grift. The problem is that the average consumer has no reliable way to tell the difference.
The federal government has shown increasing willingness to explore unconventional medical approaches. The administration recently ordered the FDA to fast-track psychedelic therapy review and committed $50 million to ibogaine research for veterans, a sign that even Washington recognizes the limits of the pharmaceutical status quo.
Meanwhile, individual patients are making their own bets. Former university president Ben Sasse recently disclosed a 76 percent tumor reduction on an experimental pancreatic cancer drug, a reminder that treatments once dismissed as fringe sometimes deliver real results when subjected to honest scrutiny.
None of this means every Instagram wellness trend deserves the benefit of the doubt. It means the opposite: that separating evidence from hype requires exactly the kind of segment Fox & Friends produced, a doctor on camera, specific numbers, honest timelines, and a clear warning about who should and shouldn't try it.
Wellness Week did a solid job of putting two popular treatments in front of a credentialed analyst. But viewers are right to want more detail. The Finnish sauna study Siegel cited was not identified by name, publication, or year. The 40-to-50 percent mortality reduction figure is dramatic enough to warrant a closer look at the data behind it.
Red light therapy's benefits were described in general terms, skin healing, collagen production, without reference to specific clinical trials, dosing protocols, or FDA clearance status. And the spa employee's explanation, while accessible, was not a substitute for peer-reviewed evidence.
These aren't criticisms of the segment so much as markers for where the conversation should go next. If Wellness Week continues, and it should, future installments would benefit from naming studies, citing sample sizes, and distinguishing between treatments with strong evidence and those still in early research.
The broader debate over which therapies actually work and which are disputed or politically charged is not going away. Americans deserve better tools to navigate it.
Red light therapy appears to offer real, if gradual, skin and recovery benefits when used consistently. Hot-cold contrast therapy has a long cultural track record and at least one long-term study suggesting significant mortality benefits, but it carries genuine cardiac risk for people who aren't in good health. Both treatments beat the worst of what social media sells. Neither is a substitute for a doctor's advice.
In a wellness market flooded with garbage, the most radical thing a morning show can do is bring on a doctor who tells you the truth, including the parts you might not want to hear.
