Gary Brecka - the celeb-fave health guru who 'saved' Dana White's life - is peddling bogus cancer cures and has no medical license, experts warn

Brecka was arrested in 2017 for theft

Doctors have accused one of social media's most lauded health gurus, famed for 'saving the life' of UFC mogul Dana White, of peddling bogus cancer cures without a medical license.

Gary Brecka, 53, who has 2.1 million combined followers on Instagram and TikTok and is popular with celebs such as Kendall Jenner and David Beckham, claims to be a 'mortality expert' who 'helps people achieve absolute peak function in their own bodies.'

He made headlines recently when UFC President Dana White revealed that tests given to him by Brecka revealed he was going to die early - spurring an incredible physical transformation. 

But experts say that information was based on dodgy science.

Physicians have also declared the wellness products Brecka sells on his website - which claim to boost oxygen flow and relieve pain - and cost up to $134,000, claim to do things that are 'not physiologically possible.'

Dr Jared Ross, a board-certified physician, told DailyMail.com: 'The evidence behind all of this is weak at best.' He called the prices 'atrocious.'

Doctors have also highlighted Mr Brecka's run-ins with the law. In 2017, Brecka was arrested for theft - although the charges were soon dropped. He has also been named in two lawsuits. One in 2011 was brought by Concord Capital Management, in which a default judgement of almost $1 million was brought against Mr Brecka for money he owed.

Mr Brecka, from Naples, Florida, is not a qualified medial doctor or clinician.

He currently works for performance-enhancing firm 10X Health - which offers blood analyses for up to $599 - where he is the co-founder. The company employs 'medical professionals and wellness experts' to 'help you live your best life'.

Mr Brecka was credited with helping Dana White lose 39 pounds and transform his body

White (pictured left) previously turned to medical help from 'biohacker' Mr Brecka, who told the fighting mogul he had just over 10 years to live based on blood and DNA samples

Mr Brecka, who is married to Instagram influencer Sage Workinger, who is also a co-founder of 10X Health, has not worked in a medical setting and is not board certified in any specialism.

Before starting 10X Health, he was the CEO of Streamline Medical Group, which offers antiaging treatments including hormone therapy.

Prior to that, he worked in the insurance industry for two decades as CEO of life insurer Life Asset Group.

The company purchases existing life insurance policies to collect a death benefit, and makes a profit when the insured person dies.

Mr Brecka used medical records and demographic data to predict how soon someone would die to the month.

He has a bachelor of science in biology from Frostburg State University and a bachelor of science in human biology from the National University of Health Sciences.

He gives talks and expos and sells a range of services via 10X Health, including a personalized supplement protocol, genetic testing, blood testing, 'true body optimization' and a 'superhuman protocol.'

P Diddy, Steve Aoki and David Beckham are just a handful of Mr Brecka's other celebrity clientele. He also appeared on an episode of The Kardashians, in which he discussed the impact of hormonal fluctuations with supermodel Kendall Jenner.

As well as being hired by celebs as their personal health guru, he also makes bold claims on his various platforms, including predicting lifespans, claiming antidepressants don't work and suggesting migraines can be solved by drinking salt water. 

Another co-founder of 10XHealth, Grant Cardone, is a financial influencer who uses social media to sell training programs and real estate investments to his five million Instagram followers.

He is currently in the middle of an ongoing class action lawsuit filed in 2020 in which he is accused of misleading investors via social media with overexaggerated claims of lofty returns.

Mr Brecka is most well-known for his role in the extreme health transformation of  Dana White - who lost 39 pounds and dramatically changed his body in the fall of 2022.

Gary Brecka did not respond to a request for comment.  

Mr White, who had been known for his untoned physique - appeared on The Action Junkeez Podcast in September 2022, and revealed that he'd undergone blood tests which had determined that he only had 10.4 years to live.

He credited Mr Brecka for carrying out the tests and arriving at the prognosis. Mr White attributed much of his weight loss to a 86-hour water fast which Gary Brecka reportedly 'advised him' on throughout. 

In November 2023 Mr Brecka appeared on the hugely popular Joe Rogan Experience podcast to talk about his role in Mr White's health improvement. The episode garnered over a million views on YouTube. 

Mr Brecka told Mr Rogan: 'He's [Dana White] on hormone therapy... he went on a strict ketogenic diet, he got a red light therapy bed, he got a PMF mat, he did start doing cold plunging and he does use something called hypermax multi-step oxygen therapy.'

'He didn't drink, we cut all the white flour, white rice, white bread, white pasta completely out of his diet. And sugars of all kinds.'

But speaking to DailyMail.com, top experts have accused Mr Brecka of using 'impossible' science to make such predictions based on blood samples.

'There's no science to predicting how long someone will live. There's multiple factors that go into it,' said Dr Ross.

'It's much more complicated than blood and DNA samples,' he said.

Dr Mike Varshavski, a board certified family medicine doctor from New York, said in a YouTube video: 'The idea of having a life expectancy is incredible. I know that Gary worked for a life insurance company and that's his gimmick, that's his thing where he tells people how long they're going to live.

'But human behavior changes. Human risk changes. It's an ever-evolving state. So to claim that you have control or intimate knowledge of when someone's going to pass is just untrue.'

Studies have shown that there is nothing unique about the effect of added sugar on body weight, as it comes down to excess calories.

'Replacing free sugars with non-sugar sweeteners does not help people control their weight long-term,' said Francesco Branca, director of WHO’s department of nutrition and food safety. 

Similarly, cold water exposure on its own has not been shown to be effective for weight loss. 

There is limited evidence that repeated exposure to cold water may decrease the amount of unhealthy body fat.

Dr Stacy Ingraham, who studies kinesiology and exercise physiology at the University of Minnesota, told CBS News that the cold actually slows down metabolism.

'To burn the most calories, sauna and room temperature, not cold water immersion,' she said.

Gary Brecka with David Beckham, one of his clients

Mr Brecka's made one of his most outrageous claims in a talk at the 10X Ladies Conference, when he suggested an unconventional 'cure' for breast cancer. 

He said that 'frequency' which 'comes from an area of the brain called the gray matter' and radiates out of the human body, has the power to heal cancer.

He said that 'energy' or 'frequency' can be absorbed from others.  

'You can get energy from conversation. You can get energy from what I'm telling you right now. You can get energy from the people around you. Or they can take energy away from you.'

Mr Brecka said: 'There are 45,000 documented cases of women curing breast cancer by changing the frequency that we send through our body. This is a fact.' 

'I need to see that research,' said Dr Adam Nessim, a resident physician from New York, reacting on YouTube to Mr Brecka's talk.

This is a dangerous claim, he added, because 'you might have someone who can get good medical care for their breast cancer who is going to go the alternative medicine route and is going to think that by changing their frequency, they're going to be cured,' he said.

'But the reality is, modern medicine and the treatments that you will get from your doctor who specializes in breast cancer will have a much higher curative rate than whatever he just said about frequency.'

Dr Nessim added: 'That isn't to say there's not going to be case reports - unique cases where cancer has gone into remission and it's unclear why.

'But there's no way to prove that it's due to changing your frequency.'

Another of Mr Brecka's most contested claims relates to mental health. A clip of him talking about why common antidepressants SSRIs don't work, shared by a TikTok user, garnered 3.6 million views. 

Mr Brecka said that if someone has low serotonin, then by definition, they are depressed. 

But Dr Varshavski said: 'No, we don't define it that way. We may have defined it that way years ago, when that was our chemical imbalance model of depression.'

'I've never checked serotonin levels in a patient to diagnose depression. I don't know any doctor that does that. No organization does that.'

A study from 2023 concluded there was 'no consistent evidence implicating serotonin in the pathophysiology of depression.'

Serotonin is a brain hormones, nicknamed the 'happiness hormone' due to the feel good feelings it produces. 

Mr Brecka also said that SSRIs do not work, because they 'ration what little serotonin these people have. So by definition, it never raises serotonin.'

Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are a widely used antidepressant, which increase levels of serotonin in the brain.

Dr Varshavski said: 'SSRIs block the things that take up serotonin and allow the serotonin to be there to function.

'But why that mechanism actually work for depression is poorly understood.' 

While there had been a lot of debate about how antidepressants work, large studies such as Cochrane reviews have found that SSRIs are effective.

Another of Mr Brecka's claims is that migraines are due to sodium deficiency and can be solved by drinking salt water.

Dr Alo told DailyMail.com: 'If that was the case then nobody would have migraines, we would just tell everyone to drink saltwater.'

Dr Ross said: 'We don't quite understand what causes migraines, there's numerous different hypotheses.

Migraines are thought to be due to things like hormonal changes, medications, alcohol and caffeine and stress.

Sheri Berger, a registered dietitian and nutrition consultant for Consumer Health Digest, told DailyMail.com: 'Sodium deficiency is not very common, unless you are  excessively exercising and drinking lots and lots of water, you could run the risk of having what's called hyponatremia, which is low sodium in your blood. 

'But that's in very rare circumstances - the everyday person isn't suffering from having a low amount of sodium in their blood, so I don't think that's a common cause of having a migraine.'

Migraines affect 47 million Americans adults. Meanwhile, Americans eat more than 3.4 grams of salt on average a day, which is well above the federal recommendation of less than 2.3 grams a day.

The idea that you can fix migraines by drinking salt water is 'bad information to give out to the public,' Ms Berger said.

'We are getting more than enough sodium in our diet from the processed foods that we eat and from the salt that we're adding to foods.

'If you are taking in too much sodium, that's going to put you at risk for high blood pressure and fluid retention, bloating, those types of issues.'

Mr Brecka during one of his talks

Mr Brecka posing with Mario Lopez and Kit Hoover after appearing on the show Access Hollywood

Another outdated assertion of Mr Brecka's relates to cholesterol, which he said in a video talking to 'high performance coach' Colin Yurcisin is 'probably the most maligned, misunderstood compound in the entire human body.'

'It's not really the amount of LDL cholesterol in your blood that matters. What matters is the size of that molecule,' he claimed.

LDL (low-density lipoprotein) cholesterol, sometimes called 'bad' cholesterol, makes up most of your body's cholesterol. High levels of LDL cholesterol raise your risk for heart disease and stroke. 

'The smaller cholesterol gets, the more dangerous it becomes. The larger it gets, the healthier and less dangerous it becomes.

Mr Brecka explained: 'As your blood fat goes up, your cholesterol gets smaller and more dangerous. As your blood fat does down, cholesterol gets larger and less dangerous.' 

But Dr Alo accused Mr Brecka of quoting outdated science. 'LDL particle size literally makes no difference,' he said. 

'All LDL particles, even the big ones, are atherogenic,' Dr Alo told DailyMail.com.

Atherogenic means that the particles will promote the formation of fatty plaques in the arteries, which can lead to heart disease, heart attacks and stroke.

Dr Alo said: 'Back in the late 90s... we thought that the size of the LDL particles mattered, that the smaller ones caused heart disease more than the bigger ones. 

'But as time went on and we studied it, more and more data has come out, it turns out that that's not true. 

'All of those particles, regardless of how big or small they are, they all cause heart disease.'

'Please stop with this nonsense,' Dr Alo said. 

On Mr Brecks' website, he offers a genetic test for $600, which claims to give customers 'a map for understanding where you may be nutrient deficient based on your body’s ability to break down and use certain vitamins and nutrients.'

Dr Neal Smoller, a licensed pharmacist from New York, said in a blog post: 'Your genes don’t tell you if you are high or low in vitamins.'

'Genetic testing, in reality, can identify if you have mutations or variants on key genes that code for enzymes that potentially process vitamins,' he said.

But he added that 'it’s way more complicated than that.'

Dr Smoller said: 'Anyone in the medical space with integrity that is educated on the subject will tell you the majority of DNA testing abilities consumers get involved in are nothing more than entertainment.

'We have about 24,000 genes. We know the function of about 12,000. We can test for about 5,000. That context, I hope, will help people understand what these DNA testing companies are actually capable of. Something, but not much.'

Mr Brecka also sells a 10X PEMF (Pulsed Electromagnetic Field) mat for $5,000. Customers should lie on the 'magnetic field of the PEMF mat for an eight minute session,' the website recommends.

'This is intended to give you 12 hours of pure charge, as every red blood cell gets 1B molecules of oxygen (Oxygen on steroids). This one step can create a 30-900 percent increase in oxygen transport.'

For a mere $133,561, customers can get the 'Superhuman protocol complete package' which contains a PEMF mat, red light bed and oxygen delivery system.

Dr Alo said: 'The red light stuff, the oxygen mask, the hydrogenaters... there's no scientific evidence that any of this actually is helpful.'

Many studies using red light therapy only include a very small number of people and do not use a placebo group.

According to the Cleveland Clinic, at this point in time, there’s not enough evidence to support most uses.