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Multivitamin Researchers Say 'Case Is Closed' As Studies Find No Health Benefits
schwit1 sends this excerpt from CBS:
"'Enough' with the multivitamins already. That's the message from doctors behind three new studies and an editorial that tackled an oft-debated question in medicine: Do daily multivitamins make you healthier? After reviewing the available evidence and conducting new trials, the authors have come to a conclusion of 'no.' 'We believe that the case is closed — supplementing the diet of well-nourished adults with (most) mineral or vitamin supplements has no clear benefit and might even be harmful,' concluded the authors of the editorial summarizing the new research papers, published Dec. 16 in the Annals of Internal Medicine. 'These vitamins should not be used for chronic disease prevention. Enough is enough.' They went on to urge consumers to not 'waste' their money on multivitamins."
yeah, and those that don't get a balanced diet?
No kidding.. but for those that are not, ( which is a LOT of people.. ) vitamins can help.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
is nothing sacred?
For 10 cents a day, I'll take the risk that I'm wasting my money. It's cheap insurance, and there might even be a benefit.
There is a clear benefit. The companies selling vitamins to over-fed and over-nourished citizens make large profits. Is that not a benefit?
So are they helpful with the typical American diet of fast food, which probably has little to no nutritional value?
So what about people who are not well nourished? Do multi-vitamins help them?
"supplementing the diet of well-nourished adults with (most) mineral or vitamin supplements has no clear benefit"
If there were a benefit, then clearly they weren't "well-nourished".
Not slashdot's fault, this time. The real conclusion is that multivitamins don't cure heart disease. But who takes them to cure heart disease?
My rock might be useless at keeping tigers away but it's useful for throwing at glass houses.
Do you even lift?
These aren't the 'roids you're looking for.
I love these quacks.
... you insensitive clod!
In my opinion, the best way to make an informed choice about supplements is to have your doctor do blood work when you get a physical exam (which you should be doing yearly once you hit middle age). Labs can test for key things like iron, B vitamins, vitamin D, etc.
Your doctor can then ask you questions to help interpret the results. If your D is low, do you get a lot of sunlight or do you spend most of your time indoors? If your iron is low, do you feel tired or mostly energetic? What sorts of things do you eat?
Based on that personalized information, supplements or other dietary/lifestyle changes can improve your health, certainly far more than grabbing a random bottle of multivitamins at GNC.
Koans and fables for the software engineer
“... supplementing the diet of well-nourished adults with (most) mineral or vitamin supplements has no clear benefit...”
This is a great example of how a precise statement by a researcher is misinterpreted or misrepresented when presented to the general public. The above statement is a useful result with a well-defined meaning which is being used in a context that makes it sound like supplements have zero benefit. It's no surprise that that supplements have no clear benefit... when you are a "well-nourished adult'! The danger is that this result can cause people who are not well-nourished to stop taking supplements that may be keeping them outside of harm.
Writers looking to make a story where there isn't one cause much more harm than supplements ever could. (No facts were harmed in the making of that statement.)
I felt like crap last winter and it turns out my Vitamin D level was on the floor (after extensive blood tests determined it was not thyroid problems or cancer. Thank goodness.) For geeks who don't go outside and prefer the dungeon/basement lifestyle, a 1000 mg dose of Vitamin D daily can be a godsend. (I was prescribed 10 minutes of daily sunshine at first, too.)
I also donate platelets regularly, and prior to a stint on the chair there I munch on some calcium chews, because otherwise I'll experience a total calcium crash from the citrate and pass out.
So while it's okay to stop wasting your money on multi-vitamins, it's important to know how your body responds to both long and short term situations and have the appropriate supplement on hand.
Occasionally living proof of the Ballmer peak.
Golden rice is genetically modified to include Vitamin A. There are plenty of people dying from a lack of vitamins.
"The research was conducted with the goal of producing a fortified food to be grown and consumed in areas with a shortage of dietary vitamin A, a deficiency which is estimated to kill 670,000 children under the age of 5 each year"
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Golden_rice
Some people die at 25 and aren't buried until 75. -Benjamin Franklin
Based on how much excess nutrition is flushed down the toilet. The human body is supremely adaptable - feed it too little of a nutrient and the digestive system will increase the absorption rate of that nutrient. Feed it to much and the nutrient will pass through the system and out to the world, hopefully to another organism who actually needs it.
Yes, people with no health problems and a robust diet don't need additional vitamins. For those living on junk food, or with substantial health issues (such as myself) vitamin support can be not only useful but essential.
And it's the number one tool social caste-preferring Americans growing up in a Judeo-Christian culture prefer for defining who's Right and who's Wrong.
Here's to hot beer, cold women, and Glaswegian kisses for all.
Oh wait, that's not an option. "Informative" sounds good.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I am of two minds on this...
Even though the US diet isn't that great many of the diseases that were fairly common during the depression era are no longer that common. My dad knew of many kids that had rickets, and I have never known, or even heard of, a modern case.
I think, however, that many of the people that are taking vitamins, or even think that they are taking them (e.g. the placebo vs vitamin study) may become a little more health conscience and make it a point to eat their veggies.
Either give it away or get top dollar, but never sell yourself cheap.
They didn't have a lot of food but what they had then wasn't grown on industrial agriculture but they could barely afford it and went without .. giving rice to rickets, scorbut and all those deficiency diseases. Now everything is grown on nutrient devoid soils and the meat is jacked up with hormones and antibiotics so we're still not off any better.
I don't even know where to start with how derpy this is.
Though I've suspected the "multi-vitamins" myself for a while, I'm wary of any claims about "case closed" or "the science is settled"...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Not all "vitamins" are equal. For one thing, Recommended Daily Allowances are set to prevent known diseases: e.g., if you don't have scurvy, establishment medicine says you must be getting enough vitamin C. Rarely is research done to discover an optimum level of supplementation. So studies that involve giving people the RDA or a little more aren't as dispositive as they might be.
Second, vitamins vary in quality. Cheapo supermarket multivitamins might have the same quantities listed on the label as something from a high-quality source like LEF, but they won't use the highest-quality sources, the most bio-available kinds, etc.
So my guess is that these "debunking" studies involved people taking Centrum multivitamins or whatever and they didn't see much in the way of results. I'd like to see a study done with LEF multivitamins, which I've taken for years and been happy with.
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
Or is it really a tautology and well-nourished means eats enough food with vitamins?
Except for pregnant women, malnourished individuals, individuals with unhealthy diets, those with celiac disease, those with a history of alcohol abuse resulting in diminished ability to absorb B vitamins, those living in locations with extended periods of time without enough direct sunlight to provide sufficient vitamin D, those living in America where the average level of consumed Magnesium is incredibly below recommended levels, those at risk of bone fractures who require more magnesium and calcium to fortify bone strength, those at risk of goiter and/or breast cancer who require more iodine, those at risk of scurvy requiring vitamin C, and those requiring vitamin K for that nearly useless thing known as blood clotting...EXCEPT for all of those AND more, multivitamins are completely worthless!
Good on ya', doctors! We totally trust the results of your research considering there's no conflict of interest and none of you or your employers could stand to benefit from increased hospital visits as a result of lacking nutrition. Thanks for saving me pennies today so I can spend plenty of Benjamins in one of your fine health and wellness establishments tomorrow!
I take 'em to prevent scurvy. Arghhh!
As opposed to taking Centrum, One a day, etc. that are made by Big pharma companies? Yeah, you're definitely sticking it to them!
Why would big pharma be against multivitamins? One. A Day, Centrum, Flintstones , etc brands are all made by Big Pharma.
"doctors behind three new studies ..."
Doctors? Who cares what doctors say, what does Jenny McCarthy say?
Coming from "doctors" who are paid by pharmaceutical companies to push High Blood pressure drugs or Cholesterol Statins so people will become lifelong customers/addicts.
Now what they don't want to recommend is diet and exercise to prevent hypertension and high cholesterol even though those 2 strategies are far more effective and cheaper than drugs.
And about vitamin supplements most diets are not balanced nor can they be as the amount of food one would need to eat to achieve it is nearly impossible. And it's already been proven that selenium yeast (not selenomethionine) supplements prevent multiple forms of cancer, Vitamin C and Zinc ward off colds and B vitamins reduce inflammation levels in the body, so yes Multivitamins are necessary.
at first read this seems counter to everything I've experienced..."highly fortified....for almost a hundred years"???
i know some products advertise that they have vitamins & some regulation took place, but those regulations were always fought by the industry as "government intervention that costs consumers"
also, i'm more skeptical of a Pepsi that says it has vitimin C that will help me than I am of a multivitamin
Thank you Dave Raggett
To make sure these multivitamins fail to produce positive results, they used vitamin analogs
that are cheap, low-grade, synthetic vitamins and inorganic minerals. The same brands of
low-grade multivitamins you get at CVS and Safeway/Publix and not the quality vitamins
you get at a health-food store. There is a huge difference in effectivity between cheap
Cyanocobalamine and the vitamin B12 that actually works: Methylcobalamin.
The vitamin E they "studied" was a synthetic, isolated vitamin E as well which
HAS A LONG HISTORY OF BEING TOXIC. They never looked at full-spectrum vitamin E,
including the tocopherols, nor did they bother to study a food concentrate form of vitamin E
(because THAT would have been amazingly beneficial to heart health).
If I wanted to make all cars look dangerous, I could buy a dozen Toyota Prius cars, line them
up bumper to bumper, fill them with gasoline and ram them together in a mock road accident
that caused them all to explode. From that, I could declare, “All cars are unsafe!” even though
I only tested the Prius. That’s the same as what’s happening with these multivitamin studies.
They intentionally choose the most toxic forms of synthetic nutrients, then they use the
negative results to declare that all multivitamins are dangerous.
I'm glad I don't get my health education from Slashdot and whoever paid for this to be placed
on Slashdot, I hope you're on a statin.
now everything is grown on nutrient devoid soils
It doesn't matter all that much, since the plants, you know, synthesize stuff. If there isn't enough nitrogen in the soil, the yields will be poor, but it's not like you'll get nitrogen-deficient plants. They'll be plant-matter-deficient in general. So talking about "nutrient devoid soils" is quite pointless: it only affects the yields, not the nutritional value of the end product. There'll be less stuff, smaller bulbs or fruit, etc. At least that's my high-school understanding, plant biologists please correct me.
A successful API design takes a mixture of software design and pedagogy.
exactly
in TFA summary "chronic disease" jumped out at me...that's a pretty high bar for ***anything known to medical science*** to hit, and no one ever really claimed that multivitamins would just flat prevent cancer.
it seems like TFA wants to beg the question...but we can't let the researchers off the hook either...they *chose* the language and 3 categories
by which to analyze the factors. That is research design and it, obviously, affects every part of your result. IMHO they look like amateurs for not including those who take multivitamins expecting a small performance boost (like athletes or fitness junkies) or to make up for a poor diet.
after reading this over and seeing a few other comments i'm definitely stickign with my vitamins
Thank you Dave Raggett
I would not care about such biased research in an actually free country where I can purchase and consume whatever vitamins and supplements I wish. But in a country on its way to government controlled medicine and with a powerful FDA this could doom me to "officially approved" opinions in this and other medical manners. I took the time to find a good longevity research group that did substantial over time blood work and other testing regarding recommended supllementation. The end experiential result is that I felt 10 years younger in terms of energy and mental focus and general health. So I don't really give a damn how many official studies say there is nothing to it. I know better.
But I noticed after I started taking a multivitamin about a year ago, I didn't get a cold at all. Before that, I was getting a cold every 1-2 months! It's worth $30/year for me not to get sick. And I'm pretty crap about eating my vegetables, so I don't have a lot of faith I'm getting some trace elements. And what about pregnant women who have little parasites sucking up all the good stuff? I know the first link mentions the need for folic acid supplements for pregnant women, but what about the rest of it?
BOOP!
Now I see why someone would want to fund this research...it increases revenue for Big Pharma.
Thank you Dave Raggett
Nope, big pharma is happy to sell you both. Centrum, One A Day, Flintstones, etc. are all big pharma brands.
Look around you if you are in the US. How many "well nourished adults" do you see? Well fed yes but that is not at all the same thing. Go to your average grocery story and count the number of isles and what percentage of them contain actual food, much less healthy food. People generally are not well nourished in the US. Also it is a known fact that various micro-nutrients, hormones, types of nutrient uptake and so on deteriorate as we age, starting about at a bit after 40 for most people. Note, the world wide population is aging rapidly. So if you want reasonably healthy and functional people it seems rather obvious you want to supplement various things that deteriorate with age.
Specific supernutritional means can address specific heart risks. Typical multivitamins are not quite a BB gun in that therapeutic arena, often poorly formulated for even the basic mission. Some typical, common brand multivitamin components use poor, obsolete model molecules, kind of like having rusty muskets for a modern infantry unit.
Time and effort is not free
The time spent making this meal is already more than 4 bucks off time
high-quality source like LEF...
Do you mean the same LEF whose founders once advocated taking food preservatives (e.g., BHA, BHT) to slow aging, and practiced cryonics (e.g. freezing people's heads through their ALCOR subsidiary)?
If so, I'm super skeptical that people should trust LEF's "high-quality" vitamin propaganda. let alone their products.
Profit margins on vitamins are virtually nonexistent compared to Pharmaceutical products like ace inhibitors and statins. Also you can't patent them.
What he is talking about is minerals.
Vitamins are just complex organic compounds. Minerals aren't something that the plant can just make all by itself.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
You're a moron. There are decades of case studies showing overuse of vitamins corresponds to the increased occurrence of numerous chronic diseases, such as heart disease and cancer. There are no advertising dollars behind them though, so all people see are advertisements made by vitamin sellers. Vitamins are an enormous profit center for the pharmaceutical industry.
And yet they make and sell billions of dollars in vitamins every year. That's a funny way to show that you're against something. Every major big Pharma company has multiple brands of vitamins.
Who do you think produces all those vitamins? The pharmaceutical industry reaps enormous profits from the production and sale of vitamins.
they will not grow properly. There is a lot more known today than even 10 years ago in biology and dependent subject e.g. medicine, pharm, argriculture etc...
There are nitrogen fixing bacteria, however, that will make many of the components plants need to thrive. But there needs to be sufficient chemical balance for this to be optimum. Fertilizer essentially replaces on of the components (via the N03 ion - nitrates) so that the chemistry is narrower, but sufficient. After a time the system becomes to acidic.
The whole point of this clinical study though, is that it is very hard to show a POSITIVE association, since it is a subtle thing and it is hard to do force diet studies on humans. This is part of the training one needs when interpreting clinical studies. It is very difficult to know for *your* personal biochemistry what the effect to any medication will be. There is now alot of clinical evidence that the gut bacteria have a huge effect on our health, and yes, that includes vitamin production and uptake.
Probably the biggest problem is that our lifestyles have changed so much that we are now all more sedentary and so become ill from all the things wrong with overweight pathology. So we could eat less? But then you will need more fortified foods...
This is a meta-article so I would need to read it carefully to see what it really says. It is complicated and non-experts make poor reviewers.
You mean the same pharma fucks who produce all of those vitamins? It's in their best interest for you to continue buying and taking massive amounts of anti-oxidants. Those are the same anti-oxidants that neutralize the process of the immune system oxidizing dangerous cells, such as cancer.
I watched this on CBC. Dr. Peter Lin made two good points:
(1) The study was carried out on healthy subjects. Thus the impact is minimal.
(2) Vegetarians, pregnant moms and people who are selective in their diets (college students) can benefit from supplements.
I could not find the transcript but the video is available here: http://www.cbc.ca/player/News/Health/ID/2424891913/
ps: just fast-forward to 2:03
By that logic, you're wasting a ton of money posting to Slashdot.
Going out and going shopping can be a social activity. You meet your neighbors, get to know the people at the stores, get some exercise, etc.
Who knows, you might meet someone interesting at the grocery store...
Most people can't make as much in their "off" time as they do during work, so it's difficult to put a dollar value on your time.
That said, you can "make" a lot of money not eating convenience foods. You can save roughly $60/hr by buying large chunks of meat and shaving it yourself. Chopping your own carrots gives similar savings.
That said, if you'd really rather not cook and can affort to eat out, then go for it.
And to add to my previous post. Let's just enumerate a list of some of the vitamin brands sold by a couple of the big name pharma companies.
Bayer:
One A Day
Supradyn
Flintstones Vitamins
Pluravit
Elevit
Redoxin
Pfizer:
Centrum
Emergen-CStresstabs
Clusivol
Trihemic
Oh and to throw in, Pfizer even has a web page extolling the virtues of taking vitamins. Funny since you would have us believe they are against them, no?
GlaxoSmithKline:
Cetebe
Rutinoscorbin
Scott's Emulsion
For people who hate vitamin supplements it's amazing how many brands just those 3 companies alone sell, no? And that's not including all the other nutritional supplements they sell which would add at least another 10 or 12 items. So this notion that big pharma hates vitamins, etc. is pure bunk.
Did you know Orange Crush used to have vitamin C in it? (It did in the 80s.)
Did you know 80 to 90% of the moderators on slashdot wouldn't recognize a troll even if one dragged them under a bridge.
Like just about everything, you can go to the extreme with vitamins. However, $7.68 for 220 count store brand multi-vitamins is not going to break my budget. If the pharmaceutical industry can make enormous profits from that, well good for them.
I really shouldn't have used someone else's email address for this account.
Doctors say stop taking vitamins! Aren't these the same folks who make money off sick people?
Wrong, Vitamins and supplements are mostly unregulated and provide a HUGE profit for pharmaceutical. FAR more then most prescribed pharmaceutical drugs.
Ye some drugs have huge sales, most do not, and take RnD into account it's even less.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
So you're concerned about money enough to think McDonalds is the way to go, but you get paid by the hour and can easily work more hours when you want. Either you're lazier than anything or you're holding the world together at the seams and not getting paid enough to do it. I'm sorry, either way.
in a country on its way to government controlled medicine and with a powerful FDA
oh PLEASE. those pills are making you more than a lot paranoid.
This is about taking multivitamins to prevent heart disease and how it doesn't help.
congratulations on feeling so youthful
Multivitamins offer no benefits to well nourished adults! No kidding? Glad we got that out of the way!
Multivitamins do nothing to prevent chronic illness or another heart attack. Who thinks vitamins are medications?
The study says nothing about the role of multivitamins in people with poor eating habits nor about their use to offset side effects from medication. The lay people and journalists are making that assumption based on the narrow confines of this report.
Folic acid has been proven to prevent birth defects, and some doctors (like mine) recommend taking vitamins if your medication is known to flush vitamins from your system or you are beginning a new diet regiment that reduces your caloric intake.
Excellent: stocks will fall and prices will plummet. My daily regimen of 20+ supplements should become significantly cheaper. My planted "studies" are panning out... I WILL LIVE FOREVER!
People seem to be assuming that the pills do their job, which is to deliver these vitamins to your body, when really, most of it goes straight through your system. It's not that getting more vitamins isn't good. It's that you can only get a vitamin-rich diet by eating well. Cutting corners with a pill doesn't cut it.
Need: freezer, plastic tubs, big pot.
I fill a five or a seven litre pot with loads of veg, spuds, a few steaks. Boil for half an hour, turn to pulp with a hand blender, and voilÃ:
http://ciaran.compsoc.com/vegetable-soup.html (scroll down for pics)
Or a few kilos of tomatoes, minced meat, carrots and red peppers, and that's spaghetti bolognaise (just add spaghetti).
Or spuds, carrots, leaks, onions, and two or three whole chickens.
Onions, garlic, and broccoli get added to pretty much everything.
All goes into tubs, into the freezer. Take out two tubs each night to thaw.
Point is, I spend a day cooking and I eat clean, non-processed food every day for a month.
Expert in software patents or patent law? Contribute to the ESP wiki!
There's now a lot of convenience foods with reasonable nutrition.
I could have waited another day. I just bought One-A-Day yesterday. Any way I will stop using it. Just wasted 8 dollars.
When I am stressed beyond limit at work I notice my cuticles start to crack and I have other issues. so I start taking a multivitamin and all those go away. Their study was conducted with stress free and balanced diet test subjects.
70% of americans do not eat a balanced diet. They eat crap like ramen, and McDonalds $1 menu because they HAVE NO MONEY. Those people benefit greatly from a multivitamin.
And a lot of very smart people and studies have proven that a D vitamin supplement in the winter for northern climates are very beneficial for people that get almost no sunlight for 3 months.
So the study is definitive for a narrow minority. Case closed.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
will not be helped. Everybody else, who tend to live on snack machine food and pork pies and soda? They stand to benefit.
or I am sitting at my desk working while posting to slashdot, but that same time can not be taken to the kitchen at home to cook.
Lucky for me, I have the Garden of Eden in my backyard!.
Oh wait, I don't. So I guess "case closed" means scurvy for me.
But at least some purist researchers will get to feel better about themselves.
Welcome to the Internet, where ACs think people posting opinions based on an article are attempting real scientific research!
You mean anecdotes about placebo effect.... Placebo is considered plenty scientific
I know people have been hating on this article because it only addresses a few specific conditions, but it is one in a long line of studies that have shown vitamin supplements to have no positive (and occasionally negative!) effects, unless you are actually deficient in that vitamin.
People are so taken by advertisements and anecdotes about vitamins that they neglect the reality. If you hear a commercial that says "You might be deficient in X!" you suddenly need to take that vitamin/mineral "just in case." Rinse and repeat for every single vitamin, mineral, or "energy/immune/etc booster," and suddenly you're taking 100+ supplements and spending an excessive amount on useless pills.
The takeaway is this:
Unless you actually have a condition that requires you to supplement a specific nutrient, you do not need to take vitamins, to say nothing of multivitamins.
If you are concerned that you are actually deficient, go get a blood test from your doctor. Saving yourself the cost of supplementation over the next 20 years when you find out that you don't actually need them will more than pay for the appointment.
Take your big pharma scare mongering and shove it up your ass. I take drugs pioneered by these companies that help with my medical conditions. You and your kind can go fuck yourself.
Of course there is no benefit to taking a MultiVItamin, or in general any supplement that your body needs.
You need to be sicker, and to see the doctor more often so you can have more health problems to increase our profits.
We doctors need you to be as sick as possible otherwise we do not make as much money. Besides, those vitamins are too cheap! We need you to spend thousands per bottle, not $30 bucks at some health food store!
How would I be able to afford those vacations.....errrr..medical conferences paid for by the drug companies if I don't make you sicker?
Sorry, but I just can't believe the crap our society produces on a daily basis so I am being incredibly sarcastic.
Up is down, Down is Up and billion spent on insuring we can't even know what is going into our food because the Drug companies, Doctors and the whole freakin monstrous medical system wants us as sick as possible for the bottom line.
Next thing they will do is just ban VItamin C because it is a figment of your imagination that it even exists.
What a bunch of sh*t science.
-Hack
Got Geometrodynamics? Awe, too hard to figure out? Too bad.
Is a beer in each hand.
Every attack on multi-vitamins paid for by pharmaceutical companies
They can't get away with trying to attack Vit C or D individually. So try they try to attack multi-vitamins.
The pharmaceutical companies want your to spend lots of money on their drugs, not pennies on multivitamins
Case is closed - except for the new report about it helping stop the progression of HIV http://www.webmd.com/hiv-aids/news/20131126/multivitamins-may-help-fight-hiv-progression-study-suggests
Well, of course doctors are going to say vitamin supplements aren't beneficial. Doctors make their money treating sick people. And, if doctors can get us to be unhealthy, it's money in their pockets. After all, they have to pay off those student loans from medical school.
You're so busy that you count the time necessary to peel an orange? Wow.
So, you're wasting a ton of your boss's money posting to Slashdot.
Given our current lifestyles, good nutrition is problematic. I find that most of the time I don't need vitamins, but sometimes I don't eat well enough for a period (a week or so), and find that multi-vitamins bring my energy levels and general health back to where they should be.
Most multivitamins are crap...That said supplementation is not. The problem is picking the good out of the crap. I suspect the studies focused on well known sources for multivitamins which would mean oneAday or centrum varieties which are almost always crap. That mixed with the study's funding by pharmaceutical companies (I didn't look but you know it was) and the "The case is closed" comment lead me to the conclusion...What a load of crap!
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
In what way am I fear mongering? By pointing out that there isn't some anti-vitamin conspiracy since all the big pharma companies sell billions in such supplements? I can only assume I'm missing the whoosh moment.
The particular examples that he's referring to are most likely:
1. Enriched flour - almost all wheat flour you can buy in the States is enriched with iron and B vitamins to match nutritionally what is found in whole-wheat flour. This probably doesn't include many organic flours.
2. Iodized salt - iodine deficiency is serious business, but goiter is almost nonexistant in the US.
3. Fluoridated water - known for improving dental health
If I ate a few servings of fruits and vegetables a day I wouldn't worry about a vitamin. As it stands, I'd probably get both Rickets and Scurvy in a matter of weeks if I didn't eat a multivitamin. Yes, that's an exaggeration but the general point stands.
What is the deal with hummus these days? 5 years ago you wouldn't find it in this entire state and now I can't even walk around the grocery store without tripping over cases of the shit. It may be good and good for you (I don't agree) but clearly this is just another stupid hipster fad which will go away soon hopefully.
If you can get a job for that time, you can afford to eat restaurant food. If you can't get paid for that time, your time is worth $0.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
most restaurant food is far from healthy.
Full of sodium and fats
Vitamins may be big business but lifestyle pharmaceuticals are much more lucrative. I am sure that if given the choice, that Big Pharma would prefer you to be hooked on one or more of those more expesnsive drugs preferably with a cascading set of side effects.
Vitamins are cheap and have no patent protection. Any old small time loser can join in the fun.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Nice trick. You completely ignored his argument. I'll restate the vitamin E portion.
For decades, almost all studies on vitamin E have only been done on the alpha tocopherol portion, and those who wish to misrepresent vitamin E do so to this day. For the last decade it's been pretty well known that doses above 400 IU of alpha tocopherol start producing negative incremental benefits because they deplete the very important gamma tocopherol. Beta and delta portions may also have some benefit. There are also the related alpha, beta, gamma, and delta tocotrienols, put into the better vitamin E formulations for additional benefit.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
how the hell do I get out of this beta? you are making the comments system even worst.. that was the best part of slashdot.. WTF is wrong?
You're a moron. There are decades of case studies showing overuse of vitamins corresponds to the increased occurrence of numerous chronic diseases, such as heart disease and cancer.
Citation?
Quite an experience to live in fear, isn't it? That's what it is to be a slave.
right...those are the things I **dont** need a source for, because anyone who's been bored at breakfast has read the back of the cereal box
I agree that those examples of enrichment are common knowledge, but that's far from what GP was claiming...he's talking like this crap is like a multivitamin itself
Also, we need to see a study of the effectiveness of ***vitamin enriched food*** done next to the TFA study if we are going to have any meaningful conversation.
Bottom line, multivitamins are a good idea unless you keep track of your vitamin intake and eat organically AND exercise once a day like the CDC recommends.
We haven't discussed athletes taking suppliments, or even a 9-5 person who does intense training or amature sports...those activities deplete certain vitamins much faster.
You're out of your mind if you think just because Fruit Loops says "enriched with Vitamin X" then you've got your proper intake.
Thank you Dave Raggett
I'd like to see a link to a multivitamin that claims to cure cancer.
Let's see it....and btw suppliments can have statements not approved by the FDA so that's not a factor
You won't find any because it's patently ridiculous and no companies claim what TFA says they claim. It's part of the researchers begging the question by over-representing Multivitamin makers claims.
No company claims that...or implies it hard either...it's silly and hurts sales
Thank you Dave Raggett
These pills may be beneficial for people who for one or other reasons are living on meagre diets for prolonged periods. A richly varied intake of fresh vegetables will cover all your needs for micronutrients, vitamin pills will not.
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The fact that it works no better than a placebo is irrelevant. I take low level multivitamin tablets. They make me happier and more productive. They give me more energy. They may not do that directly, they may work due to the placebo effect. I don't care. It really doesn't matter. The levels are not so high that it is dangerous (the dangerous levels of vitamin A are 25x the advised levels for example) so "no cure no harm" counts.
For a few cents a day I get more energy, more happiness and more productivity.
Well, I might have a way, but it only works on a semi spherical planet in a vacuum.
So, if most have no clear benefit, that means some do, and considering most Americans are not well-nourished, but eat quite unhealthy diets, the results of this study don't apply to them. Perhaps multivitamins provide a benefit to people who don't get the 100% daily allowance of all those vitamins from their diet.
Of course, multivitamins are a form of (self-)medication outside the control and regulation of the medical establishment, so the self-serving results of this study (or rather, the weasely way it's been summarized) are no surprise to me.
Liberty in your lifetime
Sheldon: Well, there’s some value to taking a multivitamin, but the human body can only absorb so much, what you’re buying here are the ingredients for very expensive urine.
Strange, because looking at patient charts I see that doctors are perscripting vitamins all the time. Could it be they don't want us to take multi vitamins so instead they can wait for us to become deficient so they can write prescriptions for drugs and vitamins?
my karma will be here long after I'm gone
Greetings and Salutations;;;
Some years ago, I was diagnosed with Hep C. My G.I. Dr. put me on a fairly minimal number of medications, but, specifically included a daily multivitamin tablet in the list. Since I have always tried to eat as healthily as I could, I suspected then, and, still think, that PART of the reason for this was to make me feel that he was really doing ALL he could to mitigate the effects of the disease. By adding a multivitamin to the mix, it was one more pill, that did not cost much of anything at all (A bottle of 450 tablets at Sam's Club is less than $25), would not do any harm, and, might help ensure that the necessary vitamin levels were maintained even if I was lying to him about my diet. So...a win/win for everyone.
I am sure that we both knew that if the tablets were pumping too much of a given vitamin into my system, that the excess would likely get excreted fairly rapidly.
Pleasant Dreams
Bee Man Dave.
YAB - http://blog.beemandave.com/
But without getting lots of money they can't do all those good things, like finding a cure for cancer or the next antibiotics etc etc. They NEED lots of money. Or so we keep getting told whenever there's a discussion about limiting the expenditure for pharmaceuticals... you may say that they should get the money for other, more valuable drugs they make, but this isn't how it works at all even when left alone. Anyone selling something doesn't try to get back "cost" but to get back anything they can. Since they won't have to do a lot of research on vitamin pills any excess money they get through selling those is available for the expensive research. IN theory - just want to take the wind out of that particular argument right away.
Not that I support any of it, I think this system doesn't quite work in health related matters, and private insurance (which serves me, personally, very well indeed) is the worst idea ever, but that's a completely different topic (maybe).
> mineral or vitamin supplements has no clear benefit and might even be harmful
It is also important not to wear a helmet when you ride the bicycle, as it is without clear benefit and might even be harmful (to those people, who are desperately waiting for your organs to become available for transplant...)
Wait, but are we sure? Please provide citations. I see several comments making this claim as if it has any more significant backing than me dressing myself up in a lab suit and making claims about nuclear physics. Not one has provided any citations to *any* experimental observations. Instead, we get "it works for me" without the slightest indication that this person realises they would likely be saying "it works for me" regardless because of biases and the placebo effect.
If I was to believe the conclusion, I would not believe the AREDS and AREDS II studies, which are widely accepted. In those studies, participants slowed the progression of macular degeneration by taking specific supplements.
I just eat raw squirrel on my way into work. It's simple, light, and is incredibly low in polymonotrisaturated fats.
Everything I've seen about this is useless so far, as I haven't seen a single dose of anything listed.
What dose of what over what time period for what population found no effect for what conditions?
On a statistical point, I'd note that failing to reject the null hypothesis does not imply accepting the null hypothesis.
Multivitamins tend to prey on people who don't track what they eat, or don't know what they're supposed to be getting, and are convinced they need to supplement their fast paced and deficient lifestyle. Now when a study comes out that isn't try to sell you something, it's worth taking a look at.
No beer and no TV make Homer something something
Due to childhood illness, I've never had a particularly strong immune system. For a large number of years, I would get upwards of six colds a year, and they would take forever to go away, meaning I was almost continually sick.
Ever since I started taking a once-a-day multivitamin, that number has decreased to two colds a year, and the duration of said colds has been cut in half.
I believe that I'm reasonably well nourished. I eat a variety of foods (equal parts 'healthy stuff' and 'junk food'), and I'm never starving.
I call B.S. on the absolute claim of "no health benefits". I don't see how that dramatic a change could be just a placebo effect.
How long does it take to go to McDonald's (I assume it's not across the street) and stand in line? My brother's ex- claimed she was saving all this time by taking the kids to eat at Burger King instead of cooking. (Not like she did anything else the whole day, but she seemed pretty proud of this accomplishment for some reason.) 10-15 minutes to get the kids ready, 10-15 minutes to drive there, 3-5 minutes in line, 10-15 to drive back, 5 to get them back inside. He was visiting us and Rosa cooked a wonderful meal in 45 minutes with more nutrition than the kids probably normally got in a week, with enough leftovers that we had them for lunch the next day.
"Think about how stupid the average person is. Now, realise that half of them are dumber than that." - George Carlin
Hydrogen oxide is sufficient, you twat.
I guess doctors that PRESCRIBE prenatal vitamins are just doing it because it does nothing medically for anyone.
Insert_Ending_Here
Vitamins were being pushed strongly when I was a kid. Since they typically were extracts and concentrates of food products, they are regulated by the FOOD regulators rather than the DRUG regulators. As the pendulum swung to finding "natural" cures for everything - a modern herbalism - the drug companies kept trying to control the business by arguing first that vitamins are useless (and only "drugs" are useful), then that vitamins should be regulated as drugs (which of course they are the most experienced at controlling), then that they are of inconsistent quality (unfortunately true, but better quality control is a good concept for drugs *or* food), and now again that they are useless.
Maybe average-quality inconsistent multivitamins really are not as useful as hoped. Maybe all of the research pro-vitamin was wrong. Or, more likely, JUST LIKE DRUG RESEARCH, maybe results vary widely from person to person and it's just not that simple. In any case, the drug industry has a vested interest in discrediting the vitamin industry, and the very fact that both of them and the medical industry are "industries" is part of the problem with modern health care.
Hedging bets, I take half a multi-vitamin daily.
If those dodos even knew what it takes to make an adult "well nourished", I might be more disposed to believe them. But they don't. The official party line from most scientists, doctors, and governments is still that fat is bad for you and so you need to fill up with carbohydrates. However, all the evidence points to the opposite conclusion: it's carbohydrates (most of all sugar and wheat) that cause many "Western" diseases such as atherosclerosis, heart disease, diabetes, and even cancer.
Since they persist in saying that unhealthy foods are healthy, and healthy foods are unhealthy, only a simpleton would pay attention to their conclusions about vitamins and minerals. Once NuSI reports in, we'll have a better idea about what's healthy and what isn't.
http://nusi.org/
http://www.second-opinions.co.uk/banting.html
I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
Your body is too irony from all those multivitimins. Seriously, though. Its ironic that they want people "to stop wasting their money", but they'll probably make it so you need a prescription to get vitamins.
Supplementing people that don't need supplements doesn't have a benefit!
So they really said nothing.
So in other words they're saying that Ray Kurzweil is an idiot?
I'll put my money on Ray instead of on pharma company shills any day.
Next.
No clear benefits at all? There's always going to be some pros and cons on this. Such a blatant over generalization is worthless.
Let's don't rush to judgement there, zippy. I take a daily multivitamin plus a vitamin A capsule (8000 IU) plus beta carotene (25,000 IU). I didn't need reading glasses until I hit 52. I don't generally use reading glasses while doing computer work.
YMMV, of course, and you can't overdo fat-soluble vitamins without serious consequences, but don't suggest multivitamins are of no use. If I cut out all of the above, my vision begins to worsen in a week or less.
Circle the wagons and fire inward. Entropy increases without bounds.
Exactly ... few actually get a good diet
If mcdonalds is on your route to or from work, the drive through is 5 minutes, max.
Just like the researchers who said fish oil was not of any value. I'll wait for the rebuttal because in the fish oil debate it was clearly a win for position of yes it does good.
http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2013/apr2013_Science-by-Ambush_01.htm
So many questions. First what type of multivitamin? Made in China and loaded with toxic crap? No where near the levels on the labels? Do the researchers have any conflict of interest? Do they have any bias that is reflected in the study?
The devil is always in the details so lets see what the details are first. The problem with slashdot and media in general is that these type of things get the headlines and then after careful analysis and rebuttal they are shown to be horribly wrong but that never gets any coverage. Here are some just to give you an idea of how totally WRONG a lot of the media coverage is:
http://www.lef.org/featured-articles/may2000_vitamin_c_03.html?source=search&key=rebuttal
http://www.lef.org/featured-articles/Rebuttal-to-Allegation-That-Certain-Vitamins-May-Shorten-Lifespan.htm?source=eNewsLetter2008Wk16-2&key=Article+Exclusive
http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2013/oct2013_Lethal-Risks-Posed-By-News-Media_01.htm?source=search&key=rebuttal
http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2013/aug2013_Rebuttal-to-Attack-Against-Carnitine_01.htm
http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2010/nov2010_Flawed-Analysis-Misleads-Public-About-Calcium-and-Heart-Attack-Risk_01.htm?source=search&key=rebuttal
The Media has been "Creatively" spinning "Meta" Reports for quite sometime.
Basically its the Equivalent of Reporters like that old guy sitting in the chair armchair Quarterbacking his opinion on Policitics till all hours of the Night.
The Media Outlets are colelctively waving their Gloved hands saying.. "Its a Jedi Mind trick.. These aren't the Vitamins your looking for.."
It also helps with Big Pharma profits.. B6 was made illegal because of an FDA Exclusivity Grant to a drug company.. many Vitamins and Minerals are being Considered for "Resitricted Substances"
There is so much uneveness the FDA is the Organization that needs a Parent.. to Regulate the regulator.
Too bad Monty Python isn't still around.. Vitamins would be the new Spam
This study is flawed in a number of ways. Sift through the facts and make your own conclusions. It's sort of like a three legged chair and a four legged chair both work equally. A four legged chair is no better but it happens to be more stable and that's why don't use many chairs with three legs.
Not for the joke it's not, you sloppy cunt.
If vitamins were any good for you they'd be occuring naturally in food. Much better to go with well researched substances like Valium and Levomethorphan.. enough of those darned "natural health" nuts...
If your time is so valuable and YOU are actually earning income during every waking moment, why are you worried about eating for less than $4 a meal?
If you hate cooking, then no, it's not free. If the activity is calming, a hobby or entertaining, then I assert that it is. You would not pay someone to play X-box for you. Well okay, some people pay for power-ups.
Paul Graham writes a lot about startups, and this is specifically intended to be something healthy to eat for startup founders trying to live really cheap. In a startup that's trying to be ramen-profitable, there's usually something profitable that can be done for the business at all times. If the cooking is a form of R&R from the startup, that's good; otherwise, there is an opportunity cost to cooking this stuff.
"When you have eliminated the unacceptable, whatever is left, however improbable, must be the truthiness" - Holmes
they couldn't even find the G-Spot, after all!
Look up sprouted bean recipes. The extended soak time allows you to shorten the cook time.
I do cook everything together when I am short on time, but you are right that yours probably come out better.
To the utter loser with nothing better to do that just modded down ten of my posts on a variety of topics from the last few days overnight - why bother? Even if you keep it up for weeks it's not going to do much to the karma points of someone who has been on Slashdot for a few years. Also it's a very cowardly way to indicate dislike of a person.
Indeed. Something else I haven't seen in this topic so far is the initial investment necessary for healthy cooking. To properly cook for yourself (especially from complete scratch, but even using some "in a box" things) you (general you) need pots, pans, utensils, potable water (for cleaning and cooking), soap, a working stove, and gas/electricity (or just electricity and a toaster oven/rotisserie/whatever, but you'll be limited in what you can do). A microwave and tupperware is cheaper still, but you're extremely limited in what you can actually make (if anything.) Oh, and a home/apartment in which to cook. And the means to get the food from shop to home; either it has to be close enough for walking, you can afford the bus fare (which may or may not be on the way to/from work, assuming you have a job), or you have a car.
For most Slashdotters, these seem like no-brainers and we probably give no thought to what it took to get those things. But to someone who grew up in poverty and are unable to land a job or higher education themself, many of these seem like far-off dreams, and if they can afford food they likely get things that don't need to be cooked or purchase from the dollar menu at fast food joints.
(I'm not saying this is the GGP's problem, but too often I see/hear people espouse about how "easy" it is to cook healthily and that poor people should be doing it a lot more, which is making a lot of assumptions, so I wanted to add to your correct statement.)
The people that fall into the bucket of not able to cook for the reasons you mention are also the ones likely to hear a study that says multivitamins don't work, and if they were taking them will stop.
If someone can't afford all of that to cook, I would be surprised if they were buying multivitamins in the first place.
But, assuming that they do, that seems like a real stretch. It seems tou're trying to convey something in your comment, but I'm not entirely sure what (poor==stupid?); the short version is that a poor person (to the point of not being able to prepare their own meals, even with food stamps) who reads the article will likely continue taking their multi-vitamins, regardless of their intellectual means:
Many a /. article has shown that people up and down all sort of spectrums don't like to be "wrong", even when absolute proof is right in front of them (and this "article" isn't absolute proof.) So, if someone were taking multivitamins under the belief that they were helpful, and found this article, there's a good chance they'd just keep on taking them regardless of both the validity of the article and their level of income.
Furthermore, if said poor person did read the article (and not the /. summary, which is missing important details as usual), they would see that it says the vitamins offer no benefit to those with proper nourishment; the vitamins can be far cheaper than buying the foods necessary to get the same amounts, which means they aren't even wrong about taking them; so if they were intelligent they would continue to take said vitamins since they have trouble eating in the first place. (The Dunning-Kruger effect may lead those without intelligence to see themselves as knowing better than the article/scientists if they miss the part about being well-nurished, and so continue taking it; if they see it, it's reinforces their world-view, and they'll continue taking it. I think they would most likely just not see the article at all, though.)
any vitamins is bad. period. google "the vitamin myth why we think we need supplements"
Google is your friend.
The result of the study was that
Multivitamins do not prevent diseases in average individuals.
This is a far cry from:
Do daily multivitamins make you healthier?
It means that in a population of people with an average diet and an average lifestyle who take multivitamins for disease prevention there is no statistically significant correlation between multivitamin intake and lesser incidence of common diseases.
This does not say anything about the use of multivitamins in cases of nutritional deficits such as in clinical cases, vegetarians/vegans or sporters who may not cover their needs with normal nutrition. In the latter group in fact, use of multivitamins does seem to show a statistically significant correlation but this is surely a proxy effect caused by the fact that sporters do lead healthier lifestyle already.
My personal concern regarding multivitamins is possible side effects and over-dosage. Last year I was taking a supplement of Vitamin A that was close to 70%-80% of the RTI... I started getting a lot of pain in my joints and muscles and they felt stiff and "rubbery". After checking my nutrition logs I found out that I was overdosing close to the 4000 IU (that's the lowest toxic concentration) as I was consuming a lot of carotenes so that my organism was creating a lot of Vitamin A. A week after stopping the intake of the supplement everything went back to normal.
I am a guy who does his homework on this nutrition and supplements, I maintain a nutrition log and keep track of macro and micronutrients. And yet I screwed up... just imagine what the normal Joe can do, specially the ones adepts to the fine academical discipline of broscience :)
-- 29A the number of the Beast
Indulge me for a moment. I donate blood. As I am O- (a universal donor), they would like me to donate "double-blood". For that I need my hemo level slightly higher than regular donation (13.5 rather than 12.5). A couple of times in a row, I failed this Iron test. I am a vegetarian and have been one all my life. It seems low iron is a problem for most vegetarians. I asked the nurse what I could do about it. She gave me a list of things to eat that would up my Iron intake. The problem was the only thing Vegetarian in that list was Spinach. I like Spinach, but I am no Popeye. I refuse to eat that shit everyday. The other thing I could eat was Eggs. Again, I do not like to eat more than 2-3 a week. So she suggested I get myself a vitamins+minerals supplement. DUH. I felt like an idiot. See, I always thought that my eating habits were really good and I do not need any 'supplements'. Turns out I was wrong. Also, I live alone and cannot eat a nutritionally 'perfect' meal all the time. I realised I probably would need this vitamins and minerals supplement for the rest of my life. I found that the best was a Mutivitamin+mineral supplement targeted for Women (obviously). It looked kinda weird seeing a hairy, bald guy buying Women's vitamins; but I sucked it up and bought some! The result is that I have not failed this test ever since. Turns out, guess what; I thought I was eating right when I was not. So a BIG FU to the writers of this article. This bald, hairy, ugly Indian Mofo is going to keep buying my multivitamins+minerals supplement for the rest of my life. I am going to have one every morning as soon as I finish brushing my teeth. So these Annals of IM writers can kiss my hairy ass. I am pissed because of the condescension in the original article. "May even be harmful".
In general, the mega-study found no significant benefits specifically for cardiovascular disease, cancer, and cognitive function. And "mortality".
From that, they claim there are absolutely zero health benefits from supplements.
That just doesn't follow. There is a huge area outside of "cardiovascular disease, cancer, cognitive function and 'mortality'" that could come under "better health".
Talk about drawing vast, generalized conclusions from narrowly defined studies.