December 15, 2008
Vitamins in Food Better Than Supplements
By Bernice Hurst, Managing
Partner, Fine Food Network
Nutritionists have long
argued that a well-balanced diet gives most people all the vitamins and
minerals they need, that food contains fiber and nutrients that pills do
not and that self-diagnosing may lead to taking things that conflict with
one another or result in overdosing.
In spite of this, many
people are convinced that supplements are good for them and that you can’t
have too much of a good thing, hoping they will act as boosters, eliminating
the free radicals believed to increase the risk of cancer and heart disease.
But recent reports from
scientists in the U.K. and U.S. claim that vitamins A and E, believed to
reduce the risk of cancer, actually do no such thing. According to The
Independent newspaper in Britain, Dr. Howard Sesso’s research, in which
almost 15,000 American men participated, noted "the lack of an effect
that we observe for vitamin E or C on cancer does convince us that these
particular doses that we tested really have no role for recommendation
for cancer prevention."
In Britain, David Gems
of University College London checked the effects of antioxidant levels
on ageing in the nematode worm. Like the American study, he told The
Guardian, "It really demonstrates finally that trying to boost
your antioxidant levels is very unlikely to have any effect on ageing."
A Boston study "discovered
that there were no significant effects on rates of heart disease after
taking vitamins E and C" while "looking at whether vitamin
E and selenium… could lower a man’s risk of prostate cancer ended amid
worries that such treatments may do more harm than good." And
doctors at New York’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Centre have apparently
warned that vitamin C protects cancer cells as well as healthy cells.
Other studies indicate
that some supplements benefit some people. B12 is still believed to benefit
women of childbearing age and the elderly while calcium and vitamin D in
women over 65 appear to protect bones. People living in places with little
sunlight for much of the year are often advised to take vitamin D.
All three articles cited
below give examples of research on both sides of the argument complete
with evidence of side effects and harm. Whether any of them will affect
sales must remain up to individual convictions.
Discussion question:
How will recent reports that vitamins do not prevent certain health conditions
affect supplement sales? Do manufacturers and retailers of nutritional
supplements need to take steps to address the recent "negative" press?
What does this mean for food suppliers and retailers?
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Vitamins have always been a fad business. Before vitamins were discovered (the word was coined in 1912), folks bought patent medicines for similar reasons. If anyone read all the vitamin studies published each month, it would be more than a full-time job. And there’d be plenty of evidence to “prove” anything.
NOTHING WILL CHANGE! News on the value of supplements swings back and forth on a regular basis. Let’s wait 3 months and something positive will be published on vitamin E or vitamin A or vitamin C. Go to a website run by organizations that support the use of supplements and you will find research quite contrary to that referenced above. And, those sites will not reference any research done on worms.
There is so much contradiction in this area that people just give credit to the articles they read that support their position on supplements. Those that use them won’t pay attention to this research, should they ever see it.
While most know that a balanced diet delivers the vitamins and nutrients we all need, most also don’t eat a balanced diet, nor want to. The supplement pill is the silver bullet that easily solves their problem.
Based on the sales trends of vitamins, supplements and healthy components such as oat brand that I have observed, it would seem to me that no study will result in any real change.
People like to take vitamins, plain and simple. It makes us feel good to put healthy stuff in our bodies, regardless of what science might tell us. And vitamins are probably the most convenient way to do this. After all, we are still a society of chronic pill poppers.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish eating my flax seed and wheat germ omelet made with Omega 3 eggs.
As with many things in our lives, if you think that something will help you, it will. Placebos help may people and for possibly the same reasons so do vitamins. I fall into the camp that believes that they help and will continue taking them until we receive more proof that they don’t.
I have the same problem with taking glucosamine and chondroitin for joint pain. I was with my wife on a visit to a specialist and asked him if G & C helped. He said that for many of his patients it did and he thought it was worth trying. I tried it and felt the best I have felt in many years. On my next trip to our family doctor he said that G & C was worthless and a waste of money. So, I quit it and my pain came back. I am taking it again, feel good, and don’t know whether it’s all in my head or not, but my joints feel better anyway. And I really don’t care as long as it works.
I think most people already know the myths of over-the-counter supplements. Most the benefits of supplements are psychological and every now and then some report “outs” them.
If you want to believe that taking a supplement, pill, etc, will cure, prevent or enhance your health then it probably will. Doctors regularly prescribe placebos with positive results. If these supplements really worked there would be a line around the block in front of GNC. I doubt these reports will have any meaningful impact on any business, either positive or negative.
It strikes me that if one or more specific vitamins were identified as an antidote to the global downturn and/or climate change (not to mention offering a route to peace on earth), there could be no more effective economic stimulus. We would all rush out to spend our money buying and popping them. Anybody got some funding available for a study to prove it?
Many pill-poppers do it solely for the placebo effect. It’s their little way of telling themselves they’re being “healthy” without having to put much work into it.
Dedicated health nuts know it takes real fresh food to get all of the vitamins and minerals needed to sustain a healthy lifestyle.
This recent news should have little effect on the sales of supplements.
Lots of comments on the placebo effect, but I think we need to give vitamins a little more credit than that. First, these studies focused on specific claimed benefits of a few vitamins. That doesn’t mean that all vitamins have no health benefits at all. Vitamin C was identified as beneficial long before anyone had heard of antioxidants and any claimed effects on aging.
Vitamins may not have miraculous effects, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t beneficial. I expect people who take vitamins (and for the record I don’t but my wife does) will continue to do so. These studies may keep the skeptical on the sidelines, however.
This is the latest in a growing lists of factual distortions and outright lies to the public by manufacturers and advertisers. It can do nothing but continue to make the public skeptical, even non-believing of claims made about a product or its ingredients’ ability to keep you healthy. When are these groups going to understand the short term gains only make the downfall harder and deeper when the truth comes out? Retailers and their suppliers can ill afford any more lose of trust by the customer.
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Vitamins have always been a fad business. Before vitamins were discovered (the word was coined in 1912), folks bought patent medicines for similar reasons. If anyone read all the vitamin studies published each month, it would be more than a full-time job. And there’d be plenty of evidence to “prove” anything.
NOTHING WILL CHANGE! News on the value of supplements swings back and forth on a regular basis. Let’s wait 3 months and something positive will be published on vitamin E or vitamin A or vitamin C. Go to a website run by organizations that support the use of supplements and you will find research quite contrary to that referenced above. And, those sites will not reference any research done on worms.
There is so much contradiction in this area that people just give credit to the articles they read that support their position on supplements. Those that use them won’t pay attention to this research, should they ever see it.
While most know that a balanced diet delivers the vitamins and nutrients we all need, most also don’t eat a balanced diet, nor want to. The supplement pill is the silver bullet that easily solves their problem.
Based on the sales trends of vitamins, supplements and healthy components such as oat brand that I have observed, it would seem to me that no study will result in any real change.
People like to take vitamins, plain and simple. It makes us feel good to put healthy stuff in our bodies, regardless of what science might tell us. And vitamins are probably the most convenient way to do this. After all, we are still a society of chronic pill poppers.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish eating my flax seed and wheat germ omelet made with Omega 3 eggs.
As with many things in our lives, if you think that something will help you, it will. Placebos help may people and for possibly the same reasons so do vitamins. I fall into the camp that believes that they help and will continue taking them until we receive more proof that they don’t.
I have the same problem with taking glucosamine and chondroitin for joint pain. I was with my wife on a visit to a specialist and asked him if G & C helped. He said that for many of his patients it did and he thought it was worth trying. I tried it and felt the best I have felt in many years. On my next trip to our family doctor he said that G & C was worthless and a waste of money. So, I quit it and my pain came back. I am taking it again, feel good, and don’t know whether it’s all in my head or not, but my joints feel better anyway. And I really don’t care as long as it works.
I think most people already know the myths of over-the-counter supplements. Most the benefits of supplements are psychological and every now and then some report “outs” them.
If you want to believe that taking a supplement, pill, etc, will cure, prevent or enhance your health then it probably will. Doctors regularly prescribe placebos with positive results. If these supplements really worked there would be a line around the block in front of GNC. I doubt these reports will have any meaningful impact on any business, either positive or negative.
It strikes me that if one or more specific vitamins were identified as an antidote to the global downturn and/or climate change (not to mention offering a route to peace on earth), there could be no more effective economic stimulus. We would all rush out to spend our money buying and popping them. Anybody got some funding available for a study to prove it?
Many pill-poppers do it solely for the placebo effect. It’s their little way of telling themselves they’re being “healthy” without having to put much work into it.
Dedicated health nuts know it takes real fresh food to get all of the vitamins and minerals needed to sustain a healthy lifestyle.
This recent news should have little effect on the sales of supplements.
Lots of comments on the placebo effect, but I think we need to give vitamins a little more credit than that. First, these studies focused on specific claimed benefits of a few vitamins. That doesn’t mean that all vitamins have no health benefits at all. Vitamin C was identified as beneficial long before anyone had heard of antioxidants and any claimed effects on aging.
Vitamins may not have miraculous effects, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t beneficial. I expect people who take vitamins (and for the record I don’t but my wife does) will continue to do so. These studies may keep the skeptical on the sidelines, however.
This is the latest in a growing lists of factual distortions and outright lies to the public by manufacturers and advertisers. It can do nothing but continue to make the public skeptical, even non-believing of claims made about a product or its ingredients’ ability to keep you healthy. When are these groups going to understand the short term gains only make the downfall harder and deeper when the truth comes out? Retailers and their suppliers can ill afford any more lose of trust by the customer.