CHICAGO — Vitamins and supplements that countless people take to improve their health are just a waste of money, a new study contends. Researchers from Northwestern University say their health benefits are mainly in the mind and some may even do more harm than good.
According to the CDC, nearly six in 10 Americans regularly took dietary supplements in 2018. Last year, Americans spent nearly $50 billion on vitamins and supplements. However, the research team says there’s no “magic set of pills to keep you healthy.” Instead, diet and exercise are still the key to good health.
“Patients ask all the time, ‘What supplements should I be taking?’” says lead author Dr. Jeffrey Linder from Northwestern University in a media release. “They’re wasting money and focus thinking there has to be a magic set of pills that will keep them healthy when we should all be following the evidence-based practices of eating healthy and exercising,”
Certain supplements could cause cancer, not prevent it
Multivitamin tablets are particularly popular as they contain a mix of a dozen or so vital nutrients. The Health Food Manufacturers’ Association says more than a third of people feel they do not get all they need through their diet.
However, the systematic review of 84 studies found “insufficient evidence” that taking multivitamins, paired, or single supplements prevent cardiovascular disease and cancer. A team from the United States Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF), an independent panel of experts that makes evidence-based recommendations, carried out that review.
READ: 5 Studies That Suggest Multivitamins Are Not Improving Your Health
“The task force is not saying ‘don’t take multivitamins,’ but there’s this idea that if these were really good for you, we’d know by now,” Linder explains.
They specifically advise against taking beta-carotene supplements because of a possible increased risk of lung cancer.
“The harm is that talking with patients about supplements during the very limited time we get to see them, we’re missing out on counseling about how to really reduce cardiovascular risks, like through exercise or smoking cessation,” the study author continues.
Multivitamins don’t have everything found in your fruit and vegetables
Writing in JAMA, Dr. Linder and colleagues say more than half of American adults take vitamins and supplements, with their popularity projected to increase significantly over the next decade. Eating fruits and vegetables leads to decreased cardiovascular disease and cancer risk, according to the team.
READ: Taking These Supplements Can Lower Risk Of Developing Autoimmune Diseases
So, it is reasonable to think key vitamins and minerals could be extracted and packaged into a pill – saving trouble and expense of maintaining a balanced diet. Unfortunately, researchers explain that whole fruits and vegetables contain a mixture of vitamins, plant chemicals, fiber, and other nutrients that probably combine to boost your health.
Micronutrients in isolation may act differently in the body than when naturally packaged with a host of other dietary components. Dr. Linder notes individuals who have a vitamin deficiency can still benefit from taking dietary supplements such as calcium and vitamin D. Previous studies have shown that they can prevent fractures and falls in older adults.
The revised guidelines do not apply to women who are pregnant or planning to start a family.
“Pregnant individuals should keep in mind that these guidelines don’t apply to them,” says co-author Dr. Natalie Cameron, an instructor of general internal medicine at Northwestern.
READ: 6 Amazing Benefits From Taking Fish Oil Supplements
“Certain vitamins, such as folic acid, are essential for pregnant women to support healthy fetal development. The most common way to meet these needs is to take a prenatal vitamin. More data is needed to understand how specific vitamin supplementation may modify risk of adverse pregnancy outcomes and cardiovascular complications during pregnancy.”
Overcoming the cost of eating healthy
Recent research has found most women in the U.S. have poor heart health prior to becoming pregnant. Dr. Cameron says discussing vitamin supplementation and optimizing cardiovascular health prior to pregnancy is an important component of pre-natal care. However, healthy eating can be a challenge when U.S. food manufacturers focus on processed products packed with fat, sugar, and salt.
“To adopt a healthy diet and exercise more, that’s easier said than done, especially among lower-income Americans,” notes co-author Dr. Jenny Jia. “Healthy food is expensive, and people don’t always have the means to find environments to exercise—maybe it’s unsafe outdoors or they can’t afford a facility. So, what can we do to try to make it easier and help support healthier decisions?”
READ: Power Of Positivity: Health Benefits Of Multivitamins ‘May All Be In The Mind’
Dr. Jia has been working with charitable food pantries and banks that supply free groceries to help people pick healthier choices and encourage donors to provide healthier options or money.
South West News Service writer Mark Waghorn contributed to this report.
These kind of studies and result are nothing new. The purpose of supplements is to supplement, not substitute. Their purpose is to prevent borderline and subclinical deficiencies of essential vitamins and minerals. People in America and most of the rest of the world too who eat, especially if their diet and varied and even minimally balanced, are not going to suffer from a deficiency disease but that doesn’t mean they are not getting enough. In the American diet, certain deficiencies are possible, especially, a magnesium deficiency and also an inadequate intake of Vitamin C.
My experience is anecdotal but individual experience always is. When I was a young guy I played some playground basketball just for recreation. When I took my vitamins, my stamina was a little better. It was not by a lot, but I did notice it. I’m not promoting alcohol consumption, but when I drank and took my vitamins, my hangovers were not as bad either.
Into my late 20s, I used to get a horrific cold every years that lasted for six weeks. When I started taking large doses of Vitamin C, these stopped. Generally, since then, I have only gotten colds when I have neglected to take extra Vitamin C. The amount I need is only 500 mg per day, not some megadose.
Again, studies cannot pick up the difference supplement use might make because they are too small to be dramatic and inconsistent and different from person to person. Go ahead and take a supplement. For larger doses, you need to do your research and have some justification.
What about food-based vitamin supplements?
1) The vitamin industry actually IS NOT big pharma….. Big pharma has plenty of its own problems
The supplement industry suffers because its OVERWHELMING full of non-technical people.
Like… literally people who don’t know jack sh*t about ANYTHING and may have even failed in multiple prior non-technical businesses before entering into a new one.
2) The above statement INCLUDES the people who do the packaging and even some in the closely related “Natural Products” space, which thankfully is also involved in the extraction and isolation of raw materials used for APIs and pharmaceuticals
The Natural Product industry only has slightly lower risk of fraud and grift because there is a high entry cost that tends to filter out the people with so much crazy they sweat it out.
3) The handful of Technical people that ARE in the supplement space OVERWHELMINGLY skew toward the “lower value” technical skill end.
Lots of Bachelors degrees
Lots of Bachelors of ARTS
Lots of Biochemist and Biology BAs….. yes, there are plenty of smart people, but statistically Bio BA and Biochem BA have a lower skill set, with a less complete chemical and physical understanding
Of course, you could move to the forward end of the gaussian distribution and pluck a super smart ANYTHING out of ANY group.
If you had to roll the dice and your options were Bio BA vs Bio BS vs Chem BA vs Chem BS vs that same distribution of MA/MS and finally full PhD…..
Your odds of finding terrible outcomes are heavily weighted toward the first part of that list.
4) related to the above:
Among the higher skilled participants:
you are a far more likely to find examples of “crazies” or people who hold unscientific or basically universally disputed beliefs on the subjects the espouse
Very often their participation in this space is because they SIMPLY CANNOT FIND WORK ANYWHERE ELSE because they have a publicly ruined reputation due to their hardcore crazy
5) Yes. This is a problem everywhere.
but lets be clear: THE ENTIRE EASTERN MEDICINE APPROACH IS THIS.
All of it. You can correctly understand and believe that psychology and mental health, which involve consideration and respect for cultural norms. Totally true.
So replace every nanogram of dried Bull Testicle with Placebo and continue calling it whatever
But that ENTIRE TOP TO BOTTOM industry is only slightly better than HOMEOPATHY
6) If you need me to explain why Homeopathy is the most insane BS that absolutely scraping-the bottom of the barrel….
I won’t even bother. I’ll just agree when you try to argue that the world is flat and Democrats are lizards.
So don’t take vitamins, but if you have any type of illness, are pregnant, older, or have underlying health issues, then we definitely take the vitamins. So what did this article accomplish??
Nonsense. The fact is pharmaceuticals started out out as way to refine, replicate & mass produce chemical compounds that knew were in various plants & herbs. Those medicinal compounds are still in those plants & can be very effective in treating common maladies. This is just another effort to discredit and/or regulate to death the supplement industry. I personally have benefited from studying & using medicinal herbs for over 40 years.
I know for “ME’ personally, I NEED specific vitamin and mineral supplements. I also prefer to take the kind that are passed out of my body when not needed.
I was thought to have hyperparathyroid disease. I had high calcium levels in my blood. But testing was done and my body was deficient in calcium (for one issue) and my blood had begun to extract it from my bones. I was in terrible pain everyday for a long time until I had the blood work confirming what was happening.
It wasn’t long after I started taking a multivitamin mineral supplement, that my bones stop hurting. Shortly after that, , I was no longer walking with my cane and I was able to walk up and down my stairs.
I do agree that too much of the world depends on vitamin and mineral supplements to make magic happen for them. This isn’t how it’s supposed to work, but there are those of us that need them.
I also need iron supplements because another medical condition makes me bleed on a regular basis. (not menstruation) Without the iron supplement I have low levels of ferritin, although it shows it within normal range, I need mine a little higher in that range or I will be extremely tired all the time and continue fall asleep doing normal daily things.
My final thought is, it was really stupid to put it out an article like this, especially with this title.
WHOLE FOOD PLANT RICH DIET!
That’s the best source of vital nutrients – period! Lazy people are always seeking pills to make up for their lack of discipline. Eat clean and exercise, and then perhaps consider a supplement like vitamin D3 if you have a proven deficiency validated through some form of diagnostic testing. Some folks living in areas of low sun light might need this, and there are other examples of supplement value, but most dimwitted slugs eat like crap and pop vitamin pills, thinking that makes everything bad A-OK.
ABSURD!
While this could be true. I can argue for them.
When I was on my Keto diet I would wake up with massive cramps in my legs at night.
I never have this problem when I eat unrestricted.
However, I started taking one a day tablet and my cramping stopped.
So my theory is in certain cases they are beneficial.
No one has a nutritionally complete diet, especially with commercially grown foods. And I agree eating healthy, whole natural foods is best. But a quality multivitamin fills the gaps every diet has. A one-a-day multivitamin is useless but quality multivitamins will be 2-6 capsules/tablets daily. There are lots of these studies and all have major flaws. Big Pharma and government collusion is obvious after Covid so I don’t believe anything put out by them.
https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/immune-boosting-supplements
We need to put things in perspective. The majority do not eat a healthy diet, much less the majority do not know what one looks like. With the consumption of “junk” food: refined white flour, high sugar content in foods, vegetables that are nor really fresh (they lose nutritional content: University of California studies show that vegetables can lose 15 to 55 percent of vitamin C, for instance, within a week. Some spinach can lose 90 percent within the first 24 hours after harvest). Consuming processed frozen food, deli meat, chips, and snacks with excess sugar and salt takes a toll on the body and rid the body of essential nutrients. Remember the RDA is the minimum recommended daily allowance. Most people lack vitamin D in their diet. Other examples of poor food quality is the addition of additives to our diet that has shown to deplete the body of vital vitamins and minerals. Artificial colorings, nitrates, high levels of Guar Gum (can has shown to cause obstruction of the esophagus or small intestine),and high fructose corn syrup, among others.
An occasional cupcake will not harm you, but the constant consumption of junk food has shown to cause nutrient depletion and imbalance. With this in mind, I do not believe that the addition of multivitamins is a waste. What I do believe is that it is difficult to find the correct multivitamin that contains what it says it contains.
I will admit that I’ve been trying supplements for more than a year. I had Covid 2021, really severe. I also have asbestosis. I’ve been trying to find something to make living more comfortable. The supplements for energy, weight control, relief of muscular pain, none of the work, expensive olive oil, MCT, Blood flow supplements. I’ve spent a lot of money.
I suspect that most people who take supplements are intelligent enough to know that such isn’t a substitute for proper diet and exercise. The article seemed rather condescending.
I take vit D because tests by my doctor showed that I’m low. Other than that, I don’t see the point of taking multiple vitamins or these ‘fruits and veggies in a capsule’ as much as their marketing makes it sound wonderful for your health. Do I eat ‘healthy’? No, but I eat in moderation. I have maintained the same weight for the last 50 years. IMO Genetics trump everything else.
I can’t believe the myth of healthy food being expensive is being perpetuated by a doctor. If anything, healthy food costs less. It just requires more effort. We eat for very low cost and we do it by avoiding processed foods. Fresh fruit and vegetables are not expensive. Canned beans are still relatively healthy as are most frozen vegetables.
So, multivitamins are worthless, eh? Except if you’re pregnant. They’re OK then. Oh, and my doctor prescribed heavy duty Vitamin D, so that’s OK. My mother’s doctor prescribed her heavy duty potassium, so that’s OK. I guess they’re worthless unless you spend $200 to see a doctor so they can prescribe individual vitamins that cost 10x more than a bottle of multivitamins. I see how it works.
Between this nonsense and the pandemic fraud, I don’t have a lot of faith in, or respect for, doctors any longer.
Who are these wonderful people who are so worried we might spend a few dollars a month on supplements? They are the same wonderful people who were unable to deal with a very delicate virus that killed millions of people. And, they are worried about a few dollars a month for vitamins in a nation which spends an average of 30,000 dollars a year on health care for people over 65, which produces sick old people who can barely walk.
For those who are products of the modern public school system, that is 2500 dollars a month, but we gotta’ stop that terrible waste of 5 bucks a month.
This article is BS…an insult to peoples intelligence…last time I click on site….thanks!
Supplements=Placebo effect. It’s their money, let them spend it how they will.
The industry, by in large, is analogous to the people who feel like they are doing some good by “tithing” hard earned money to support a television evangelist, when in fact all they are doing is lining the pockets of the Jimmy Bakers of this world. They feel better, but the people at the top of the scheme are wealthy beyond belief.
Remember this is the same Allopathic drug, cut, burn, poison & radiate industry whose “Doctors” used to sell their preference in CIGARETTES!