Most popular vitamin and mineral supplements provide no health benefit, study finds
The most commonly consumed vitamin and mineral supplements provide no consistent health benefit or harm, suggests a new study led by researchers at St. Michael's Hospital and the University of Toronto.
Published today in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, the systematic review of existing data and single randomized control trials published in English from January 2012 to October 2017 found that multivitamins, vitamin D, calcium and vitamin C -- the most common supplements -- showed no advantage or added risk in the prevention of cardiovascular disease, heart attack, stroke or premature death. Generally, vitamin and mineral supplements are taken to add to nutrients that are found in food.
"We were surprised to find so few positive effects of the most common supplements that people consume," said Dr. David Jenkins*, the study's lead author. "Our review found that if you want to use multivitamins, vitamin D, calcium or vitamin C, it does no harm -- but there is no apparent advantage either."
The study found folic acid alone and B-vitamins with folic acid may reduce cardiovascular disease and stroke. Meanwhile, niacin and antioxidants showed a very small effect that might signify an increased risk of death from any cause.
What about people who would otherwise eat an incredibly nutrient-deficient diet (e.g. junk food, rice, bread, pasta, french fries, hot dogs, etc.)?
Supplemental Vitamins and Minerals for CVD Prevention and Treatment (DOI: 10.1016/j.jacc.2018.04.020) (DX)
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Average healthy adult doesn't really get much benefit, Med School professor says:
Are you among the one in three Americans who gulps down a multivitamin every morning, probably with a sip of water? The truth about this popular habit may be hard to swallow.
"Most people would be better off just drinking a full glass of water and skipping the vitamin," says Pieter Cohen, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and an internist at Harvard-affiliated Cambridge Health Alliance. In addition to saving money, you'll have the satisfaction of not succumbing to misleading marketing schemes.
That's because for the average American adult, a daily multivitamin doesn't provide any meaningful health benefit, as noted recently by the US Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF). Their review, which analyzed 84 studies involving nearly 700,000 people, found little or no evidence that taking vitamin and mineral supplements helps prevent cancer and cardiovascular disease that can lead to heart attacks and stroke, nor do they help prevent an early death.
"We have good evidence that for the vast majority of people, taking multivitamins won't help you," says Cohen, an expert in dietary supplement research and regulation.
[...] Surveys suggest people take vitamins to stay healthy, feel more energetic, or gain peace of mind, according to an editorial that accompanied the USPSTF review. These beliefs stem from a powerful narrative about vitamins being healthy and natural that dates back nearly a century.
"This narrative appeals to many groups in our population, including people who are progressive vegetarians and also to conservatives who are suspicious about science and think that doctors are up to no good," says Cohen.
See also: Study Finds No Benefit to Taking Multivitamins and Some Other Supplements
(Score: 2) by looorg on Wednesday May 30 2018, @03:57AM (11 children)
Even if you eat McJunkFood you would or should get enough vitamins etc. You have to be some kind of 300-500 year old Pirate in a timemachine to get scurvy today, or a serious case of malnutrition as some starving third world orphan to not get enough vitamins.
You eat them cause you like them, placebo effect, or because they taste good or you just really like to produce extra expensive urine.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @04:15AM (2 children)
Yeah, a few enrichments prevent some of the worst and otherwise most common deficiencies, but otherwise... Do even a little bit of research in nutrition and evidence abounds that pretty much everyone is deficient as all hell in all kinds of things, and public health is awful (in part) for it!
Please don't ignorantly propagate this erroneously dismissive attitude. Either do some research or shut the hell up.
(Score: 1, Offtopic) by aristarchus on Wednesday May 30 2018, @07:46AM (1 child)
Even mild doses of Water Hemlock [wikipedia.org] can be very efficacious! If you are trying to die. "Pharma" is Greek for poison, don't ya know?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:27PM
Are you from Greece or Nebraska? Rhetorical question, we all know you're from Jersey.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by AthanasiusKircher on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:42AM (1 child)
Uh, actually scurvy is seemingly surprisingly common [slate.com] these days, though woefully underdiagnosed.
And actually, a friend of one of my good friends in college actually was diagnosed with it after eating a really bad diet with no fruits or vegetables. Yes, I actually knew this guy personally (or at least saw him and talked to him a few times). No, he didn't eat only instant ramen, but it was a pretty bad diet that probably had only a few items including stuff like that.
Scurvy is indeed around and in the days of processed foods, it's quite possible to get it.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Goghit on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:37PM
Thanks for the link. That's hilarious, in a "Fuck this FSM-Forsaken Earth" sort of way.
I'll have to alert my wife about this. She works with autistic children and some of the diets described in that article are straight out of the "Autism for Dummies" handbook.
This study as presented is junk. Lack of impact on CVD does not mean lack of impact on health. There's lots of research showing the negative impact of low Vitmin D on neuromuscular issues, balance, bone health and even certain cancers. Once doctors finally started measuring D levels a lot of of us northerners are at risk due to our indoor slip-slap-slop-fear-the-sun livestyle.
The researchers made a fundamental error by not choosing their words more carefully while talking to the sensation-driven idiots from the press. Or maybe the researchers are idiots too.
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:40AM (2 children)
I Am Absolutely Serious:
"You should floss your teeth. You're gums are bleeding."
"No I have scurvy."
"You cannot possibly have scurvy!"
"I'm a Caltech student; I have scurvy."
I picked up a whole grocery sack of oranges on the way back to Ricketts House.
I had scurvy.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by driverless on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:06AM (1 child)
And Rickets, by the sounds of it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:40PM
He's on his way to becoming Cricket! Just gotta drop out of the clergy first...
(Score: 2) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:42AM (2 children)
Blood tests find that I have a Vitamin D3 deficiency despite massive doses of prescription ercocalciferol.
I expect there's some reason for that yet cannot be bothered to google it. Perhaps you could help me out.
Possibly the D3 test when I'm done with this second ergocalciferol will motivate my doc to diagnose some manner of inability to metabolize it.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 1) by jjr on Wednesday May 30 2018, @01:04PM (1 child)
I have also vitamin D deficiency (but not sure if it's D3 as yours). In my case it's caused by a benign tumor (adenoma) in one of my parathyroid glands, causing calcium to pile up in my blood instead of attaching to my bones. The tumor causes the gland to go overdrive and leaves me out of vitamin D and a lot of calcium to deal with. All I needed for the diagnose was a blood test (showing the amount of calcium in blood, this raised the alarm), echography (to check thyroids, parathyroids and kidneys) and a radiography with radioactive contrast to determine which of the 4 parathyroid glands were malfunctioning. I also took a densiometry to check the status of my bones.
Aside taking calciferol to compensate, the only solution is surgery to remove the tumor, but right now the numbers from the blood test don't qualify me yet for intervention, since my bones are ok and I have no kidney stones yet. In 6 months I'll undergo another blood test to see if I can get the surgery.
(Score: 2) by rondon on Monday June 04 2018, @03:31AM
Jesus Christ this is fucked. Obvious problem, obvious solution, can't obtain solution because...?
I don't know the answer to the problem that JJR just presented, but I do know one solution that isn't working - private insurance.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @03:58AM (4 children)
Study Finds No Benefit to Taking Multivitamins or Some Other Supplements
The union is formed by "or"; the intersection is formed by "and".
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:20AM (2 children)
the article pointed out that Folate and B12 reduce the chances of cardiac arrest.
B12 is required to make red blood cells. It is not found in any plant, just meat and fungus.
Not all vegans are aware they need to do lots of shrooms.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @01:38PM (1 child)
Because we don’t need to. B12 supplements are microbially produced, not derived from mushrooms or meat.
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Wednesday May 30 2018, @07:54PM
So many people eat hamburgers, right? Munch’s Burger Shack in Tokyo, they served me a hamburger with 100% Angus beef, imported from America. With Colby cheese. They named it after me. And people come from all over to order one. I'm very honored, believe me.
And some restaurants, you can order the fake burger, the mushroom burger. No meat, they have the fake meat made from mushrooms. That's a California number, do I have to tell you? And it's a little dry.
Where do you get the microbial burger, the burger made from microbial? I haven't seen that one. And I don't want to see that one. Because it sounds like germs, like eating germs. And I happen to be a clean hands freak. I feel much better after I thoroughly wash my hands, which I do as much as possible.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:54AM
Well, I have a multivitamin and Pop Tarts for breakfast, so I'm covered.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @04:07AM (7 children)
So, an analysis I've seen of several common modern diets, including the "Standard American Diet" (aka SAD) and a few popular planned health and/or weight oriented diets, find them ALL to be grossly deficient in many necessary micronutrients. Several essential micronutrients are also commonly found by studies to be chronically deficient in the general populations of developed nations. And in the face of all this, I've seen several things like this post.
Why? Well the ones I've previously seen were funded by pharmaceutical companies, tested vitamins as treatment for medical conditions (primarily cardiovascular disease) in comparison to drugs designed to treat those medical conditions, and when the vitamins turned out not to be super effective treatments, they go hyping up the "results" that "multivitamins offer no benefits," while leaving out the pesky part about "for treating a particular and serious medical condition."
This one at least sounds like it wasn't conducted directly by a pharmaceutical company, but still sounds (just from the summary) to have been testing them as treatment for certain diseases, and then misrepresenting the results by wording it like it's applicable to general health.
But still, what the hell do pharmaceutical companies have against vitamins? Aren't they making enough cash with all their overpriced (and often dubious) medications already, they have to go and actively stifle people's health so they can sell them new patented medicines to treat simple nutrient deficiencies, OR WHAT? Cause that's like downright cartoonish villainy level E V I L, and, err... ok maybe that is it, judging by their other recent practices, eh?
Still, I also find it incredibly irresponsible of the editors to pass these stories through at face value, without at least more critical analysis and commentary!
Please don't leave it up to the rare attentive commenter to notice and remark on these things, while otherwise propagating misleading stories that may be incredibly destructive to public health, which is already suffering with terrible nutrition exacerbated by misleading guidelines and just how abjectly awful science reporting is in general. This crap is damaging people's health directly, and undermining science to further compound these and other problems.
Editors: Please don't encourage people to destroy their health with preventable deficiencies just for being lazy about stories like this!
And Everyone: Get your freakin' vitamins, ffs!
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @04:15AM (1 child)
The way I see it: Multivitamins are cheap, not harmful, and may help me stay healthier in some ways. Science likes to flip-flop on things like this to get the eyeballs and grant money, so I'll continue "wasting" $10 every 3 months.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:18AM
Same here... it looks to me the WalMart generics are about as good as anything...
Personally I like those big bottles of "over 50" multivitamins, whichever they have in stock, mens or womens... can't see too much difference in 'em.
If its an advertised brand, its probably junk.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:37AM (1 child)
If even you (and I) have heard about this many times in the past, why did the lead author say they were surprised at the results? Shouldn't they have at least looked up the past research?
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:32PM
> Shouldn't they have at least looked up the past research?
It was probably paywalled.
(Score: 2) by digitalaudiorock on Wednesday May 30 2018, @10:36PM (2 children)
+1000. To me, unless everything we know about nutrition and minimum requirements etc it just totally false this just always seemed to be common sense to me. When you look at the minimum requirements for various nutrients in conjunction with lists of various foods and their content of those nutrients it becomes pretty clear that it's actually very difficult to have a diet where you aren't missing something if not quite a bit. It also tells you that you'd have to be eating a lot and that it would have to be healthy and pretty diverse. I've always ignored any/all of these BS studies and take vitamins daily. As long as you don't take abnormal quantities of anything, at worst you're just playing it safe.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:06AM (1 child)
If you really gave a crap, you'd eat healthier food, but you don't.
Nutrition from a quality diet HAS been proven to improve health. Pills, no.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by digitalaudiorock on Thursday May 31 2018, @06:10PM
...and you know this how? The answer is you don't. I also happen to be going on 65 and can clear 110 pushups. Can you? How 'bout go fuck yourself?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:11AM (7 children)
I've seen instant, massive, and positive effects from a powdered Mg citrate supplement 2x daily, and seem to have kickstarted what I thought was a permanently sluggish metabolism (and digestive system) with 500mg niacin b.i.d. and some methyl-complexed B vitamins. I'm with the poster who suspects that this is a question of profit rather than effectiveness.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Magic Oddball on Wednesday May 30 2018, @10:32AM (1 child)
If I'm reading it correctly, the article title and quote from the doctor are misleading — the study found only that standard vitamin supplements weren't useful for preventing cardiovascular disease, heart attacks, strokes, or sudden death. No judgment was apparently passed on whether vitamin supplements can do anything else.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:18PM
Yes, that's how I read it also, very misleading conclusions drawn from a limited study.
I think cardiologists have a single-minded view of the human body--all that matters to them is the heart-lung system, everything else is someone else's problem (or ignored completely). For one example, consider their long term prescription of anti-coagulants (Warfarin) to heart patients, who then suffer internal bleeds which can be just as fatal as a clot in the heart. I talked to a neuro-surgeon once who complained bitterly about this practice, a large fraction of his patients with destructive brain bleeds had been on warfarin for many years.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bobthecimmerian on Wednesday May 30 2018, @11:00AM (3 children)
At age 40 I was diagnosed with persistent constipation. I was, to be crude, pooping at least once a day every day but my system was always backed up and it made me less energetic and more prone to fatigue than I should have been. I changed my eating habits to incorporate more high fiber fruits and vegetables. Now I typically have at least one apple and one tomato per day plus some mix of salads, broccoli, legumes, cucumbers, celery, berries, and so forth. It took over a month for my digestive processes to return to normal, but after they did I noticed a difference. I have more energy and need an average amount of sleep instead of the higher than average amount I previously needed. I was also prone to mild stomach aches and diarrhea, and those events are far less often and less severe now. The eating change was last fall, and I'm still doing well. I also lost about ten pounds without trying over the first few months, but the fat loss stopped (and I'm still plenty fat). It's also easier for me to muster the energy to exercise.
I had attempted a positive change in eating habits many times before, but had never stuck with it more than a week or two. Nothing would change, so I assumed the extra fruits and vegetables were not helping and went back to my previous eating habits. Now I know that at least for me it takes a long stretch for my system to return to normal. I wish I had figured all of this out thirty years earlier.
One last note: at least for me, fiber in fruits and vegetables has an affect and fiber in grains (wheat, oats, quinoa) has a weaker effect or maybe no effect.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @04:31PM (2 children)
So basically, when people used to say you were full of shit, they were right?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:24PM
Met a grad student once who proposed a patch with bar graph that you could stick on your forehead--it would display how full of shit your intestines were at any given time.
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Wednesday May 30 2018, @07:07PM
Yes, but to be fair I'm still figuratively full of shit even if my system is cleaned out.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Wednesday May 30 2018, @11:25AM
I'm with you. Taking vitamins makes a big difference to my energy levels and mood. That's despite eating a diet that's replete with superfoods like kale and chia.
I've also noticed that taking the vitamins and supplements right after a workout produces the best recovery time I've ever known, even better than drinking chocolate milk.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:18AM (1 child)
One the bus today a winsome lass struck up a conversation with me.
After I suggested we meet for a hot caffeinated beverage then exchanged phone numbers, she asked me whether I'd be interested in her nutritional supplements.
It remains to be seen whether her vitamins will really save her from Saturday afternoon's amorous onslaught.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:22AM
From what I see, people selling those "nutritional supplements" is just a pyramid ruse.
They are way overpriced, and all you are doing is funding someone who will now be armed with money to outbid you in the market.
The only reason the pills are involved is to give the illusion of marketing a product, not a pyramid.
TLDR: If you just wanna get in her pants, buy some pills from her. If you are looking for decent pills, go to WalMart.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by sjames on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:23AM (7 children)
This is truly TERRIBLE reporting. They found that calcium, vitamin D and vitamin C didn't reduce cardiovascular disease, stroke, or premature death. I wasn't aware of any claims that they would. That's like saying don't ever bother with antibiotics because they have no benefit in mending a broken leg.
But even for that vary narrow selection of medical problems, they found that folic acid and B vitamins DO benefit those conditions.
Meanwhile, they are known to prevent rickets, scurvy, and osteoporosis which won't kill you or give you a heart attack, but you definitely don't want those conditions.
(Score: 1) by Z-A,z-a,01234 on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:38AM (1 child)
Yeah, the summary sucks and is misleading.
As usual we have a conversation without actually reading the FA. :)
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday May 31 2018, @02:14AM
To be fair, the summary here is taken from the first few paragraphs of TFA. The actual paper presumably was more clear.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:12AM (2 children)
I take a zinc supplement and for me it helps prevent or reduce the severity (just a bit of a sniffle while others are suffering badly) and duration of the symptoms of colds. I probably still get infected with the cold virus but without the symptoms it doesn't matter much does it? :)
Also take coenzyme q10 for energy and a low/zero iron multivitamin to cover any "gaps". Low iron because I prefer to get my iron from other sources and taking too much iron seems to be bad for health.
I don't take mega doses of antioxidants via pills like many people seem to do because that's been shown to be bad for health too and I probably get enough antioxidants from my diet (leafy vegetables[1]).
[1] From a health perspective fruits are overrated and unnecessary, might as well take vegetables especially leafy greens. But if you want dessert and sugar then fruits are a good match for that.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:32PM
> ...zinc supplement and for me it helps prevent or reduce the severity ... colds.
My mother is a big believer in this. Caution -- at one point she expanded to using a nasal spray containing some zinc compound (forgot details). It appeared to be effective in limiting colds. Then she lost most of her sense of smell (a big part of "tasting" and enjoying food). Later I did some searching and this could be a common side effect of zinc in the sinus cavity, and in her case it was permanent (happened 20+ years ago).
(Score: 2) by realDonaldTrump on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:29PM
Our beautiful, beautiful young women need the iron. Even the ones that are VERY VERY NOT NICE (Megyn Kelly). Because they have blood coming out of their eyes. Blood coming out of their wherever. And it's a lot of iron coming out of there, that I can tell you.
And our very ugly & old women, sometimes they need the iron. When they get the facelifts -- always get the facelift -- and they're bleeding from the facelift. Again, so much iron coming out of that.
And anybody that has a gunshot wound. Or the multiple gunshot wounds. Maybe it's a girl who hasn't started with the periods yet, you know? Or a boy or man. So many of our boys & men, they get a gunshot wound or two, they're bleeding out. It happens, right? And they think, oh, I can just eat my regular food, maybe extra meat. I don't need the supplement. And I'll be 100% very quickly. WRONG! Trust me on this, you need the iron supplement. Costs a little money, it's not much. But it's so important.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday May 30 2018, @06:08PM (1 child)
Another obvious example is mild folic acid supplementation for breeding age chicks is probably extremely wise although it will never prevent heart attacks, strokes, osteoporosis, all that end of life stage stuff. From memory folic acid is water soluble and essentially impossible to OD on, although I'm sure some hero would find a way. Its interesting that my son has medically diagnosed Celiac disease aka gluten intolerance and the SAD (shitty american diet) seems to rely on folic acid supplementation of wheat... so I forget how much he takes but he does take a little, as he can't eat the wheat that most americans get their folic acid from. I suppose folic acid supplementation is more important for young women with Celiac disease. I mostly eat paleo low carb ish so I can't get folic acid from the standard american half dozen donuts for breakfast or one pizza daily or whatever it is fat people aka standard american diet victims, eat. Anyway, regardless the point is there's more to nutrition than mere prevention of fatal diseases. Its entirely possible to improve quality of life or duration of life without dodging the eventual CVA or MI bullet at the end.
A perhaps overly close reading also indicates no trend in preventing afflictions is defined as five years, although getting cardiovascular-related-diseases takes a lifelong effort of laziness and bad eating habits, so its almost exactly like people who wait until they're 75 to start exercising on the theory that their ancestors all died of cardiovascular incidents around 80 so may as well take it easy and have that second bowl of ice cream for the first 3/4 of a century. It don't work that way; to some extent how you die (or not) at 80 depends on what you exercised and ate at 40, you can't start at 75 and expect to dodge the bullet. I seem to recall a smoking lung cancer study that after quitting or avoiding second hand smoke it takes darn near a quarter century for victim rates to decline to non-smoking averages. Presumably physical wear and tear damage to blood vessels takes awhile to repair.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by fakefuck39 on Thursday May 31 2018, @01:01AM
Averages don't work the way you think they work. During the smoking period you either fucked something up or not. Your 25 years is because that disease takes time to grow and kill you. Not over 25 years though, so after a long enough time the average returns to non-smoker levels - because after that long, anything bad you got from your smoking period has run its course and killed you or healed.
Speaking of cancer, folic acid is often added to birth control pills, and women who plan on getting pregnant in the next year or two take it. Otherwise, breeding age or not, it increases your chance for cancer. Take a look at a supa-dupa type of b complex that makes you piss yellow. You'll have 2k% of all those b vitamins, but not over 100% of falloc flacid. There's a reason for that.
As far as the article, the summary and especially the title have nothing to do with each other. The study specifically studied the effect of some vitamins as it pertains to cardiology, and found no effect. They don't claim anything besides that. The idiots that run soylent do, from their white trash cum-filled bunker.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @08:18AM (3 children)
Why are you grouping junk food and rice and hot dogs and bread all together?? Seems rather stupid to me.
1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enriched_flour [wikipedia.org] - "These restored nutrients include iron and B vitamins (folic acid, riboflavin, niacin, and thiamine). Calcium may also be supplemented.". Many nations have supplements in all flour, by law, to prevent birth defects. So if you eat pasta or bread, you are eating vitamins too.
2. whole grain breads have fiber
3. while rice may be somewhat low, people that eat rice tend to eat it with tons of vegetables.
4. dietary fiber is the most important part of your diet, not the vitamins you eat. If you feed your bacteria, their "poop" feeds you very nicely too, including in many of the vitamins that you would otherwise not get.
Having said that, the problem with "low nutrition" diet is the low fiber to high calorie ratio. It's not that you will get scurvy or rickets. This means your bacteria are starving while you are getting fat. So you keep eating more and more (since bacteria will signal your brain that it's hungry) and obesity and early grave is the result. But such diet will not result in you having very low amount of vitamins in your blood.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @01:54PM (1 child)
Interesting that more and more people are declaring they have GI or allergy problems related to consuming grains. Another possibility is the chinese body waste being used to generate cysteine used to prolong the shelflife of bread: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/2007/01/does_your_daily_bread_contain_human_hair.html [bbc.co.uk]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @05:37PM
I've noticed issues with highly processed bread, the "super white" kind of stuff that is light fluffy and delicious. I wonder if preservatives or some such are having long term effects on the population.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @10:45PM
No, calories are the most important part of your diet
(Score: 2) by pkrasimirov on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:55AM
It's not so good with vitamins as it is bad without them.
(Score: 2) by ledow on Wednesday May 30 2018, @12:09PM (3 children)
If you're not getting these nutrients from your diet you are malnourished.
Taking a supplement may fix that malnourishment.
Taking MORE of them when you're not already malnourished is a waste of time and money.
Eat properly. In the modern day there is no excuse for not being able to do this unless you are literally penniless.
But people take offence when I say "I didn't realise you were deliberating subjecting yourself to malnourishment that required that" when they're popping vitamins left, right and centre.
(P.S. Guideline daily amounts are AVERAGES. There's nothing wrong with blasting through your guideline for a treat. Just don't do it every day.)
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Wednesday May 30 2018, @01:49PM (2 children)
I'll have you know that Americans have the most vitamin enriched pee in the entire world! The best pee. The very best. Make American Pee great again! When you have other people pee for you onto a bed, be sure it is not on video tape. Believe me! Trust me, I know about videotape. I have people calling me all the time, in between McDonalds meals, um, to tell me how great genuine American pee really is. And you can have a healthy heart and eat tons of genuine American McDonalds food if you take vitamins. Viagra and Opiates are the best vitamins. The best. The very best. But people across our southern border will be peeing on our beautiful southern border wall with their non-vitamin enriched pee! Next thing other countries will begin thinking that they can have McDonalds in their country too. But I will tell you that we will keep our great American McDonalds institution strictly within America so that other nations can see how great and healthy we are from eating McDonalds and vitamins.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @02:58PM (1 child)
Nice. So are you the guy who has been posting as realDonaldTrump here are SN lately? Just asking.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:28PM
Nope.
The lower I set my standards the more accomplishments I have.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday May 30 2018, @02:50PM (2 children)
Big construction sites have those sani-cans, or Prota-potties, all over the place. Talk to any person who is responsible for dumping those things, he'll tell you about your multivitamins. He sees them every day, lying in the bottom of that sani-can. Maybe you get some of the nutrients from those things before they pass through. Maybe. Not really likely, though, because when he finds them, he can usually tell what brand they were.
I stopped buying the damned things when I learned that. Better to take your vitamins in liquid form, or gel, or maybe even ground up into some kind of food. Best, is to plan your diet to include all the vitamins, minerals, etc that you need.
Don't waste your money on those bottles of multivitamins. If you need a vitamin, shop around and find it in liquid form, then put a few cc of it on your salad, or in you drink. Or, just be a real man, and drink a month's supply straight from the bottle. That's what these rednecks in Arkansas would do, LOL!!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 30 2018, @07:15PM
Interesting "waste product analysis"...
Cautionary counter-indication-- Just because some pills/tablets make it through the whole digestive system unscathed does not necessarily mean that you should grind up or use liquid for *all* pills. Some meds need a capsule to make it through the stomach, and then dissolve in the small intestine where they can be absorbed. For example, this is part of the instructions for the Parkinson's meds that a relative is on -- under no circumstances open the capsule and take the powdered contents in liquid or mixed in pudding/yogurt/etc.
(Score: -1) by fakefuck39 on Thursday May 31 2018, @03:16AM
Well, this is simply false. I'm glad the medical information you trust is from the guy cleaning out shitcans. Are you the guy who kept arguing that Rubies are a metal? I'm pretty sure you are.