The Life Ledger

Fitness is a way of life.

I’m not too hip on multivitamins. Not only do we take on faith what’s in them, we take on faith they’re healthy. My own personal opinion - get your vitamins the way they’re meant to be processed, from food.

There’s a new study out that makes me even more wary of multivitamins. The U.S. News and World Report recently ran an article about a study from the National Cancer Institute that indicates taking more than 7 multivitamin pills a week could increase mens’ risk of “advanced and fatal” prostate cancer:

Researchers followed 295,344 men for five years and found that while high multivitamin use did not correlate with higher rates of localized cancer, it increased the risk of advanced cancer by 30 percent and nearly doubled the risk of fatal prostate cancer. Taking additional beta carotene and zinc supplements increased the risk even more.

…

Goran Bjelakovic, a researcher at the University of Nis in Serbia who has looked at the impact of nutritional supplements and wrote an editorial accompanying the study in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute, points out that the average American diet provides 120 percent of the beta carotene and vitamins A and C needed, suggesting that additional vitamins could upset the body’s balance of micronutrients.

Wow, the average American gets 120% of the body’s required beta carotene, vitamin A and vitamin C from diet, before even taking the multivitamin? The National Institute of Health has this to say about taking too much vitamin A:

Hypervitaminosis A refers to high storage levels of vitamin A in the body that can lead to toxic symptoms. There are four major adverse effects of hypervitaminosis A: birth defects, liver abnormalities, reduced bone mineral density that may result in osteoporosis (see the previous section), and central nervous system disorders [1,48-49].

Toxic symptoms can also arise after consuming very large amounts of preformed vitamin A over a short period of time. Signs of acute toxicity include nausea and vomiting, headache, dizziness, blurred vision, and muscular uncoordination [1,48-49]. Although hypervitaminosis A can occur when large amounts of liver are regularly consumed, most cases result from taking excess amounts of the nutrient in supplements.

Makes me wonder about the other vitamins and minerals we take “for health” without thinking about the damage we might be doing to ourselves.

Fast food burgers, fast food vitamins, fast food money - before long, we’ll be driving up to McDonalds and purchase hamburgers enriched with E. coli and vitamin A with our credit cards. All we’re missing is the vitamin A.

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A vitamin a day may do more harm than good (@ msnbc)

MSNBC points to a study on multivitamins performed by ConsumerLab (an independent tester of nutrition products, visit their about page for more) on 39 products, 21 of which are available in US and Canada.  Of those 21, only 10 met the stated claims on the labels and other criteria set by ConsumerLab (including the time it takes for the pill to break apart).  Failures of note included:

The Vitamin Shoppe Multivitamins Especially for Women - contaminated with 15.3 micrograms of lead per daily dose of 2 pills.

Hero Nutritionals Yummi Bears - contained more than twice the amount of daily tolerated vitamin A for kids, which can lead to bone weakening and liver problems.

Freaking lead in multivitamins!  What was their response?

David Morrison, vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs at The Vitamin Shoppe, said his company’s products are all tested more than once, including screening for lead, and he questioned the new results. “It would be very surprising to me if this were actually true,” he said.

Steve Mister, president and CEO of the Council for Responsible Nutrition, a trade group in Washington, D.C., that represents supplement manufacturers, said that if the findings on lead and vitamin A are, in fact, accurate, “that is not acceptable for the industry. … If we had a serious issue of safety, we’d be hearing concerns from consumers in large numbers and we’re not.”

One more reason to eat healthy - get as many of your vitaimins from foods as possible.  I’ll have to do some research myself to learn where to find the important ones, and in what levels.

Here’s the report excerpt from MSNBC’s article:

Multivitamins that met standards:

• Centrum Silver
• Member’s Mark
• Complete Multi One A Day Women’s
• Flinstones Complete

Those that failed:

• The Vitamin Shoppe Multivitamins Especially for women: Contaminated with lead
• Hero Nutritionals Yummi Bears: Had twice the labeled amount of vitamin A
• Nature’s Plus Especially Yours for Women: Took twice as long as allowed to disintegrate
• AARP Maturity Formula: Took nearly twice as long as allowed to disintegrate
• Eniva VIBE: Had only 54 percent of claimed vitamin
• A Pet-Tabs Complete Daily Vitamin-Mineral Supplement for Dogs: Contained lead