Attacks on Multivitamins

I like to read what other newsletters and magazines write about vitamin supplements. The Tufts Health & Nutrition Letter, Reader’s Digest, and even Prevention recently published long articles attacking multivitamins. These rabid attacks cited widely criticized scientific articles, and by repeating misinformation, they may have misguided and harmed millions of people.

As one example, the Tufts newsletter claimed to investigate the “top 20” multivitamin supplements (apparently those sold in drug stores) and warned that they don’t contain enough calcium and vitamin D for bone health, not enough antioxidants for eye health, not enough DHA (one of the omega-3s), not enough ginkgo, not enough bilberry, and not enough probiotics.

First, I could quibble about ingredients in multivitamins, but these formulas have never been intended as the end all of
supplements. They’re basically a form of nutritional insurance, one that’s needed more than ever given the disastrous state of malnutrition in the United States and other Western nations. It’s physically impossible to pack ideal amounts of every nutrient into a capsule or tablet.

Second, in its diatribe against multivitamins, the nutritionally conservative Tufts newsletter indirectly suggested that, if people wanted higher potencies of some nutrients or herbs, they should go buy standalone supplements of calcium and D, lutein, antioxidants, DHA, ginkgo, bilberry, and probiotics. After all, if you can’t get enough of these nutrients in a multivitamin, it only makes sense to make up the difference with whatever individual supplements are important to your health.

There is so much good research supporting the benefits of taking a high-potency multivitamin. Taking a daily multi reduces inflammation and your risk of heart disease, cancer, mood problems and many other health problems.

I have long recommended that people take at least a high-potency multivitamin, and I continue making this recommendation. Given the millions of Americans (and others) who do not get adequate nutrition, it only makes sense.