An overdose of headlines

I'm suffering from an overdose of headlines again.

This time, the scare is vitamin tablets. A Copenhagen University among 230,000 people, we're told, says that taking vitamin pills might not do you any good and might actually do you positive harm. Really?

Well, I'm no biochemist, and not even in the pay of any pill producers. But the headline sounded pretty daft to me. And I've never really trusted Danish science after the way they beat up Bjorn Lomborg so mercilessly instead of getting to grips with his arguments. Yet the story was so well-spun by its promoters that I had to read quite a long way down the coverage before I could get a balanced picture.

It took a lot of reading to discover that even the spinners of this story aren't saying that a daily multivitamin pill will do you any harm. They're talking about people taking really big doses of a single supplement - Vitamin A, E, C, Beta-Carotene and Selenium. I discovered that the researchers had started by reviewing 815 (some reports say just 467) clinical trials. But a lot of these were studies on very sick people, whose experience is probably not very relevant to the rest of us. Then, it seems, the reviewers eliminated all but 68 because they showed no deaths. Yes, well that would skew things a bit, wouldn't it? By the time they had eliminated the Selenium studies (which showed a reduction in deaths), they were down to less than half a dozen studies, on which the scary headlines are based.

Well, scary headlines sell newspapers and a balanced appraisal of complicated science doesn't. Ask Bjorn Lomborg.

...
written by Adam, April 18, 2008

They got rid of all the trials that didn't involve double blind tests; - not one that showed no deaths - that was just the vitimin pill companies said. The group who did it also are pretty respected internationally - and whilst the stories were a little over exagerated - vitimin pills getting a bad press can't be a bad thing - since they are in essence a con.

re: An overdose of headlines
written by Charles D Quarles, April 19, 2008

It has been long established that the fat soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K) accumulate in the body. It has long been established that intake of more than 50,000 IU per day of vitamin A is hepatotoxic and can be fatal.

Every chemical has a dose that is toxic (yes, Virginia, foods and vitamins are mixtures of chemicals). Every chemical has a dose that is "safe" (there is no such thing as absolute safety). The Recommended Daily Allowances are designed to prevent deficiency diseases in the general population.

Some people make kidney stones from high doses of vitamin C. Most folks simply excrete the excess and the metabolites from vitamin C.Beta Carotene is safer than vitamin A in that it is a precursor whose conversion into vitamin A saturates at a level short of known toxicity.

Written by Dr Eamonn Butler
Friday, 18 April 2008
I'm suffering from an overdose of headlines again. This time, the scare is vitamin tablets. A Copenhagen University among 230,000 people, we're told, says that taking vitamin pills might not do you any good and might actually do you positive harm. Really? Well, I'm no biochemist, and not even in the pay of any pill producers. But the headline sounded pretty daft to me. And I've never really trusted Danish science after the way they beat up Bjorn Lomborg so mercilessly instead of getting to grips with his arguments. Yet the story was so well-spun by its promoters that I had to read quite a long way down the coverage before I could get a balanced picture. It took a lot of reading to discover that even the spinners of this story aren't saying that a daily multivitamin pill will do you any harm. They're talking about people taking really big doses of a single supplement - Vitamin A, E, C, Beta-Carotene and Selenium. I discovered that the researchers had started by reviewing 815 (some reports say just 467) clinical trials. But a lot of these were studies on very sick people, whose experience is probably not very relevant to the rest of us. Then, it seems, the reviewers eliminated all but 68 because they showed no deaths. Yes, well that would skew things a bit, wouldn't it? By the time they had eliminated the Selenium studies (which showed a reduction in deaths), they were down to less than half a dozen studies, on which the scary headlines are based. Well, scary headlines sell newspapers and a balanced appraisal of complicated science doesn't. Ask Bjorn Lomborg. Bookmark Comments (2) Subscribe to this comment's feed ... written by Adam, April 18, 2008 They got rid of all the trials that didn't involve double blind tests; - not one that showed no deaths - that was just the vitimin pill companies said. The group who did it also are pretty respected internationally - and whilst the stories were a little over exagerated - vitimin pills getting a bad press can't be a bad thing - since they are in essence a con. re: An overdose of headlines written by Charles D Quarles, April 19, 2008 It has been long established that the fat soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K) accumulate in the body. It has long been established that intake of more than 50,000 IU per day of vitamin A is hepatotoxic and can be fatal. Every chemical has a dose that is toxic (yes, Virginia, foods and vitamins are mixtures of chemicals). Every chemical has a dose that is "safe" (there is no such thing as absolute safety). The Recommended Daily Allowances are designed to prevent deficiency diseases in the general population. Some people make kidney stones from high doses of vitamin C. Most folks simply excrete the excess and the metabolites from vitamin C.Beta Carotene is safer than vitamin A in that it is a precursor whose conversion into vitamin A saturates at a level short of known toxicity. Write comment This content has been locked. You can no longer post any comment. Powered by Azrul's Jom Comment for Joomla!