According to the findings of a group of canadian scientists from the University of Toronto and the hospital St-Michel, published in the journal of the American College of Cardiology, the daily use of vitamin and mineral supplements has little positive effect.
The deficiency of certain nutrients obtained from food (vitamins, minerals and antioxidants), often try to compensate by using dietary supplements. Such supplements do not undergo clinical trials, which are not considered medicinal, and their turnover is virtually unregulated.
After a systematic analysis of the results of hundreds of previous studies, conducted from January 2012 to October 2017, the researchers found that the most popular multivitamin supplements contain vitamins C and D, and calcium, has no practical use on human health. In addition, the researchers note that the found no evidence that use of vitamin preparations do reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease, heart attacks, strokes or early death.
The exception was, perhaps, only folic acid and to a lesser extent, a complex of vitamins of group B, which showed its usefulness for prevention of cardiovascular diseases, particularly stroke.
“We were surprised to find only a few positive effects provided popular vitamin and mineral supplements,” says Dr. David Jenkins, lead author of the study.
“Our research showed that if you want to use a multivitamin, vitamin D, calcium, or vitamin C, this won’t do any harm, but as it turned out, and also no good will not.”
Meanwhile, the study showed that excess amounts of Niacin (vitamin B3) and antioxidants in the body, in turn, may be associated with increased risk of death. The reason is that Niacin can have a negative effect on blood sugar levels. Antioxidants (free radicals) is produced naturally by our body in sufficient quantity. And their excess can lead, for example, to the disruption of the natural antitumor mechanisms in the body.
According to researchers, most often, overabundance of vitamins and minerals in the body occurs as a result of exceeding human norms prescribed by doctors.
“This study suggests that people should more carefully approach the selection of additives and use only the amount of vitamins and minerals which are prescribed by the attending physician in each case,” says Jenkins.
As objects of study, the scientists used vitamins a, B1, B2, B3 (Niacin), B6, B9 (folic acid) and mineral substances, carotene, calcium, iron, zinc, magnesium and selenium.
The researchers also found that some substances show higher efficiency compared to other. For example, it was noted the relationship between supplementation with zinc content and reduce the time to manifestation of the effects of a cold. Despite widespread belief in the effectiveness of vitamin C, it is no practical benefit in that is not shown.
“Due to the lack of any significant positive effects – in addition to folic acid, which reduces the potential risk of developing diseases of the cardiovascular system – a more common solution is to rely on healthy foods that will provide your body with essential vitamins and minerals,” says Jenkins.
“There is no research proving that the use of dietary Supplements may be more useful than a healthy diet containing fresh fruits and vegetables, and nuts”.
Canadian scientists suggest that a possible reason for the lack of positive effects of dietary Supplements on human health can be characteristics of the composition of additives. And in some cases dietary Supplements can be quite dangerous for health. So, the magazine Consumer Reports two years ago, analyzed the composition of some popular nutritional Supplements and found them hazardous to human health substances that can cause lesions of the digestive organs, arrhythmia, dizziness and the development of cancer.
Vitamin and mineral supplements showed its uselessness
Nikolai Khizhnyak