I have seen numerous articles in the media proclaiming the news about those worthless multivitamins. Headlines like “Read this before taking your multivitamin today” and “No scientific support for taking a multivitamin” have been printed from coast to coast. This is a great example of influencing someone’s point of view by only telling part of a story. Let me give you the whole story so you can end any confusion. But first, here are some quotes from recently published news articles:

“Although tens of millions of Americans take multivitamin and mineral supplements, there is little evidence they are effective or even safe, scientists said Wednesday.”

“For the average healthy American, there’s not enough evidence to tell whether taking vitamins is a good idea.”

Neither of these statements is blatantly false, although the question of multivitamin safety pushes the boarders of honesty. I say this because all of the individual vitamins and minerals found in a multivitamin have been tested for safety and they pass with flying colors at much higher doses than can be found in any multivitamin. Raising the question of safety is not based in intellectual honesty. It is meant to simply place a negative thought into consumers’ minds. And, unfortunately, it works!

So, what about the claim that there is little scientific evidence for the use of multivitamins? First, this is only true for the average HEALTHY American. Most read the above headlines and interpret them to mean everyone. There are numerous published scientific studies showing benefits from taking multivitamins for older patients and for those with deficiencies. The problem is that there will NEVER be scientific evidence for the use of multivitamins in the average HEALTHY American. Why? Because how could this study be done? You would have to give thousands of healthy people multivitamins and follow them over the next 20-30 years. It would cost millions of dollars to complete such a study. And, what researcher wants to waste the next 20 years studying something that really does not need to be studied? This study will never be done and it shouldn’t be done.

Thus, one of the above headlines, written honestly, would read:

“Although tens of millions of Americans take multivitamin and mineral supplements, there is little evidence and there will never be evidence whether or not they are effective. There is no question they are safe, however. So, why are we even writing about this? Who knows?”

My suggestion to you is that if you eat large amounts of fresh organic fruits and vegetables, exercise regularly, have little stress, and have no family history of any disease, you might not need a multivitamin. The rest of us should take a good multivitamin. Listen to or download:  “The Vitamin Answer Book” to learn how to make a choice about buying a good quality multivitamin.