MASTERJOHN: Multivitamins have almost no effect on lifespan but are good for health span

from Chris Masterjohn, "Will Multivitamins Help You Live Longer?" August 12, 2024.

He opens with a new observational study on how multivitamins might actually slightly decrease your lifespan. 

I like the opening, 

THE SHORT ANSWER

The best way to get all your micronutrients in is to have an average daily intake of one or two ounces of liver, one or two oysters, a tablespoon or two of unfortified nutritional yeast, several servings of something rich in vitamin C such as bell peppers or strawberries, and a large volume of potassium-rich foods, such as the lean portions of meat, eggs, and milk; legumes, such as lentils, peas, and beans; tubers such as potatoes; and fruits and vegetables. If you don’t follow these rules of thumb, track your diet in Cronometer (see How to Track Your Diet in Cronometer) to make sure you are hitting all the micronutrient targets. If you cannot meet your micronutrient targets with foods, use a high-quality multivitamin such as Adapt Naturals and Seeking Health Optimal Multivitamin Chewable. If you really want to optimize, run the Comprehensive Nutritional Screening and use the screening and Cronometer to keep tweaking till everything is fully on target.

If you have a loved one who is not motivated to do any of this, have them take a run-of-the-mill drugstore multivitamin. The data support that it has almost no effect on lifespan but is good for the health span.

MULTIVITAMINS ARE FAR FROM USELESS

The Benefits of a Multivitamin:

They reduce high blood pressure [1] and they provide a number of brain-boosting benefits, ranging from improvements in short-term memory [2] to reductions in stress, anxiety, fatigue, and confusion.[3] Older adults who take multivitamins spend 2.5 fewer weeks a year being sick than those who don’t,[4] and there’s some evidence that multivitamins can even reduce the risk of cataracts,[5] a common cause of cloudy vision. 

Multivitamins are especially important in pregnancy when women are medically advised to take a special formulation known as a prenatal vitamin. Use of multivitamins during pregnancy reduces the risk of miscarriage[6] and birth defects,[7] and it may even reduce the risk of childhood cancers.[8] Multivitamins also seem to prevent preeclampsia,[9] a condition that causes nausea, vomiting, high blood pressure, and headache, and when left untreated can lead to seizures and even the death of the mother.

At this point, the benefits of multivitamins come to a screeching halt. 

Multis do nothing to reduce the risk of heart disease or cancer,[10] the leading causes of death,[11] and as a result, they don’t make us live any longer.[12] Although most studies show that multivitamins are safe,[13] they appear to worsen the risk of age-related macular degeneration,[14] the leading cause of blindness in older adults.

Keep reading . . . 

Will Multivitamins Help You Live Longer? by Chris Masterjohn, PhD

Here are the facts.

Read on Substack

Did you take your multivitamins today?

You had your multivitamin, I mean steak, today right? pic.twitter.com/a0q25zh5TH

— Equip Foods (@EquipFoods) November 26, 2022

LIFE EXPECTANCY IN THE U.S. IS CRASHING, THANKS TO OBAMACARE

UPDATE BELOW

Bob Wenzel penned a post at Economic Policy Journal that should not shock any astute observer of government machinations.  The murderous machination to which I refer is . . . Obamacare or Pelosicare, however, you like your government sauce.  The title of Wenzel's post is "Crashing Life Expectancy in the United States."  By citing Gabriel Zucman, Wenzel reminds us immediately what life expectancy was like in the United States before Obamacare.  

Reminder: In 1980, life expectancy was the same in the US, UK, Germany, and France.

Now it's 3-4 years lower in the US.

And it is falling.

That's in a country that spends almost twice as much on health care than every other nation. pic.twitter.com/9ppnkvAo2p

— Gabriel Zucman (@gabriel_zucman) September 9, 2019

Wenzel asks, "Who would have expected it?"  Actually, he did.  In 2012, he wrote:

Why Life Expectancy Will Crash in the United States

It's coming. It will take some time before it shows up in the stats, but the socialization of medicine is going to have a dramatic impact on medical care---for the worse.

It doesn't matter what the Supremes rule on Obamacare. If they rule against it, it will just slow things down, but socialist thinking surrounds the medical industry, especially among the "big thinkers", the interventionist minded, central planning focused bioethicists.

And the sad news is that it is now only happening at the margins. It will get worse.  -RW 

What this means is what this has always meant--stay away from government-run gigs and people.  Government lies.  They do this by individual and institutionally.  Good people have become government administrators and they are taught to lie, cheat, distort, distract, deflect, and otherwise dupe the tax-payer.  In fact, one of the reasons that so many inside government have so much contempt for the tax-payer is that the gov't agent looks down on the tax-payer as some uncritical, helpless rube in a rigged tax game.  

The instruction then becomes clear.  You need to take care of yourself.  Start with a powerful multivitamin, Molecular Multi.  See other essential vitamins for vigor.

Take vitamin C daily.  You'll live longer.  

UPDATE to Wenzel's post on socialized medicine.  Some pushback. This just got interesting. 

Bob –  When you write below that this is a result of the socialization of medicine you leave yourself open to the counterpoint that Europe has socialized medicine and is not experiencing this drop off in life expectancy.  In my view, the largest reason for this is due to the American diet and resulting in obesity levels.  The US has an obesity problem that far outstrips other first-world nations.  The carb-rich and erroneously dangerous USDA food pyramid is the primary culprit.  Worse, our medical community resorts to drugs to treat this epidemic (largely in the form of diabetes, high blood pressure, and other cardiovascular drugs).

The ”socialization of medicine”, while a big problem in and of itself and the primary cause in rising healthcare costs, it is difficult to make that argument when other socialized medicine countries are not seeing the same reduction in life expectancy. 

Read Wenzel's reply here.

AN ANNOUNCEMENT THAT BENFOTIAMINE CURES AND PREVENTS ALZHEIMER'S IS EXPECTED SOON

A few quotes from Bill Sardi.  

One,

There is a doctor in Italy who is astonishingly curing Parkinson's disease with B1 shots (mostly among alcoholics).   

Two, 

Because of poor absorption, it is unlikely the best diet or fortified foods can overcome a state of B1 deficiency. 

Three,

Vitamin B1 is well provided but just not absorbed or is rapidly excreted (diuretics). 

Four, 

An announcement of the highly absorbable fat-soluble form of vitamin B1 (Benfotiamine) cures and prevents Alzheimer's disease is expected soon. 

And Five,

One of the ways widespread nutritional deficiencies remain hidden is that blood tests only reveal what is called the reference range (commonly occurring range), not the healthy range.

I remember sitting in an Anatomy class at UC Irvine back in 1990 and how the professor made the comment that vitamin supplements only produce expensive urine.  My thought that followed was "Why would he make such a claim?  Was it to direct all health authority to the practitioners of health, to doctors?  Was he a spokesman for doctors?"  I didn't know.  I didn't know his credentials.  I should have checked.  But it was an Anatomy class.  He made other cracks, too, that I didn't like.  Years passed before I began to understand how universities are staffed with folks loyal to the medical industrial complex and not necessarily to human health.  This is one reason I appreciate the work of nutritional journalists, especially Bill Sardi.  

Sardi in his article, "Just Remember Dietary Supplements Are Not Supported By Science And Are A Waste of Money," reminds us, perhaps constantly so, that nutritional supplements play an important, nay, vital role in providing health, in recovering from illness and injury, as well as stave off the ravages of age-related diseases.  Troubling is the fact that we don't read as much as we should learn about the benefits, or that we begin to read regrettably when it is a bit late.  In his latest reminder, Sardi lists the benefits of certain vitamins. 

Folic Acid prevents spinal defects during birth.

In the 1990s grain products were fortified with folic acid to prevent birth defects (spina bifida, anencephaly) . . . 

Folic Acid prevents strokes; prevents deaths from stroke, and facilitates better and faster recovery.  You probably need to be on Folic Acid daily to get these results.  I wouldn't wait until after the fact if you know what I mean. 

and a decline in stroke-related mortality was reported. Researchers then subsequently reported that 31,000 stroke-associated deaths may have been prevented by folic acid food fortification. Folic acid blood levels doubled during this period (from 6.6 to 15 nanograms/milliliter per blood sample) with an accompanying 14% decline in homocysteine blood levels, which was believed to be the mechanism responsible for the decline.

If you're not familiar with Bill Sardi, a nutritional journalist who has been studying, reviewing, reporting on the supplement industry since the 1970s, and you're unsure whether to take his word, then check his sources.

Here is the Lancet:

Then in 2007 The Lancet journal reported that folic acid (vitamin B9) supplementation reduces stroke risk by 18%.

Here is the Journal of the American Medical Association:

Then again in 2015 the Journal of the American Medical Association reported the combined use of a blood pressure pill (enalapril) and folic acid, but not the drug alone, significantly reduced the risk for first stroke.

Maybe my old UC Irvine Anatomy professor could read an article or two by Bill Sardi and learn . . . learn something beyond the 3 x 5 index card of allowable opinion on vitamin supplements.  But it appears that my old Anatomy professor was not alone, that, in fact, there was an industry consensus that multivitamins were a waste of money.  Read for yourself.

Thereafter organized medicine reached a consensus that:

Dietary supplements are still popular despite little evidence they're useful. – Science-Based Medicine

Study after study has demonstrated that favorites like multivitamins don’t actually improve outcomes on a number of health measures. - VOX.com

Multivitamins are a waste of money, doctors say. – Scientific American

There is no evidence that taking a multivitamin regularly has the ability to ward off chronic diseases. – LiveScience.com

Thankfully, opinions change.  The results of Folic Acid on stroke and its effects are a stunning 73% decline.  

Fast forward to today. . . . News reports claim a massive 73% decline in strokes and stroke-related death among the highest risk patients and a 21% decline in stroke overall with folic acid supplementation.

If we're 65 and older, we should be taking Folic Acid daily.  

About 795,000 people suffer a stroke each year in the U.S. and more than 140,000 people die from stroke. Most strokes occur among adults over age 65. If a recent study holds true for every senior American, the consumption of a multivitamin with folic acid could reduce the number of strokes from 795,000 to 628,050 (166,950 fewer strokes). Stroke death rates would dramatically plunge too. And they say vitamin supplements are worthless. Go figure.

Folic Acid reduces strokes in folks with high blood pressure from 5.6% to 1.8%.  Can you doctor's prescription claim that?  Ha.

Strokes occur among individuals who have high blood pressure. Their risk for stroke is 5.6% and folic acid drastically reduces this risk to 1.8% in high-risk groups.

Imagine the savings in healthcare costs if folks supplemented daily with Folic Acid.  I didn't realize that stroke-related costs run $34 billion a year.

With strokes costing $34 billion a year, a public health agenda to encourage all senior Americans to supplement with folic acid could theoretically reduce strokes costs to $26.9 billion, a savings of $7.9 billion.

According to the Census Bureau, there were 49.2 million Americans over age 65 in 2016. At $.20 [cents] per folic acid pill, it would cost $3.59 billion for American seniors to protect themselves from a stroke. Net savings would be ~$4.3 billion. It appears modern medicine is throwing away health dollars and lives for its bias against dietary supplements. Obviously, folic acid pills far exceeded what food fortification began over two decades ago.

Folic Acid is required for DNA repair.  Blood vessels are damaged without adequate folic acid.  

The researchers noted that a low folic acid level was associated with a low blood platelet count. Folic acid is required to repair DNA. It then follows that wall of blood vessels and blood platelets are damaged and platelet count declines without adequate folic acid. Blood platelets are responsible for blood clotting, a necessary part of wound healing.

If this is true, and I have no reason so far to doubt it, why then do university professors, representatives for modern medicine, continue in their claim that vitamin supplements and multi-vitamin supplements, in particular, are of no benefit?  

Sardi addresses this too. 

HOW MODERN MEDICINE CONCLUDES DIETARY SUPPLEMENTS ARE UNNECESSARY

Here is how modern medicine comes to its erroneous conclusion [that] dietary supplements are not needed: 

. . . a good diet will provide all the nutrients necessary for health. 

Of course, that position is self-serving as modern medicine games human populations for more disease to treat.

A good diet is not enough to stave off disease or to maintain health.  And I particularly like Sardi calling out "high-calorie malnutrition."  Wow.  I wonder if one of the reasons that vitamin supplementation is frowned upon by the medical industry and its representatives at the universities is that for vitamins to be effective, one must remove sugars, high-glycemic carbohydrates, and alcohols from one's diet.  These foods are representative of huge industries.  You tell people that B1 improves this, restores that, and prevents this on condition that they stop consuming one of these foods, then you might see the conflict of interest that the university reps protect.  

Beriberi, the name for the disease that emanates from a deficiency of thiamin (vitamin B1), is broadly prevalent [in] well-fed societies as it is induced by "high-calorie malnutrition" given that added sugars, carbohydrates, alcohol, and even tea block its absorption. 

Okay, here is another bullet point for those 50 and up managing stomach acid.

The progressive decline in stomach acid secretion with advancing age is yet another reason why B1 deficiency is highly prevalent but unrecognized. 

What is interesting that B1 deficiency is not easily recognizable or detectable.  Sardi says that "it defies detection as a collective disease." And my guess is that the physician who doesn't know much about nutrition, will diagnose B1 deficiency as some psychiatric condition and compel him to write a referral to a psychiatrist rather than informally recommend a patient to take 2 B1 tablets every day for the next week, then call him by week's end.  

Derrick Lonsdale, the reigning expert on vitamin B1, says thiamin deficiency has a low mortality and a long morbidity.

That low-mortality and long-morbidity mean that a B1 deficiency won't kill you, but it will present the symptoms of illness, the kind that is chronic or "long morbidity." 

Because B1 deficiency is associated with so many maladies (autism, diabetic complications, disruptive autonomic [nervous] system disorders, heart failure, neuropathy, sudden infant death, alcoholism, it defies detection as a collective disease. An announcement of the highly absorbable fat-soluble form of vitamin B1 (Benfotiamine) cures and prevents Alzheimer's disease is expected soon. There is a doctor in Italy who is astonishingly curing Parkinson's disease with B1 shots (mostly among alcoholics).

B1 can be found aplenty in our food supply and even through supplementation.  Supply is not the issue: absorption is.  

Because of poor absorption, it is unlikely the best diet or fortified foods can overcome a state of B1 deficiency. Once classified as a prison camp for malnutrition disease, beriberi is now prevalent as a disease of overconsumption. A sub-disease population is beriberi induced by water pills (diuretics). Modern medicine can't imagine how a B vitamin deficiency prevails in a well-fed population. Vitamin B1 is well provided but just not absorbed or is rapidly excreted (diuretics).

What's terrible is that the symptoms of a B1 deficiency show up as mild cognitive, even psychiatric in nature, and so not knowing that they are deficient in B1, some folks seek relief via marijuana, which only exacerbates the symptoms.  Ugh.  

According to the US Department of Agriculture "only" 18.4% of Americans consume an inadequate amount of thiamin (that's ~57 million Americans), not enough to cause a run on health food stores, but millions more simply don't absorb or retain B1. The B1-deficient run for marijuana instead.

[BESIDES B1 & FOLIC ACID, THERE IS] ANOTHER OVERLOOKED B VITAMIN DEFICIENCY

Healthy ranges used to measure values in your blood are mistaken and often result in poor detection of B12 deficiency.  

Pernicious (vitamin B12) anemia is prevalent depending upon the blood level used to define deficiency. Up to 40% of US adults may be B12 deficient. One of the ways widespread nutritional deficiencies remain hidden is that blood tests only reveal what is called the reference range (commonly occurring range), not the healthy range. If massive numbers of people are B12 deficient then that becomes the reference range, which mistakenly can lead to the false belief an individual has a normal (common) blood level but is deficient.

Doctors misdiagnose all the time, often for self-serving interests. 

It is common for doctors to look at a blood test and mistakenly conclude whatever symptoms a patient is suffering from are not caused by a shortage of vitamin B12.

False normal B12 blood tests are common. This is likely why many older adults with so-called normal blood levels experience clearance of symptoms upon B12 supplementation.

For me at least, B12 gave me back my circadian rhythms, and I am able to return to a regular sleep pattern, one where my sleep is uninterrupted and deep; not long, just deep and I wake rested.  B12 does this.  

B12 deficiency may be rampant, especially among certain groups (vegetarians, gastric bypass patients, users of B12 depleting drugs (metformin, antacids), yet public health authorities will claim prevalence of deficiency is low. A US Department of Agriculture report issued over a decade ago noted that 4 or 10 Americans "may be flirting with vitamin B12 deficiency." 

Even milder symptoms that we dismiss with a wave of the hand could be a B12 deficiency.

Many chronic unsuspected symptoms of B12 deficiency such as a chronic cough and back pain, may never be counted in estimates of the prevalence of B12 pathology.

The comparative costs of supplementation are in your favor. 

JUST REMEMBER, the prevailing position by modern medicine, despite the science, is that vitamin supplements are needless. You must be a crazy, eccentric, ignorant, easily misled fool to be caught taking dietary supplements. Best to take them in your closet where nobody will see you. Because of this attitude, many patients simply hide the fact from their doctors [that] they are loading up with vitamins every day. Still, Americans only spend ~$8 a month on dietary supplements and ~$250 a month on drugs. It should be the other way around.