Why supplements including anti-oxidants should be taken seriously. Originally published in WODMASTERS. Click for complete article.
- Products that are classified as drugs/medicine are required to meet standards of quality and consistency in manufacturing and of safety. Studies are done in vitro, on animals, and finally on humans. Drug interactions are checked. Information is gathered on how the drug is metabolized. Drugs are sometimes metabolized into something deadly before being rapidly metabolized into something safe. Tylenol is an example. Not a problem unless something, like alcohol, blocks a metabolic step and traps Tylenol in its deadly form. This is why people sometimes die when they drink alcohol and then take Tylenol. This should be common knowledge, but it isn’t, yet.
- Another important thing to know about a drug or supplement is its “Effective Dose.” How much is needed to give a desired effect? How much selenium is needed for health? How much is too much? How much is “optimal”? These are unanswered questions for many nutritional supplements. What happens if you take too much? Frequently the answer to that question is unknown as well.
- Anti-Oxidants should not be assumed to be safe. Recent research has indicated that anti-oxidants, like oxidants, can harm DNA. DNA damage can lead to cancer, the very thing anti-oxidants in nutritional supplements are supposed to prevent.
- The last point to raise for this article is a manufacturing issue. Like most people, I used to assume that vitamins and supplements contained what was written on the package. But this is not always the case. An example is the recent report of human growth factors added to deer antler velvet supplements. It is hard to believe human growth factors were accidentally added to deer antler velvet supplements. You’d have to hear the manufacturer out on that one. However, problems like poor mixing and poor calculations can and do happen. Our research group found that out the hard way when we tried to use a well-known brand of vitamins for a human health study.
So, how much of what is in a multi-vitamin? How much of what is in Deer Antler Velvet, DHEA supplements, or “high performance packets?” Deer antler velvet, especially if it is secretly spiked with human growth hormone may quite unsafe. Secret additions to supplements may or may not be added carefully or consistently. There is no way to know unless you are the one doing the spiking . . . or if you have the technical expertise and expensive equipment needed to test it yourself.
