Heart Doctors Biased in Recommendation to Avoid Antioxidant Supplement

[Guest guest]

KNOWLEDGE OF HEALTH, INC.

 

457 West Allen Avenue, Unit 117

San Dimas, CA 91773

Tel: 909 596-9507 | Fax: 909 596-9189 Email: Bsardi

For Immediate Release  

Contact: Bill Sardi

 

Heart Doctors Reveal Biases In Their Recommendation To Avoid Antioxidant

Vitamin Supplements

 

San Dimas, CA- A widely reported study, published in the June 14 issue

of The Lancet, a prestigious British medical journal, mistakenly

discourages the public from taking antioxidant food supplements and

reveals common biases among heart doctors, says Bill Sardi, consumer

advocate and president of Knowledge of Health, Inc., San Dimas, Calif.

 

?These researchers are mistakenly frightening the public away from

antioxidant vitamin supplements while ignoring the drawbacks of the drug

therapies they so frequently prescribe,? says Sardi.

 

?First,? says Sardi, ?the widely-aired report gives the false impression

that there is some kind of widespread hazard when in fact the alleged

increased mortality associated with beta carotene and vitamin E

supplements never even reached one-percent.? The report in Lancet cites

a 7.4 percent mortality rate with beta carotene supplements versus 7.0

percent without supplements, and an 11.3 percent mortality rate with

supplemental vitamin E versus 11.1 percent with no supplements. ?These

may just be chance findings. A repeat of the same studies might produce

results that would tip to the other side of the scale and show that

these vitamins slightly decrease mortality rates. In either case, they

would not be significant,? says Sardi. Additionally, supplemental

vitamin C and E help to prevent arterial and heart disease and may not

show benefits among patients with existing cardiac disease, the group

that was studied in the Lancet report.

 

?Second, the authors of the Lancet report mischaracterize antioxidant

vitamins as interfering with cholesterol-lowering statin drugs. A recent

study showed that supplemental vitamin blunted the rise in HDL-good

cholesterol when niacin and statin drugs were used. In fact, vitamins C

and E help to rescue the liver from the toxic drugs, but this is

misinterpreted as posing a hazard,? emphasizes Sardi.

 

?Compare this report, used to denigrate supplemental antioxidant

vitamins, with the questionable benefits of statin drugs which the

authors of the Lancet report promote in other papers they have written,?

says Sardi. The largest study of its kind, recently reported in the

Journal of the American Medical Association, showed that statin drugs

only produce an 0.4 percent drop in mortality (not even 1 percent), and

increase the risk of liver problems by 0.5 to 2.0 percent and the risk

of a potentially mortal muscle-degeneration by 0.2 percent, about the

same ?risk? posed by the supplemental antioxidant vitamins. ?You can?t

talk out of two sides of your mouth here,? says Sardi. ?How come the

drugs are safe and vitamins are potentially troublesome using similar

statistics,? asks Sardi.

 

?Essentially, this report suggests adults abandon antioxidant vitamin

supplements and blindly submit to widespread statin drug therapy which

is only beneficial in 8 out of 100 patients who take them, which causes

side effects that force 35 percent of users to switch to other

medications, 4-5 percent who must abandon them, and causes muscle

soreness in up to 5 percent of statin-drug users which is a sign of a

potentially mortal side effect,? indicates Sardi.

 

A report in the Journal of the American Medical Association recently

recommended every American take a multivitamin. Sardi says Americans

ought to heed that advice, continue to take their vitamins, and dismiss

these alarmist reports which don?t reveal the biases of their authors.

####

 

If you no longer wish to receive our Newsletter, please click below to

..

 

Un me

 

Donadaghovi AiSv Nv wa do hi ya do

(Til next we meet, Walk in Peace)

--<<< --<<< --<<<