Take multivitamins, AMA urges in policy reversal

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JAMA REVERSAL

Take multivitamins, AMA urges in policy reversal

 

By Ronald Kotulak

Chicago Tribune

 

CHICAGO Reversing a long-standing anti-vitamin policy, The Journal of the

American Medical Association today is advising all adults to take at least one

multivitamin pill each day. Scientists' understanding of the bene fits of

vitamins has rapidly advanced, and it now appears that people who ge t enough

vitamins may be able to prevent such common chronic illnesses as ca ncer, heart

disease and osteoporosis, according to Drs. Robert Fletcher and Kathleen

Fairfield of Harvard University, who wrote the new guidelines. The last time

JAMA

made a comprehensive review of vitamins, about 20 years ago, it concluded people

of normal health shouldn't take multivitamins because th ey were a waste of time

and money. People can get all the nutrients they nee d from their diet, JAMA

advised, adding that only pregnant women and chronic ally sick people may need

certain vitamins. That was at a time when knowledg e about vitamins was just

beginning to expand. The role that low levels of f olate, or folic acid, play in

neural tube defects, for instance, was not kno wn, nor was its role as a major

risk factor for heart disease. Researchers h ope JAMA's endorsement will

encourage more people to reap health benefits of a daily multivitamin. Health

experts are increasingly worried that most Ame rican adults do not consume

healthy amounts of vitamins in their diet, altho ugh they may be getting enough

to ward off such vitamin-deficiency disorders as scurvy, beriberi and pellagra.

Almost 80 percent of Americans do not eat at least five helpings of fruits and

vegetables a day, the recommended mini mum amount believed to provide sufficient

essential nutrients. Humans do not make their own vitamins, except for some

vitamin D, and they must get them from an outside source to prevent metabolic

disorders. " It's nice to see thi s change in philosophy that's saying we can

make

public-health recommendatio ns based on this really compelling set of data, "

said

Dr. Jeffrey Blumberg, chief of antioxidant research at Tufts University's Jean

Mayer USDA Human Nu trition Research Center on Aging. Blumberg said the JAMA

recommendations und erscore a growing concern among nutrition experts that the

recommended daily allowances, or RDAs, for many vitamins are set too low. RDAs

essentially we re established to prevent symptoms of vitamin-deficiency

disorders, he said. But evidence is growing that higher levels of many vitamins

are necessary t o achieve optimum health, he said. The National Academy of

Sciences, which s ets RDAs, is revising its recommendations based on the new

evidence. Even pe ople who eat five daily servings of fruits and vegetables may

not get enough of certain vitamins for optimum health, Fletcher said. Most

people, for ins tance, cannot get the healthiest levels of folate and vitamins D

and E from recommended diets, he said. " All of us grew up believing that if we

ate a re asonable diet, that would take care of our vitamin needs, " Fletcher

said. " B ut the new evidence, much of it in the last couple of years, is that

vitamin s also prevent the usual diseases we deal with every day heart dis ease,

cancer, osteoporosis and birth defects. " Because foods contain thousan ds of

vitaminlike compounds many not yet identified that may be important for good

health, vitamin supplements should not be a subst itute for a wholesome diet,

Blumberg said. In another matter, the AMA yester day urged researchers to study

whether financial payments would ease the nat ion's critical shortage of

transplant organs. Its policymaking House of Dele gates voted at its annual

meeting to adopt the measure against the recommend ation of a committee, which

heard from doctors Sunday who called such paymen ts unethical and said that even

studying them would cheapen the value of org an donation. The measure involves

organs from cadavers, not living donors, a nd supports research into payments

such as reimbursement for funeral expense s.

 

 

http://www.bolenreport.com/articles/bsardi.html#JAMA

 

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