Toxic Vitamins

[Guest guest]

" Toxic " Vitamins

 

The safety of vitamins has been clearly demonstrated by the toxicological

literature and further by the experience of orthomolecular physicians over the

past forty years. Why then, is the public subjected to periodic outbursts of

information about how toxic vitamins are? We do not have similar outbursts

against the use of drugs even though vitamins have a zero death rate while drugs

in the United States alone kill 106,000 patients in hospitals annually.

 

The Food Standard Agency (FSA) in England released a press statement early in

May, 2003, entitled " New FSA advice on safety of high doses of vitamins and

minerals. " Why they titled their statement " new " puzzles me since this is the

sort of advice we have been getting from various government agencies for the

past

50 years.

 

The toxicological facts about vitamins gathered over the past 60 years do not

support their advice. It is advice which follows from the vitamins-as-prevention

paradigm established over 100 years ago and rejects the extensive research over

the past 50 years that established the vitamin-as-treat- ment paradigm. The

press

release was dutifully copied and reprinted in the mass media with very little,

if

any; critical examination of the claims made in the FSA statement. The headlines

in the National Post, Canada, May 13, 2003, ran: " Searching for a Magic Bullet; "

The Globe and Mail, Canada, May 31, 2003, went under the heading " Too Much of a

Good Thing? " ; the BBC News, May 7, 2003, harked a " Warning Over Vitamin Doses " ;

and The Times, England, May 8, 2003, warned " Vitamins Can Damage Your Health "

and

so on. An EMedicine report on " Vitamin Toxicity " by Mark Rosenbloom carries the

same information.

 

The FSA recommends that while most vitamins are safe a few have to be taken with

great caution. The FSA states it is an independent food safety watchdog but

later

on adds they are accountable to Parliament through Ministers of Health. A board

that is appointed and is supposed to have a wide range of relevant skills and

experience lead it. The readers of this issue will be able to deduce on their

own

what skills are represented on the board. In my opinion they did not include any

relevant clinicians experienced in using vitamins as supplements: There are not

enough clinicians so experienced in Great Britain to form such a board.

(Orthomolecular medicine in Great Britain has been thoroughly rejected for

years.

 

 

A paradigm is a system of thought or ideas based on observations, hypotheses and

theories. It is an attempt to coordinate the acceptable observations about a

topic which makes some sense to its practitioners. Paradigms are evanescent

since

newer observations will make older paradigms out of date and mostly wrong. But

replacing one paradigm by a newer and better on does not happen smoothly. It

occurs in quantum leaps. The old paradigm is taught and studied and defended

vigorously by scientists in that area. It will be changed with great difficulty

because it has a large body of adherents who will protect its main hypotheses to

the end. When there is sufficient new information and enough adherents to the

new

information there may be a shift to the new paradigm, which in turn will be

replaced. Paradigms are very useful and serve science well but as they become

well established they prevent new inform~ tion from being gathered and from

being

published in the literature, which is part of that paradigm.

 

In the field of vitamin use and theory the first paradigm is called the

vitamin-as- prevention (VAP) paradigm. It was introduced after many years

against

the opposition of the medical establishment. Here is an example. In 1916, the

U.S.A. Department of Agriculture announced that Dr. J. Goldberger had discovered

the cause of pellagra; it was caused by a diet deficient in something. Around

the

same time two U.S.A. physicians, from the establishment announced that they had

discovered the

 

(P. 124)

 

 

Journal of Orthomolecular Medicine

 

Vol.18, Nos. 3 & 4, 2003

 

Cause of pellagra; it was caused by the bite of the stable fly. As late as 1950

I

read in a medical textbook that it is alleged that niacin cures pellagra. The

principles of VAP paradigm are (1) that vitamins are needed only in very small

amounts, as declared by the recommended daily doses in common use; (2) that they

are used only to prevent certain classical deficiency diseases. Thiamine

prevents

beri beri, vitamin C prevents scurvy, vitamin D prevents rickets, and vitamin B3

prevents pellagra. If these principles are gospel truth it follows (1) that

large

doses, above the recommended vitamin doses are not to be used, are

contraindicated, may be dangerous even though the evidence for this is non-

existent, and indicates that the clinician is probably not fit to practice

medicine. Several of my colleagues lost their licence because they used large

doses of vitamin C; (2) that giving any vitamins to patients with diseases not

known to be vitamin deficiency diseases is contraindicated. The VAP paradigm is

accepted by almost every nutritionist, physician, government agency and food

board such as FSA. The statement issued by the FSA is a typical statement from

adherents to this paradigm. The modern paradigm is the vitamins- as-treatment

paradigm (VAT), which is defined by a different set of principles. These are:

(1)

that vitamins are therapeutic for a large number of conditions not considered to

be vitamin deficiency diseases; (2) optimum doses are used which vary in

quantity

but are much larger than those recom- mended by the original paradigm and by the

recommended daily requirements. The best example of the V AT paradigm in

practice

is the use of niacin, which is used in 3 to 9 grams dosages daily to lower total

cholesterol, to elevate high-density lipoprotein cholesterol and to lower

elevated triglycerides. This unexpected property of niacin was reported in 1955

(footnote 1) and marks the beginning of the new VAT paradigm.

 

There were several pioneers ahead of us. The first pioneers were Drs. Evan Shute

and WIlfrid Shute (footnote 2) from Ontario who found, that vitamin E was very

useful in treating and preventing heart disease. Their work was vilified,

ignored

and suppressed. At about the same time Dr W Kaufman (footnote 3) reported that

niacinamide was very helpful for the arthritides and for many of the conditions

associated with aging. His work was totally ignored. Then Dr. Fred Klenner,

(footnote 4) North Carolina, found that very large dose of vitamin C were very

therapeutic for large number of conditions including cancer, viral and bacterial

infections, multip1e sclerosis and more. His work was totally ignored by

medicine

but is enjoying a renaissance especially for his treatment program for multiple

sclerosis and his use of large doses of vitamin C for cancer. Our niacin

cholesterol work was not ignored due to a series of talks I gave the Mayo

Research Foundation in 1955. During the last farewell dinner I told Dr: Howard

Rome about our work. He passed it on to the Chief of Medicine. His senior

resident, Dr William Parsons, (footnote 5) became interested and as a result of

this interest our work was quickly confirmed. Coming from the Mayo Clinic it

carried much more weight and of course it was easy to confirm whether

cholesterol

was lowered or not. Other pioneers included Dr: Irwin Stone, (footnote 6) Dr:

Linus Pauling (footnote 7) and recently Dr: Bruce Ames.(footnote 8) Information

about drugs released to the public in the Compendium, in letters to doctors, in

advertisements and in press releases is usually accurate. The FDA in the United

States and the FDD in Canada vet efficacy information. Side effects and toxicity

information is vetted by the manufacturers of the drugs, the companies that hold

the patents. There is no doubt that the descriptions in the compendiums do not

appear until their proprietors have rigorously examined them. Vitamins have no

proprietors. They are not patentable. Efficacy claims are vetted by the same

agencies as those vetting drugs but descriptions of efficacy and toxicity are

not. This is why descriptions in the Compendiums have to be read very carefully

because they carry information which is wrong or out of date. We need someone or

some agency to do for the nutrients what drug companies do for their drugs.

Unfortunately, university departments of nutrition, and the companies that sell

the vitamins have not undertaken this role. This special issue of the Journal of

Orthomolecular Medicine is a first attempt to correct the record. Clinicians and

scientists who are familiar with vitamins, and with the literature and with long

experience in having used them in treatment, will discuss the vitamins that are

commonly used in the VAT range.

 

At the beginning of this editorial I posed the question, “Why are we subjected

to

periodic outbursts of information as to how toxic vitamins are?” I think the

reason is fairly obvious. The attack on the safety of vitamins is really an

attack on the efficacy of these nutrients. If the critics really conceded that

the vitamins have therapeutic properties they would not be attacking their

efficacy. It is an indirect method of downgrading the value of orthomolecular

medicine. That means that the protestations we all make about the uninformed

criticisms of the critics will have little effect. We must emphasize the

therapeutic value of vitamins when used properly. We must continue to study

their

therapeutic properties as the drug companies do with their drugs, repeat the

message that they are valuable. We cannot advertise, but we can publish. My

complaint about my colleagues is that having published a paper once or twice

reporting the advantages of vitamins, they are content to sit back and do

nothing

more. This must stop.

 

I urge you all to do the following: (1)research and publish your studies in

orthomolecular medicine and psychiatry; (2) continue to protest the false claims

made by the opposition. Use all the media you have access to. The Journal of

Orthomolecular Medicine will consider all manuscripts. The web site,

International Bulletin Board for Orthomolecular Medicine (IBBOM) can become a

very valuable world wide medium. Please use it.

http://www.orthoeurope.com/IBBOM/index.php

-Abram Hoffer, M.D., Ph.D., FRCP©

 

References

 

1 Altschul R, Hoffer A, Stephen JD: Influence of nicotinic acid on serum

cholesterol in man.

Arch Biochem Biophys, 1955; 54: 558-559

 

2. Shute WE: Vitamin E. Keats Publishing, New Canaan CT 1978

 

3. Kaufman W: The Common Form of Niacinamide Deficiency Disease.

Aniacinamidosis.

Yale University Press, New Haven, CT 1943

 

4. Klenner FR: Massive doses of vitamin C and the viral diseases. Southern Med

Surg, 1951; 113: 101-107

 

5. Parsoms WB Jr. Cholesterol Content without diet. The Niacin Solution. Lilac

Press, Scottsdale, AR. 1998, Revised 2003

 

6. Stone I: The Healing Factor: Vitamin C Against Disease. Grosset and Dunlop,

New York, 1967.

 

7. Pauling, L: Orthomolecular Psychiatry: Science 1968; 160:265-271

 

8. Ames BN, Elson-Schwab I, Silver EA: High Dose vitamin therapy stimulates

variant enzymes with decreased coenzyme binding affinity (increased Km):

relevance to genetic disease and polmorphisms. Am J. Clin. Nutr, 2002;

75:616-658

 

For Health Freedom,

John C. Hammell, President

International Advocates for Health Freedom

556 Boundary Bay Road

Point Roberts, WA 98281-8702 USA

http://www.iahf.com

jham

800-333-2553 N.America

360-945-0352 World

 

 

Find local movie times and trailers on Movies.

http://au.movies.