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Misinformation on vitamins

Salted Baloney

Grain of Salt Alert: The mainstream media is at it again.

As you are well aware by now, reports on medical research – as provided by major media outlets – should be taken with a grain of salt.

Well, today I suggest you have a whole BAG of salt at the ready. And prepare for some exercise as we go jumping to wild conclusions with “reporting” that’s sure to spread misinformation far and wide about some of the most important vitamins you can take.

A new pathway?

Antioxidant vitamins raise bad cholesterol levels. How’s that for some medical news that will warm the cockles of every drug company executive’s heart?

But this “news” is only relevant for those who read the headlines and the opening paragraph and then move on. For anyone who lingers over the details and asks a couple of obvious questions, this isn’t really news at all; it’s a curiosity that’s been pumped up to resemble something newsworthy.

Here’s what this paper mache boat is built of: Testing liver cells in a laboratory, researchers from New York University (NYU) found that vitamin E nourishes a protein that keeps LDL cholesterol and VLDL (very low density lipoproteins) from degrading. The result: higher LDL.

Surprised that vitamin E had this LDL-improving effect, the NYU team then studied the process on mice and came up with basically the same results. One of the authors of the study pointed out to the BBC that their research was the first to document this association between LDL and antioxidant vitamins.

And there’s good reason why. The NYU researchers recently discovered a new “pathway” by which this critical protein of LDL is degraded. In other words, in studying their new pathway, they were playing on their field, with their ball, and their rules. Of course no one had found the antioxidant- LDL association before – it wasn’t there to find! And how reliable is this new pathway? Is it genuinely significant? That’s not discussed in the study, and it isn’t even mentioned in any of the reporting of the study.

Of mice and men

Naturally, the NYU study came with the disclaimer that “further tests are necessary to confirm the results.” This is especially so because the results are the most preliminary imaginable. But never mind all that. Seizing on the single idea that vitamin E MIGHT elevate LDL in mice, here are some of the headlines mainstream editors came up with:

  • Vitamins “Increase Cholesterol”
  • Do Antioxidants Contribute to Heart Disease?
  • Vitamins Raise Bad Cholesterol Levels

That last one is my favorite. No gray areas. Take it to the bank. Mice, humans – what’s the difference? “Vitamins Raise Bad Cholesterol.” Period. (Don’t get me wrong; studies with lab animals are useful. But you can’t reasonably come to this sort of blanket conclusion based on one mouse study.)

In the BBC article (headline number one, above), the Chief of Medical Information for the British Heart Foundation (BHF) stated that, “Most research tends to suggest that supplementation with antioxidant vitamins, although not beneficial, does not lead to undue harm.”

And that extremely faint, left-handed praise is what passes for the voice of reason in this “balanced” reporting.

Hidden details

I had a hunch that HSI Panelist Allan Spreen, M.D., would have some strong opinions on these “revelations” about antioxidant vitamins, and he did. Cutting straight to the chase, he found two important points that every one of those media reports somehow missed.

“The reams of research long published in multiple sources cast incredible doubt on such an inane conclusion as the NYU authors come up with. Let me design the study and you’ll see completely different results (hmm, and the chances of THAT are !).

“They use the same ploy used by so much drug company- sponsored research: Study a single metabolic issue separate from the grand scheme of bodily control (homeostasis). That type of stunt ‘proved’ that vitamin C caused DNA damage (while another part of the same study, not publicized, showed it even more protective against it!).”

And on that BHF quote about antioxidant vitamins being “not beneficial,” Dr. Spreen offered this insight:

“That happens to be true, if you use their research. Using the minimum daily requirement (MDR) doses, they did, in fact, ‘prove’ that vitamin therapy does basically nothing. The doses used were so low they were not measurable by the equipment, so of course you can say they weren’t very effective (and consequently not beneficial).”

And his overall assessment of the study: “Useless moronic drivel well, not useless – it keeps the uninformed in line.”

The uninformed AND the misinformed. Once again, the mainstream media has done its readers a disservice, planting the absurd idea that the supportive effects of antioxidants might actually be dangerous.

To Your Good Health,

Jenny Thompson
Health Sciences Institute

Sources:
“Lipid Peroxidation and Oxidant Stress Regulate Hepatic Apolipoprotein B Degradation and VLDL Production” Journal of Clinical Investigation, Vol. 113, 2004, jci.org
“Vitamins ‘Increase Cholesterol'” BBC News, 5/4/04, bbc.co.uk
“Could Vitamins Raise Levels of Bad Cholesterol? Animal Study Suggests They Might” EurekAlert, 5/3/04, eurekalert.org
“Do Antioxidants Contribute to Heart Disease?” Sig Kirchheimer, 5/3/04, my.webmd.com
“Vitamins Raise Bad Cholesterol Levels” Times of India, 5/4/04, timesofindia.indiatimes.com

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