Medicine: Turning the Science of Misinformation into an Art Form
A new study published February 28, 2007 in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) contends vitamins are dangerous and even cause death. Is this really so? Not to the experienced researcher who knows the scientific literature and doesn’t have a bias against non-drug treatments or a hidden agenda.
The authors used what has been called a ‘gold standard’ for studies, that is meta-analysis (pooling of studies) to get larger numbers to presumably give better statistical significance and a better understanding of results. But, not if you have an agenda and are looking to smear a competitors product, a la a political candidate. This is marketing 101 for politicians. Now why on earth would so-called scientists try to smear vitamins? What have these innocent inexpensive safe and effective nutrients done to them for this action to be taken?
Well they would save the U.S. economy (read losses for Big Pharma, Major News Media and Medical Establishment) $58 billion dollars per year if everyone took 1 multivitamin per day alone. This is according to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) State-of-the-Science Conference on Multivitamin/Mineral Supplements and Chronic Disease Prevention. May 15–17, 2006.
So Scientists, ‘Show Me The Science’!
Here in a nutshell is what these Danish Scientists (if I may use that term loosely) did in the JAMA study.
They selected 68 out of 815 clinical trials with 232,606 patients and pooled then to form a large-scale study to look into the benefits of vitamins. They concluded that when the antioxidant supplements were taken separately, beta carotene increased death rates by 7 per cent, vitamin A by 16 per cent, and vitamin E by 4 per cent.
The Major News Media were all over this with headlines like – Vitamins Kill! And surprise, surprise the authors suggested – “that money spent on vitamin supplements is wasted.” Gee, I’ve heard that one before; they should have added that with the money saved on vitamins and your nutritionally deficient body in need of repair, that you’d have more money left over to buy expensive prescription drugs.
So what they did really was compare apples to oranges. Or another analogy would be that they compared — hockey to basketball to baseball to football and concluded that exercise is dangerous for your health. Common sense says that exercise is good for you, and so are vitamins. Walking down the street is dangerous for goodness sake. These authors strain credulity. But is it science? I’d have to say ‘There is something rotten in Denmark!’
Scaremongering and Medicine
Let’s look at the methodology of the authors, from an article by Ed Edelson of HealthDay who reported that the JAMA study “drew quick criticism from one independent expert.”
“One of the major premises of doing such a meta-analysis is that the studies should be comparable,” said Jeffrey Blumberg, director of the Antioxidants Research Laboratory at Tufts University in Boston. “Here, they looked at primary prevention, treatment, old people, young people, smokers, nonsmokers. Only when they used their own criteria of what was good and what was bad were they able to show an increase in all-cause mortality.”
“You don’t see people dropping dead right and left from overdoses of antioxidant supplements,” Blumberg said. “It is just not happening. You have to explain to me how some essential nutrients kill you in a couple of years.”
Antioxidant supplements “have been shown in a number of studies to have no adverse effects,” Blumberg said. “They are not toxic, but evidence that they prevent heart disease and cancer is equivocal (susceptible of double interpretation).”
It is scaremongering to say vitamins are dangerous based on flawed data when scientists use “their own criteria” and or “body English” (as another physician put it) to achieve the outcome they wanted.
“Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics.” - Mark Twain
A similar study a few years ago by Johns Hopkins that analyzed 19 clinical trials, concluded that 400 or more international units (IU) of vitamin E per day increased the risk of dying from all causes by about four per cent. Well known physician Dr. W. Gifford Jones, a syndicated columnist was at first taken in by this research, however a vacation on a cruise-ship cleared his thinking ability and he saw the study for the flaw that it was as well. Read his account as reported at Canadafreepress.com.
Manipulation of statistics is an art form in the so-called scientific community and should be an embarrassment but some people you just can’t embarrass. The medical community sang the praises of dangerous Vioxxx and Hormones for years because they were drugs, if they had been vitamins they would have called congressional hearings to have them banned. The bias against vitamins and nutrition is evident when such flawed studies are published in medical journals.
There is always the potential risk if you overdo anything; drink too much water and you won’t feel to well, however, common sense should prevail. Enough quality studies have been done to show the benefits of vitamins and antioxidants in reducing death, hospitalizations and improvement in quality of life, to continue taking them without reservations.
To find out more about antioxidants download a copy of Dennis’ report Antioxidants: The Key To A Better Life, at his website Get A Better Life Today.
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Dennis Cutforth is a researcher and writer with over 35 years experience in health-care sales, marketing and research in pharmaceuticals and natural health. Dennis will cut through all the propaganda and give you the real facts about what really works to make you healthier and happier. Visit his Blog at Better Life Blog.
