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by rossdavidh
2649 days ago
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There is, I am starting to believe (regardless of whether or not this particular finding holds up), an ongoing problem with our approach to nutrition. The anti-pattern goes like this:
1) people who eat/drink X have health benefits
2) it seems to be related to X having Y in it
3) let's sell Y as a pill
4) dang, no health benefits, how did that happen? Now this could be for several reasons. Maybe eating/drinking X is a marker for a lifestyle that is healthy, or for coming from a background that includes beneficial genes of some sort. Maybe Y is not the only thing in X which matters, it's just the most obviously related thing, and you really need the whole package. Maybe the amount of Y you get from eating/drinking X is good, but in concentrated form at high levels there are drawbacks of some sort. But, however you look at it, putting Y into a pill (that can often be patented and sold as medicine) is not the same as eating/drinking X, and despite the financial incentives for claiming it is, we need to recognize that. |
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Vitamin C is a good one for that, I seem to remember reading that at best taking large doses just means your piss contains a lot of it, and at worst, if you mega-dose for long periods, it raises your chance of getting some cancers.
It reminds me of the adverts on the London Underground. Every time I travel through London to see my parents there will be adverts medicalising lack of sleep and exhaustion, flogging supplements and "remedies" for what is basically being tired, or "chronic tiredness syndrome" as one advert described it. I'm so glad I didn't choose that life.