“Riches enlarge, rather than satisfy appetites.”
Thomas Fuller.

On the face of it this looks like a silly question. This is the most profound question today as most of us, the unfortunate literate lot, are being bombarded on all sides, both by the print and electronic media, about the benefits of eating this or that food supplement. A simple formula would be to consider anything very heavily advertised as potentially harmful. If that is not so why, on earth, should such a thing like a food item be advertised in the first place? To make matters worse we are in the rat race against time these days. Both husband and wife working full time adds to the problem, while it is an economic necessity. Under those circumstances it looks very attractive to go in for ready-made quick fixes of canned and preserved foods. To make the whole exercise safe we think we could swallow a few multivitamin and anti-oxidant pills along with meals!

In most sophisticated households today we get to see vitamin pills on the dining table! Every one, from the baby in arms to the old granny, takes vitamins in some form or the other. There is a multibillion-dollar business in vitamin trade. Most large multinationals are chipping in their lot in this lucrative business. In fact, the manufacture of life saving drugs has been pushed to the background! No company is interested in ploughing money into antibiotics now, as the initial seed money required might not be recovered easily in that area, what with more than five hundred antibiotics already in the market.

Let us examine the whole business for the good of humanity at large. While it is true that many of the vitamins in Nature are very essential for growth and health, it is far removed from truth that the artificial vitamins made by man are as good! They have been shown to be bad instead! However, the business in vitamins is so good that the NPVr (risk adjusted net present value) for vitamins is said to be 200 times that of antibiotics!

The reason is that plant based foods, like fruits and vegetables, have many hitherto unidentified "phyto-chemicals" in them, in addition to the known vitamins which, together, work to give us the benefit, that too in the fresh state in Nature Man made vitamin pills contain many other ingredients like: fillers, binders, yeast, sugars and artificial sweeteners, preservatives, and gum etc, many of which could be health hazards when taken on a long term basis. There is also the concept of hormesis, a new idea in pharmacology that a small dose of a drug has a bio-positive effect while the larger dose could have a bio-negative effect.

Clever marketing tactics by large companies promise amazing results from these supplements. Starting from dry skin, dry hair, fatigue, stress to long life are all promised, based on anecdotal testimony from individuals rather than hard scientific evidence. Some of the scientific studies did show the reverse. Two large studies involving more than 29,000 smoking men in two groups showed the controlled half that received vitamin supplements did have between 18-28% more cancers compared to the group that did not receive these vitamin supplements.

This could be easily explained, but suffice it to say that extra supply of these artificial chemicals might interact with other body needs during the absorption phase in the intestine. To cite one example, an extra dose of food iron might suppress the absorption of zinc from the gut resulting in its deficiency. When given in excess most of these vitamins, if they are water soluble, get lost in the urine and help the germs in the toilet. Your hard-earned money is not wasted after all. It goes to help the poor germs there!

There are some very important ingredients that we need to get in our diet to keep diseases like cancer and heart attacks away. Beta-carotene, vitamin C, vitamin E, and the mineral selenium are the leading ones in that category. Please try to get them in the daily diet and not through pills. Carrots, sweet potatoes, red pepper, pumpkin, tomatoes, spinach, greens, mangoes, peaches, and apricots are the main sources of the above anti-oxidants. Oranges, grapefruit, cauliflower, cabbage, frozen peas, nuts of different kinds, chickpeas, sweetcorn, soya, and wholegrain products are an added bonus in diet.

Who ShouldTake Vitamins?

Most people do not require vitamin pills, but there are a few exceptions and they are:

1.Women ready to conceive or already pregnant need extra 400 mcg. Of folic acid daily.

2.People over 60 years who do not get a balanced diet or who have any one of the gastrointestinal diseases coming in the way of proper absorption.

3.Pregnant women, women with very heavy menstrual flow, some infants and adolescents might need extra iron supplements as also very old people.

4.Vegans might need vitamin B12 supplements.

5.People on heavy dieting, chronically ill patients and those who are recovering from such illnesses need extra supplements.

Under all the above circumstances do not self medicate yourself, but consult your family doctor and take his advice.

We must all learn to eat to live and not live to eat, although it is not what you eat that kills you, but what eats you (negative thoughts) that kills you. That said I must hasten to add that fussing over what one eats is more stressful than eating the wrong food. Enjoy what you eat but try to include the necessary things mentioned above in the diet. An occasional binge at some things, which do not come under the above category, is not a sin. The golden rule is to enjoy what you do. Sensible eating could reduce your medical bills significantly and make you live happily as long as you live. Trying to live here forever would never succeed. Happy eating folks!

“There is nothing new under the sun”…………….Ecclesastes 1:9.