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Health Warning: Vitamin Pills and Supplements Can Be Bad for Your Health.
Recent studies have shown that some vitamin supplements, rather than increase your lifespan and improve your health, are actually likely to do you more harm. Many people started taking vitamins in high doses with the hope that they would boost their immune system and make them stronger and healthier. Celebrities are famous for taking vitamin supplements. Robbie Williams had a dose of multivitamins injected into his bum after a particularly intensive party, and Madonna was also reported to have given Justin Timberlake a B12 vitamin injection in his backside. Apparently Justin Timberlake was feeling a bit tired, and Madonna offered him a shot from one of her syringes stashed in her handbag. Geri Halliwell used vitamin injections to keep going when she was on a starvation diet and skeletally thin. But were they actually improving their long term health? Here are the main problem vitamins:
Vitamin A (retinol)
Helps keep skin healthy, enhances immunity and helps you see in dim light. But all you need is 0.7mg a day if you are a man and o.6mg if you are a woman, according to the Food Standards Agency (FSA), which says you can get all you need from foods such as cheese, eggs, oily fish, milk and yogurt. Liver, another source, is not recommended for pregnant women. More than 1.5mg of per day may make your bones more brittle and prone to fracture as you age.
Vitamin C
We need around 4omg a day and it is not stored in the body because it is water soluble – but we should get enough from a normal diet. It is in a wide variety of fruit and vegetables and protects cells and helps the body absorb iron. Taking less than 1000mg in supplements is unlikely to do harm, says the FSA, but large amounts can cause diarrhea and flatulence.
Beta-carotene
Turns into vitamin A in the body. You should get all you need from a varied diet, in particular from yellow
and green leafy vegetables such as spinach, carrots and red peppers; and yellow fruit such as mangos, melons and apricots. Too much beta-carotene can increase the chances of smokers developing lung cancer. The FSA recommends taking no more than 7mg a day in supplements.
Vitamin E
Protects cell membranes. It is fat soluble, so the body will store it and you do not need a dose every day. It is found in plant oils, nuts and seeds and wheat germ in cereals. The FSA advises that taking too much supplementary vitamin E is not a good idea, but less than 540mg a day is “unlikely to cause any harm”.
Selenium
The tiny amounts we need should be easily obtained from meat, nuts, bread, fish or eggs. It has an important role in the immune system, in thyroid hormone metabolism, reproduction and prevention of damage to cells and tissues; Too much can lead to loss of skin, hair and nails, but ingesting less than 0.3Smga day will do no harm.
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