Supplements and Safety (full documentary) | Hidden Dangers of Vitamins & Supplements | FRONTLINE

tonight on Frontline, a multi-billion dollar a year industry, the debate over

supplements

, how is it possible that something can be sold without any evidence that it is safe or effective? They say their products will make them healthier. Consumers make a profit in more than half the country every day. take a supplement safely and effectively, but critics say many have fraudulent claims that could be dangerous and should be regulated. It almost takes a slaughtered lamb to die before the Food and Drug Administration can take any action. Correspondent Jillian Finlay investigates. Oh, that doesn't smell good. very strong fishy smell

supplements

and

safety

a special report from Frontline New York Times this is a product that was formulated for people with serious illnesses this is an herb that would be excellent for older people who are worried it is estimated that half of all Americans take a health supplement every day that will be amazing to support encapsulates nutrients in a non-GMO soy antio is a 30+ billion doll industry.

I guarantee this will change your reality in 3 to 5 days. Companies range from Big Pharma to M and Pop I started in my kitchen making them by hand back in the 80's I would order the ingredients order the capsules and with a plate of 100 capsules I would weigh them and fill them and you have a bottle of 100 capsules of any vitamin In particular that you would like, do you have experience in pharmacology or medicine or any experience in this area? I studied some in college, but most of my time was spent in the medical libraries at Stony Brook, so you were self-taught, right? self-taught right, yes, Candace trip called her company Purity first, she says that her then husband, Terren Dulan, a chiropractor, helped her and what was his educational background or experience in this area, he was a chemist, he was a chemist in college and then continued. to chiropractic school since Mod's inception, she says she grew the business to half a million dolls a year.

The company sells on the web in stores and through local alternative healthcare providers. Purity first is a great name and I was like, Wow, how can you go wrong? what you imagine you would want in each vitamin that is absolutely pure Vinnie Gro was one of Purity First's first customers the

vitamins

became part of her daily quest for better health. I felt good and of course you know I'm running every day. I felt great until October, November and December 2012, where I had some very unusual symptoms. It started with unexplained back pain that soon became debilitating. Then he began hearing from other Purity First clients with their own troubling symptoms. stories my daughter is an honor student, she is on the swim team but she got expelled from school for being too aggressive.

I'm talking to a woman who had lost her position in a choir because her voice had changed. I'm talking to someone else. woman who said I have these incredible bleeding scales on my head and I can't go to work were all taking the same recommended

vitamins

, says Terren Duan, the chiropractor turned naturopath. Duan refused to be interviewed and denies any responsibility Terry had come to see me in January and asked me if I thought something was wrong because he said some blood tests had come back which were rare at the time we had just been through Hurricane Sandy and a lot of people They were getting sick after being in their basements cleaning water and that's why I had recommended people go see this other doctor, right, and they started going to see the doctor, faith, they gave us an exam and he told me , what is it that all of you who have come to me?

In the last month and a half they have something in common: they have all taken Purity first b50 vitamins. It is estimated that there are 85,000 dietary supplements for sale in the United States today. I have our liposomal D right here, this is our bopa, this is an herb that is great for seniors because they are essential nutrients like chromium with so many pictures and promises that you would assume some government agency has approved them before allowing them to be used. commercialization. The FDA does not conduct any review of dietary supplements before they go on the market. and I think all consumers should understand this: there is no testing, there is no obligation to provide any evidence that a product is effective or even safe, the only thing manufacturers have to prove is that they follow good manufacturing practices, the FDA conducts inspections for that, but it is limited by resources and information.

We don't really know the total number of manufacturers that we need to be able to inspect because there is no formal registration system that is required of manufacturers that make dietary supplements, so we do inspections of the What We Know About the FDA, we knew about a supplement manufacturer that used to operate here in 2012 and again in the spring of 2013. FDA inspectors cited Mira Health Products for violating manufacturing codes among the products Mea produced. Candace stps. Purity, first vitamins. I had a lot of faith in Mirror because it was more of a smaller scale manufacturer, it wasn't one of those big pharmaceutical companies that just didn't make you feel warm and fuzzy, well what did you do to try to verify that this was a pharmaceutical company?

Good reputation? that would make the product you wanted. They are supposed to test the product and give you an analysis at the end that what is in the capsule is what they have tested and the certificate is supposed to be certified and this is what your product is and did they give you those certificates? I think so, they did, they gave them to us and there didn't seem to be any problem, but in 2013 there was a problem. Dr. Kenna Spaith, who specializes in environmental health, is a man who is pure. The first clients came to investigate his symptoms.

He arranged a trial for vitamins B50 and the results were a shock. The capsules were mixed with two anabolic steroids. Joe Quailer, Candace Trip's current husband, spoke with Mir's owner. I called Mike and told him enough. What could have happened? And you know he was making M enhancement pills and he said Joe said if they found any kind of steroids in there the only thing he would think is maybe the mixer wasn't cleaned enough. Now Purity's first clients had begun hiring lawyers and sharing their stories. Change in voice. Change in sexual organs. Those who ingested these things developed what is called gynecomastia.

You end up with man boobs. It would take the FDA almost 6 months to remove the first Purity vitamins from the market. A response that Dr. Spai calls glacial. He declined to be interviewed on camera, but shared an email. exchange with us detailing his efforts to get the FDA to act on space says he suspected contamination, but his first inquiry went unanswered when he emailed again asking if the lack of response was due to a lack of interest. He was referred to the FDA's adverse reaction hotline called Medwatch. Spaith had tried to have the line transferred and put on hold before being disconnected twice. 5 weeks later.

He was still frustrated. Could you tell me what his plans are? he wrote. . I have 20 very worried patients and little to offer them among the officials. Spaith was writing. For Daniel, the manufacturer and then head of the FDA's dietary supplement division, we took that information. While helpful, he didn't solve the entire case. We had to file the case with the FDA and we did so and success

full

y removed the product. His biggest complaint is the amount of time it took him to get someone to call him back. He says one of the operators acted like he was telling him that aliens put messages in my Cheerios, that doesn't suggest you have a particularly robust system for allowing people to report problems when they happen.

I can assure you that the government worked very quickly and the agency is moving to eliminate the product throughout the country, so it is a little more scientific. More than just a doctor having a hunch or a feeling about something, we had to build evidence, court ready evidence to take away someone's product, someone's manufacturing operation and that's exactly what we did and by doing it in 6 months, the FDA team worked diligently and worked. quickly to do that, which was a pretty successful accomplishment, two women from the FDA came and were talking to us about how there seemed to be a problem with one of our products when we asked them which product they said, oh, that didn't matter. but okay, do you want us to stop selling the product?

No, you don't have to stop selling the product. No one died. They said no one died. Those were his words. His words were: Nobody died. You do not have to remove the product if there was any. concern at all why didn't you take it off the market? I mean, why didn't you do it yourself? Great question, his answer for me was that people call the FDA all the time to report minor things, so don't worry about it. the FDA flatly denies those things. Some vitamins made here on Long Island were said to be causing a recently released steroid.

In the end, Purity first recalled the V under pressure from the FDA forced it to go out of business. Nobody from the company wanted to talk to us. 36 people. Now they are suing the companies and no one knows how many people in total may have been harmed. SPI had mentioned that it was looking for a needle in a Hy for Vin Grau and his lawyer. It was a sobering look at a troubled global dollar. I am very concerned and then I realized that this whole industry needs a change and the danger we are all in, not only from Purity first, but also from others who can put anything in these little bottles and put a seal and a label on them.

By 2013, Children's Hospital of Philadelphia was tired of worrying about the quantity and quality of supplements its patients were bringing. The hospital pharmacists decided to challenge the manufacturers. Families literally show up with shopping bags

full

of dietary supplements. The regulatory problems in the United States are that you have to, if a patient brings a medication to a hospital, we as pharmacists have to verify that it is a quality product, that it is what it says, that it is labeled appropriately, that is being dosed properly, etc., we got fed up and took a step back. and we said okay, we're going to ask these companies to at least comply with a labeling standard.

They have to send us something called a certificate of analysis, which means that their product has been analyzed by an independent party that says what is on the labels. what's in the bottle 90% of the companies never responded and of the 10% that responded of that 10% they often sent us certificates of analysis where what was on the label was not even close to what was in the bottle and these were the ones who responded to us, which made us fear an industry we couldn't trust, for example, this is a water drop of vitamin D, which is why we use vitamin D in premature babies.

It says it should have 400 international units per 1 ml of However, the solution tells us that the results are 213% of the value stated on the label, so it is more than double what it says. That's right, if we're dosing premature babies who need very small doses of this medication, now we're potentially giving them double what they should be getting and it could really put them at risk for toxicity. In the end, only 35 supplements met the hospital's standards. I leave very worried and dismayed. What concerns me most is what the American public is exposed to because it is essentially a complete unknown when you buy a dietary supplement, unless you have some proof of what is in that product.

It could be anything. At the New York Botanical Garden you can find many of the herbs we buy in bottles in their natural state. This is black kohos. Commonly recommended to women to treat menopausal symptoms In 2010, gynecologist David Baker decided to check what many of his patients were taking, purchased dozens of brands of black coo supplements, and began conducting DNA tests. 30% did not have black Kash and the samples. We discovered that we could also identify the other plants and that they were ornamental plants from China. Baker and his colleagues published the results in an academic journal, but they did not receive much attention, so they continued testing other supplements and produced results that were no less disturbing more than 15% of supplements like Sal pometto or not Sal pometto uh supplements like um Devil's Claw 100% are not Devil's Claw nor are they contaminated with any other problem what I see in this is that there are those who take the easy way out fraudulently and want to put something in the bottle that is cheap and easily available and the buyer Be careful with billions of dollars at stake.

It's no surprise that the supplement industry is a powerful force in Washington. There are four separate lobby groups, the largest being the Natural Products Association.headed by manufacturer Daniel, knows many products, now you will see private brands. Many of the contract manufacturers who make the private label are also members. It is the same manufacturer Daniel who until 2014 was in charge of regulating dietary supplements at the FDA, he defends what critics have called a disturbing revolving door. People who understand an industry make regulators very effective. I think it certainly worked for the benefit of the consumer, which at the end of the day I think the FDA and the industry are in the same business. to ensure consumers have access to healthy and safe products, do you accept that there is a problem with adulteration?

Although in the natural and healthy food industry there may be some problems in the supply chain that we must be aware of, but again I believe that there are federal authorities that cover that which ensures that the products are made for you, made according to certain quality parameters. They are defined by law and if companies don't do it, there are clear consequences, so I think that's what's important and Americans have a high degree of trust in the products because of that, but just a few months after leaving the FDA, the manufacturer did not. He sounded so confident in a presentation at a Trade Association conference that he shared some of the results of the FDA inspections.

You talked about some of the findings from companies that weren't doing testing. They have no idea what they are buying or selling. they have no standards, inadequate records are kept, no specifications are set and this is a quote, the extreme of this observation is more common than expected, what I read is worse than the extreme, those are the companies we take action against, Those are the companies that we drive out of business, although I speak from my experience when I was a regulator, when we saw those problems and they were extreme, we threw the book at people and I think that is good news for consumers, since how many companies , you threw into a business, a good number.

I think we processed over 25 warrants during my time at the agency, mhm, so in an industry that has 4,000 or more manufacturers it's so significant. I got my 25, you get yours, no. a regulator I don't think that's going to happen it's significant it's very significant the division of the FDA in charge of the supplement industry is Tiny only 25 employees target companies they consider riskiest but agree the problem remains being much higher than that due to Due to the targeting and the traditional way this industry has developed over time, we see a higher proportion of inspections that we do with dietary supplements and a higher proportion of them that have substantial problems than in other categories that we regulate.

How much does that worry you? Well, of course it's a concern because ultimately this isn't about us or the companies, it's about the consumers. Many supplements may seem like prescription drugs, but there is a big difference that drug manufacturers have to prove that their products are safe and effective before putting them on the market, those who make supplements do not, unless they are introducing a new ingredient that has never been marketed before, it is an absurd and absurd system, many years in the future we will look back and say how could we possibly have done this, it took a hundred years of well thought out regulatory advances to ensure that the drugs we are now When it comes to prescription medications, they are safe and effective.

How could it be that the clock turns back to the world of the 1920s and 1930s when it can? selling something without any evidence that it is safe or effective This is the turn of the century when snake oil salesmen could sell their potions with promises they couldn't keep. In the early 1990s, the head of the FDA was David Kesler, that is absolutely False, he came to office promising stricter regulations for supplements, in particular requiring that health claims be backed by scientific evidence, the industry was went crazy, everything blew up, I mean, I've taken on some of the toughest regulatory issues, I did, uh, tobacco, tobacco seemed easy compared to U. dietary supplements what happened was the dietary supplement industry recognized that the standard that we set a significant scientific agreement would require it before you could claim it had a scientific basis and they just couldn't make any claims and they saw literally billions of dollars at stake and they unleashed a lobbying campaign that was second to none, the campaign was so dramatic as well as effective.

Hey guys, you got your only full vitam with Hollywood stars, vitamin C, like in oranges. Congress received more letters about this than they ever received about the Vietnam War Dan Hurley has written what many consider the definitive account of the industry's battle with the regulator; we heard people claim it's the FDA while David Kler was trying to convince Congress behind the scenes, another Kler was working Jerry Wrer ran a big dietary supplement The company had a very strong W character, the FDA is going to limit the potency of vitamins, which is what they said, the FDA is going to take herbs and turn them into drugs and they called all the major manufacturers to come to their ranch in California, which used to belong to Ray Croc of McDonald's, okay, so Jerry basically He stands before the group and says: this is the end of our industry or a new beginning and we have to defend our interests.

Jerry Kastler would prove to be a very effective lobbyist joining forces with powerful political friends because today we honor the wishes of 100 million dietary supplement users friends like Senator Orin Hatch of Utah, the senator who was interviewed, his state has been seen as the global center for manufacturing dietary supplements for your child. He has lobbied on behalf of the industry and created his own shares in at least one supplement company. He has never

hidden

the fact that he is a believer. We know that the American people are not a group of cooks or a group of fools and what the people want is a right. to use products that have helped them for centuries the campaign worked Jerry Kesler said forget about this law that is really going to regulate we need a law that says uh you can't regulate these products and he called it the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act. with the name Jerry Kessler made a manufacturer, the only concession the FDA got was an agreement that manufacturers would not make unproven health claims and therefore, for example, could not say that their products cure our arthritis or they prevent heart disease, but they can say that they support things like bone density they promote cardiovascular health what Congress did is basically say that the industry makes the claims and if the FDA has a problem with it, the FDA has to prove that it is false or misleading, so the horse is out of the barn, then the FDA has to confiscate the product, go to court and is burdened with 784 a bill to amend the federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act to establish standards Regarding dietary supplements, problems with the legislation would become apparent even before it was passed, the FDA was receiving complaints about popular new weight loss supplements containing an ingredient called aedra Manufacture has fought the FDA for more. a decade yesterday, Steve Beckler, 23, became the first baseball player to die.

It wasn't until a young major league pitcher died after taking a phedra whose sales stopped, called edra, by then they had been linked With more than 160 deaths with the supplement, it almost takes a slaughtered lamb to die from a liver injury or some other injury before the Food and Drug Administration can take any action. I'm Dr. Bowski. thank you, thank you for being here, Dr. Herbert Bowski is a researcher with a Liver Injury Network funded by the National Institutes of Health, let me listen to your lungs and then worry about the damage the supplements are causing and just stay there back for this.

It has been the fastest growing type of liver injury we are seeing in the Drug Induced Liver Injury Network. The frequency with which we see this has approximately tripled in the last 10 years, to about 7% of all cases we have enrolled. on this network over the years it is because of this in recent years it has been around 20% it is incredibly difficult to quantify the current problem how much damage are supplements doing yesterday I was talking to a patient who suffered a bleeding stroke in his brain after taking just one training supplement and the reason we don't know is that there is no effective system to detect harm from supplements.

Take what happened in Hawaii in the summer of 2013, there was an outbreak of liver problem. Health officials would link it to a diet and exercise supplement that we didn't know if it was something in the Hawaiian population or some type of contaminant or what exactly the problem was the state's only transplant center was overrun an initial group of seven patients grew to more than two Dozen and two of them were sick enough to need new livers. It was difficult, it was stressful because people were calling and continually referring new patients and, um, I don't have enough organs to donate.

I don't know how I could put all of these together. patients on a transplant list and possibly saving them all sad news tonight from the family of a Maui woman, mother of seven, who fell ill after taking diet pills, Department of Health reports 32 cases of liver damage or supplement dietary advice from health officials and oxy elite pro professionals Just two months before the outbreak, the makers of oxy elite pro had been pressured to recall an earlier form of oxy elite pro from the market. After years of complaints, the new version included a compound called ageline Now ageline is a normal component of the baale tree and has been used as a natural product by naturopathic healers for centuries, usually quite safely, but they did not use bail tree extract.

They purchased Ageline from a Chinese pharmaceutical company that manufactured Ageline. At least the company claimed it was Ageline and within a few months. They started seeing patients with liver failure, mostly in Hawaii, but not entirely. Cynthia Novid is a Chief Petty Officer in the U.S. Navy based in San Diego. She turned to oxy elite pro to help her pass fitness tests. She helped me keep my weight down. She helped you. I know, just give me that extra push during training and I was liking it and I knew I would take it, but only halfway through the first bottle did Cynthia's eyes start to turn yellow.

Her doctor had bad news and that's when she told me that your liver was practically destroyed. You may need a liver transplant. She would receive a transplant. The FDA has linked oxy Elite to more than 70 cases of liver damage. The company declined to be interviewed and denies any liability. Doctors in Hawaii still remember how slow the FDA was to act, saying they followed all the instructions on the agency's Medwatch website, called several times, but it wasn't until they approached state health authorities that the FDA finally called them back and they told one of our liver doctors that they thought she was a prankster because she had sent her private email address and kept bothering them and you know they didn't think we were real, they weren't taking you seriously , no, it would be nice if there was a system that you know we could use. and get some consistent results but the FDA says they have a system which is what medat is you know that well but I don't know if they're overwhelmed but the way things are is you know we're not getting as much of a response fast.

As we should probably be in Hawaii, there were reports of a group of people developing serious liver problems. The doctor in the case we spoke to repeatedly raises troubling questions. She says she and her colleagues tried to contact Medwatch. They tried to inform and they tried. to get advice from the FDA on what to do and she repeatedly says they haven't heard anything if they had heard this before. No, I can't stand to hear people say speculation and I'm not going to speculate. What I can tell you is when FDA documents arrived that alerted us to the problem in Hawaii.

We were able to remove the product in a month. At that time, 56 cases of liver damage had been reported and this was for a company that only 6 months before had another formulation there eliminated what there were. 56 cases were not reported until some time after they took the product away from us, they took the product away from us. product effectively with about 20 cases Cynthia Novida is one of the more than a hundred people who are now suing the manufacturers of oxy elite pro, a 23-year veteran of the Navy, she hoped to obtain her badge of25 years of service, that's not likely to happen now, you know I have to be able to travel and I can't do it now, I can't go on a ship because they don't carry the medications that I need, your doctors continually tell you that the price of that pill is that he will have to take 19 pills every day for the rest of his life the makers of oxy Elite deny all claims against them revealed the allegations against USP Labs and its operators, but in November 2015 the department of justice launched a criminal case against the company and arrested four of its executives on fraud charges.

Vigilants when it comes to the health and

safety

of the American public, it's a big beautiful day. omega3 is essential for good health the promises are endless the minerals your kids need but even if what you buy in those jars is real critics argue there is a bigger problem many supplements simply don't work and worse, they could be doing you harm now supplements I get this question all the time I only take four pills Our screens flash advice on how to get healthy with one pill and today I'd like to talk to you a little bit about the reputation of supplements that have been built on giving that advice that everyone should continue. take a multivitamin and multimineral product as safe against, but amid all the hype, what often gets lost is the science when people walk into the dietary supplement or vitamin store, they think everything is perfectly safe, plus be a specialist in pediatric nutrition.

Paul Offet is the best. -selling author whose book do you believe in magic questions are supplement habits, so I have vitamins for kids and vitamins for adults. The problem is that when you look at the back, you discover that several of these vitamins are contained in uh, in amounts that are much greater than the recommended daily allowance, Offet believes that we simply take too many. I think multivitamins won't hurt you, meaning vitamins at or around the recommended L daily for each of those vitamins. I mean, you need vitamins to Live, the question is do you get enough from food and I think the answer to that question is yes, but now there have been studies that show that if you use a megavitamin, you can actually harm yourself and, You may actually increase your risk of cancer. increase your risk of heart disease I think few people know the risks they are taking and how you know what is too much.

That's how you know what too much is. You should not overlook the level of satiety. Your stomach is so big for a reason. He illustrates the point with 1000 mg of vitamin C, which is one of these pills, to get the same amount of vitamin from one food source, you would have to eat seven to eight whole melons, no, you shouldn't eat eight melons, it's dangerous do to go against what nature intends, it is even worse with vitamin E. It says that this capsule has a thousand international units. You can also find vitamin E in almonds, but to get the same 1,000 units you would have to eat a lot of almonds. 1,670 to be Precise scientific studies have shown that so much vitamin E can be dangerous.

If you take large amounts of vitamin E as a supplement, you clearly and definitely increase your risk of prostate cancer, and in a better world, in a regulated world where vitamin E is a regulated product. It should have a black box warning that simply says that vitamins E and C are antioxidants and for years we have been told to take them because antioxidants are the mortal enemy of free radical cells linked to cancer and other diseases. in people, for example, who eat diets rich in fruits rich in vegetables, contain antioxidants, seem to live longer and have lower rates of cancer and heart disease, so the idea was great.

Well, now we discovered a way to make ourselves healthier. let's double down and take even higher amounts of antioxidants and that's where we cross the line and now study after study shows that it is in fact true that you can take too many antioxidants in response to the 2013 studies, one of the largest in the world. Important scientific journals published an editorial, enough is enough, they argued that the case is closed supplementing the diet of well-nourished adults with most supplements has no clear benefit and could even be harmful. Dr. alisso yr was the lead author. This could be one of the best. compounds studied in the history of humanity in terms of clinical trials, there are more than a couple hundred thousand people who have participated in clinical trials, so the conclusions that we have for antioxidant vitamins I think are very strong: the Vitamin D is not an antioxidant, but it is one of the best-selling vitamins in the United States, accompanied by information that often confuses vitamin D in choosing a vitamin and forcing everyone to think about it again in their lives.

It's vitamin D. It's true that we all need some vitamin D. The Institute of Medicine recommends that adults consume 600 international units of vitamin D3 a day, but watch the dosages, others are suggested. 5000 IUS daily are recommended. 5000. It tends to be perfect when people are initially actually on a website. I answered only three questions. My age. My height. and my weight and I was told I needed 10,000 IUS per day 16 times the IOM recommendation when I heard several groups routinely recommend 10,000 IUS per day or even 5,000 IUS per day. I really want to say: show me the data, show me the evidence evidence is what Dr.

Joanne Manson is accumulating here. She has collected blood samples from more than 25,000 people. The vital trial is, to our knowledge, the largest randomized clinical trial of vitamin D supplementation in the world. Manson is comparing disease rates between those who take vitamin D supplements and those who do not have final results will not be known until 2017, but he is already concerned that many people are taking too much vitamin D. The Institute of Medicine also recommended avoiding consuming more than 4,000 IUS daily because that could be associated with adverse calcium events. in the urine, which can be associated with kidney stones, high blood calcium, calcium in the arteries, vascular calcification and soft tissue calcification, and there are now studies showing a U-shaped curve that those who have blood levels Both high and low vitamin D have increased risks of cardiovascular disease and all-cause mortality, so we cannot assume that more is necessarily better.

The third most used supplement in the United States is fish oil. Many believe that the Omega-3s contained in the oil are essential for good health. DHA omega-3s in particular are extremely important and also help prevent disease according to the man who runs one of the largest fish oil trade associations. Unlike them, there is certainly ample evidence that it helps with things like lowering blood pressure. your risk of coronary death but the science behind fish oil is a little more complicated than that so these are two capsules this is an FDA approved product this is Dr.

Preston Mason is a researcher at Harvard University here It's comparing prescription quality fish oil to the oil found in over the counter supplements and, uh, give it a whiff, it smells a little fishy, ​​but it's not bad, it smells good, you'll always have some odor. One of the problems with fish oil is that it is delicate, it is extracted as a byproduct of the oil. Fish like anchovies, when the fish is mashed the oil is exposed to oxygen and it doesn't take much oxygen to turn it rancid. This is a common supplement for fish oil. See how it smells.

Oh, that doesn't smell good. That's all. it smells like it's bad yes sure yes it's a very strong fishy smell if it was just an odor problem that would be one thing but oxidized oil contains oxidized lipids one of the building blocks of cells we know It's been a long time since lipids when oxidized can be harmful lipids, so when oxidized, they trigger inflammatory responses within our body, particularly in our cells, and if we ingest oxidized lipids, we can trigger these inflammatory changes that can lead to things. such as cardiovascular diseases. Recently, Mason published his own study on fish oil supplements, the results were consistent with other studies showing high levels of oxidation, one in New Zealand found that 83% of the fish oils analyzed did not meet the standard of the industry.

It was shocking to see such a high proportion of products having high levels of oxidation, so we went and bought. 47 products from the New Zealand market and we tested them in several laboratories and we did not see the same effect. What was the percentage of those you discovered did not meet your standards? It was around 20%, do you agree? that 20% is still problematic, well from a consumer point of view, I mean, if it really is 20%, then yes, we would like to see that 20% improved, but improving the quality will not solve the other problem with the fish . Years ago, epidemiologist Dr.

Andrew Gray compiled the best studies on fish oil as reported in the world's most prestigious scientific journals. I think in the case of cardiovascular disease it has to be said that there is no convincing evidence that taking fish oils protects against a first heart attack or a second heart attack, so people who are advised to do so or Those who are doing it are wasting time and money, but the fish oil industry continues to insist that there is a benefit, particularly in preventing heart disease. attacks we asked their spokesperson to send us their best evidence which included some of the same studies Gray had cited and they didn't seem to support his case this one says it doesn't appear to reduce sudden cardiac death next insufficient evidence jamama 2012 Overall, supplementation with omega-3 was not associated with a lower risk of all-cause mortality.

Another journal, the evidence is unclear and the benefits are almost certainly not as great as previously believed, so that doesn't seem to suggest there is an overwhelming amount. of evidence, yeah, well, I think what you're seeing are the summaries, but the conclusions are the conclusions, but again, those articles look at very broad areas of cardiovascular disease and, you know, I think it's hard to argue that Omega Los - 3 are not important for heart function, many researchers agree that if they are obtained by eating real fish, the problem is that science has not yet proven that to be true for supplements, we would think that it is something that is natural, that it is essential for the normal functioning of cells and the body.

The function would have clinical benefits, it just needs to be proven, but in the meantime there has certainly been a lot of hype suggesting a benefit in everything from Alzheimer's disease to cardiovascular disease, but we still need robust clinical trials to validate those hypotheses. It can be said about virtually every product the supplement industry sells. Essential vitamins and minerals to help you maintain. We wanted to discuss the issues with some of the industry's most prominent advocates. So many questions. So many worries. Dr. Plus, it is loaded with beneficial vitamin D. Case in point, Dr Andrew Wild refuses to be interviewed as he continues the debate over whether supplements really work in rural G onario.

There's a botanist who may have found an answer to that other problematic question: what's really in the pills and potions we take Dr. Steven Newmaster is part of a global effort to collect and catalog nature's vast array of DNA. He believes in the power of nature to heal. I buy and use natural health products. I believe in them. I've used them all my life. Um used. With my family we have that anecdotal evidence that you have some ailment and you take any remedy and it is treated, so it is an irony that GF University was responsible for one of the last studies documenting problems with supplement quality in 2012.

Master and his team randomly selected 44 herbal products from shelves in Canada and the US and began comparing them to the plant DNA in their data bank and we looked at the results. I was quite amazed. 60% of the products contained ingredients not listed. on their labels, even more surprising, one in three turned out to be completely fake, if I put on my consumer hat, that makes me angry because I'm going to buy a product that I believe in and care about and pay a lot of money for it. Not even in the bottle, are you kidding me?

Unlike similar studies conducted in the past, this one appeared on the front page of the New York Times health section. An article that was read, among others, by the attorney general of New York last December. My office purchased a variety of brand name herbal supplements from stores in different partsNew York State's Eric Schneiderman ordered his own trial of herbal supplements that produced even worse results and found that only 21% of the products we tested had DNA evidence that they contained the product. On the label, we found the results to be shocking. We buy products from four major chains: Walmart, Walgreens, Target and GNC.

We found DNA from asparagus, DNA from houseplants, rice and other things, but not the product that was on the labels and looked like there was. there was simply massive fraud going on. The Attorney General demanded the company stop selling the products. At first, the industry questioned the methodology, but then GNC, the largest supplement retailer, agreed to use DNA barcodes to authenticate its products. However, the industry spokesperson is still not convinced. Daniel Fabricant we are working with the Attorney General's Office so that they understand more about the industry and we understand their concerns more. I think it's important that we work together.

Do you accept the findings they published? I could not. Review the findings not because they say it is an act of research but what they have told you you accept without seeing the science. I am a scientist first and foremost. I can't really comment on data I haven't seen. it's a yes or no, that's a no, you say you haven't seen the actual AG study so you can't really comment, but you have seen the Guf University study that was published a year ago . 2013 I've seen it and you know, what do you think of that? I mean quite a similar finding, well I think some have the same challenges, although it is the accreditation of the laboratory, there is no mention of reference materials.

Reference materials are essential when you do this. DNA analysis, you know, without knowing how you established a baseline, what are you comparing? The new Master's comparison was with that DNA library that he and international scientists have been collecting. We have done this now thousands, actually tens of thousands of times, for the products and the process. It works and it works very well today 14 state Attorneys General have met to demand changes not only from the industry but also from the FDA and legislators. We believe that there is responsibility in Congress and there is responsibility at the agency level and we are just going to keep pushing until we can get them to take action, thank you since that interview, federal prosecutors and regulators announced that they have taken action against over 100 companies, we see There are a number of serious problems with dietary supplements and products falsely marketed as dietary supplements that exist now. signs that at least some in the industry are adopting new technology to ensure accurate labeling.

We have implemented the use of DNA barcoding technology here in our products. I think it's a game. Chang, right, it's new and with newness comes, you know, first. Some early adopters Nature's Way is among those leading the way, the manufacturer is one of several that have now partnered with Canadian scientists in a renewed effort to put quality first, we reached out to him and we began a relationship that included testing many of our At this time, identity testing of our herbal dietary ingredients is done off-site at the U of G and Dr. the new teacher is working on some technology that possibly could be implemented commercially, take part of the sample and just put it in this.

ProThe new teacher believes that the association is just the beginning and loads it into the machine. He has further refined his barcode technology, making it cheaper and easier to use. He can start testing further back in the supply chain. What happens to that batch that arrived? It's huge. vat and it is powder the DNA is excellent because it is easy it is cheap it can be tested at the place where it is transported and the supplier is marketing and purchasing it can be tested at the producer the farmer it can be tested at all times and I think it is a way appropriate way to solve the problem, but there is still the question of what happens if any of this actually works.

We are using the herb combined with the standardized extract. The industry is quick to criticize studies that question its products, but it has failed to do so. It has not produced large peer-reviewed studies of its own with clinical trials in which supplements are tested against placebos. The crazy thing about the world of dietary supplements is that there are no such studies and the studies that are done say that the product does not work there. There is science available all the time. Consumers will continue to take supplements because they get a benefit. More than half of the country takes a supplement every day safely and effectively.

We love the idea of ​​a magic pill with something that makes everything better. It's too seductive. but it's a pill like any other pill, the only difference is that it's an unregulated pill and you don't know what's in it. For more information about this and other Frontline programs, visit our website at pbs.org. Frontline Supplements and Safety Front Lines is available on DVD to order, visit the pbs.org store or call 1 1800 playay PBS front line is also available for download on iTunes oh