Posted on 09/08/2014 6:59:46 PM PDT by LibWhacker
If you are taking vitamins, there is a good chance that they were imported from China.
An aging population and growing focus on health in the United States has fueled the growth of a $28 billion vitamin and nutritional supplement market, and it is expected to continue to grow at about 3 percent a year.
Over half of American adults are popping vitamins and supplements. They may not be aware they are eating products made in China, or made using raw materials from China.
China has captured over 90 percent of the Vitamin C market in the United States, according to the Seattle Times. Think about how many labels advertise added Vitamin C. Vitamin C goes into many food and drink products—almost all processed food for humans as well as pets contains Vitamin C.
The consumer has no way of knowing the added vitamin C comes from China, because there is no rule requiring labeling the country of origin for ingredients.
This may raise quite a few eyebrows as Chinese food safety scandals make headlines every day.
Here are five facts any consumer of vitamins should know.
1. Only 2 percent of all imported vitamins and other supplements are inspected. Why? Vitamins and supplements are classified as “food” by law and therefore not subject to the tough regulatory scrutiny of prescription drugs.
2. China’s top vitamin and supplement production areas are among the most polluted in the country (and thus in the world).
Vitamins and nutritional supplements usually use agricultural products as key raw materials. The top vitamin exporting province, Zhejiang, has an alarming level of soil pollution from heavy metal. As matter of fact, one-sixth of China’s farmlands are heavily polluted.
For example, rice planted in several key agricultural provinces was reported to contain excessive Cadmium, a metal commonly found in batteries, coloring, and the industrial waste from making plastic. It may cause serious kidney disease.
Irrigation water is a nightmare: Half of the country’s major water bodies are polluted, as are 86 percent of city water bodies. Pollution is largely caused by the country’s numerous factories, which rarely have equipment for treating pollution. Seventy to 80 percent of the country’s industrial waste is directly emitted into rivers.
3. Even those labeled as “organic” are not safe, since USDA organic standards place no limit on levels of heavy metal contamination for certified organic foods.
4. Approximately 6,300 Americans nationwide complained about adverse reactions to dietary supplements between 2008 and 2012, according to FDA statistics. But the actual number may be more than eight times higher, some experts say, because most people don’t believe health products can make them sick. While not all such problems would be caused by pollution in China, that pollution may have played a role.
5. Worst of all, China-made vitamins are everywhere, and even those who do not consume vitamins and supplements can hardly escape. Many vitamins end up as ingredients in items like soft drinks, food, animal feed, and even cosmetics.
As much as the “political” smells...at the local “health food” stores around here are really “progressive” .I always buy by nutritional stuff from them.
the vitamin shoppe is a good alternative to both drugstore brands and health food store Attutide...and pricing.
http://www.vitaminshoppe.com/store/en/vitamins_minerals/index.jsp
If you have a medically confirmed vitamin or mineral deficiency, then you might need a supplement. Otherwise, your body just filters out all the supplements that you take.
There is research just getting underway that examines the long-term effects of taking large doses of vitamins and minerals you don’t need. It probably is not a healthy practice.
If I don’t trust China to make treats for my dog why would I trust them to make vitamins for me?
How do you know the source of the product is not American, or actually from the China?
lots of people dont assimilate the supplements that they take...
many of us...in the millions its suspected.. cant assimilate many of the supplements available
Not all supplements are compounded the same...hence the wide...range of opinions on whether...supplements IN GENERAL ..work.
I check with a “manufacturers” website and or phone them
Sun Chlorella...made in Japan...cant be beat.
there are studies backing their claims as well
It’s not pretty much proven that vitamins provide NO HEALTH BENEFITS if you eat a reasonably balanced diet (nothing special...but eat more than just pork, for example).
So if the Chinese want to ply us with contaminated pills, no skin off my back.
“Well, we talked about more than that single approach (although it is the gold standard).”
Typically not. Most studies like this are funded by drug companies. Subsequent independent studies tend to show worse results than initially reported.
The study is most often short-term. No one has any idea of the results of taking those drugs long-term. No one has studied that.
The studies do not look beyond enough evidence to make claims the FDA will approve in order to market the drug to doctors.
No one does tests to see if these drugs promote cancer or other diseases.
Finally, despite “the gold standard” of these studies, after approval and “success”, a great number of these drugs kill people - like Vioxx (somewhere around 60,000, I read once). How can a “gold standard” result in death, if it is the ultimate test?
“Your link basically boils down to: Not demonstrably helpful, but not harmful either.”
I respectfully disagree.
Also, this is simply one link. If your doctor looked outside his field, or read other scientific journals in additional fields like clinical nutrition, he would see things his discipline never considers.
best.
Other than shilling a supplement, I see not a single link to a clinical study of any kind.
If you get enough vitamins and minerals from your diet, there is absolutely no need to take pills. Either you get enough, or you don’t, and taking more than you need does you absolutely no good, and may actually be harmful.
Big Vitamin really has a racket going.
Many prescription drugs are also produced in China, particularly the generics. (Not sure if the article mentioned that.)
I do everything I can to avoid anything made in Red China. They killed an estimated 60 million of the their own -- all contemporaneous events for me since Mao's "agrarian reformers" took over. They sure don't give a sh!t about a few of us Americans.
the vitamins and mineral content in even the best of foods...is nowhere nearly what it was even fifty years ago.
The soils been BURNT OUT.
modern farming doesnt allow for the soil...from whence the vitamins and minerals come....toi rest and be replentished.
Yes there are plenty of BIG vitamn companies that sell JUNK
Not all supplements are the same.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23381814
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23402318
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22116695
pages and pages and pages. And that’s just a search for ‘intravenous ascorbate’.
search engines are our friends..
heres one result per a study
My Medical Doctor is their US spokesman btw.
the proof is in the pudding
Do you read your own posts?
>>CONCLUSIONS:
Data suggest pharmacologic ascorbate administered concurrently with gemcitabine is well tolerated. Initial data from this small sampling suggest some efficacy. Further studies powered to determine efficacy should be conducted<<
>>The ability of ascorbate to reduce platelet aggregation and P-selectin expression could be an important mechanism by which ascorbate inhibits capillary plugging in sepsis.<<
>>Therefore, it may be possible to improve microvascular function in sepsis by using intravenous vitamin C as an adjunct therapy.<<
Not a single definitive statement, just some statements of hope.
These mostly CLEAR Vitamin C as benign. Nothing that says it actually DOES something.
>>While this clinical study is relatively small and still preliminary, it adds to our growing understanding of how chlorella helps you feel great. <<
>>As this new research indicates, chlorella may be just what your body needs!<<
You people need to read your attempts at proof.
Nothing definitive, just some hopeful optimism.
I doubt these will be “rigourous” enough.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2048599/
“Although calcium and vitamin D3 supplements alone have been proven to be beneficial in frail, institutionalised patients,6 it has recently been shown to be less use in the general population.7 The NICE guidelines,5 therefore, recommend starting all patients who sustain a fragility fracture on a bisphosphonate as well as calcium and vitamin D3 supplements (raloxifene and teriparatide are second-line treatments if patients cannot tolerate bisphosphonates). Etc”
and.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18443709
“CONCLUSION:
The high prevalence of vitamin D insufficiency (78%) observed in this study affirms the importance of incorporating vitamin D supplementation in hospital-based fracture care pathways. The discharge pathway was more effective than the newer admission pathway, a finding attributable to effects of familiarity, retraining, and introduction of computer-prompts. These evolving pathways represent a much-needed paradigm shift in the care of fragility fracture patients.”
There are apparently doctors who think vitamin D and calcium supplements work, certainly for those with bone loss or fractures.
http://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements/vitamin-d/background/hrb-20060400
General layman info on supplements here:
http://www.mayoclinic.org/drugs-supplements
(Not all the reviews of supplements are positive.)
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