| The question of whether we should take food | | | | massive quantities of toxic substances, chemicals |
| supplements has been debated endlessly, and | | | | in our food, water, and the air we breathe. Could |
| there is no single answer that all will agree to. | | | | evolution possibly have dealt with that through |
| When I first took an interest in diet and health, | | | | evolution, in such a short space of time? My |
| and supplementation, more than 20 years ago, | | | | common sense told me no. While a virus can |
| the standard view of doctors was that you do | | | | change rapidly, the human body cannot. |
| not need food supplements. Eat and drink a good | | | | I decided to err on the side of caution and have |
| diet, and you will get all the vitamins and minerals | | | | taken a general vitamin and mineral supplement |
| you need - that was what doctors would say. | | | | ever since. Have I benefitted from that long term |
| That was the public view anyway, although I | | | | use? I am certain I have, but that is not science. |
| could not help but note, when I visited the home | | | | However, I did observe a notable drop in |
| of a doctor I knew in England, that he had a good | | | | incidences of colds and flu. When I worked in |
| supply of multivitamins and minerals on a kitchen | | | | London, I would get 7 or 8 bugs a year; that |
| shelf. He also had a couple of other vitamin | | | | quickly dropped to 2 or three after taking the |
| bottles, vitamin E and one other I fail to | | | | supplements, and with a faster ability to recover. |
| remember after all this time. Interestingly, he had | | | | That had a knock on effect of reducing incidences |
| always been a "scotch in the evening" man, but | | | | of iritis, which tended to follow a cold or flu when |
| had suddenly switched to red wine. I made no | | | | I was run down. |
| comment, just smiled inwardly. I was a red wine | | | | One thing I noticed a few years later was that |
| drinker anyway, and I had been taking a general | | | | two large cysts I had had since a teenager, or |
| multivitamin and mineral for some time already. | | | | maybe earlier, had gone. One enormous cyst by |
| By the early 80's, the health food revolution was | | | | my knee had quietly disappeared, and a smaller |
| already under way, and the food supplement | | | | one on my arm too. Any connection? There is no |
| industry preparing for rapid growth over the next | | | | scientific evidence that there is a connection. But |
| 25 years. I ignored what doctors were saying, | | | | those cysts were seemingly there for life, and |
| and started taking a general multivitamin and | | | | the only change I could think of that could have |
| mineral supplement. I did so through common | | | | made them disappear was the addition of |
| sense and logic, for the following reasons: | | | | multivitamins and minerals. |
| 1. A good diet may have provided all the vitamins | | | | Things have come a long way since then, and |
| and minerals needed 200 years ago, so in a way | | | | doctors are more likely to advise patients to use |
| the doctors were probably right. | | | | a vitamin supplement. In the Philippines, where I |
| 2. The human body had evolved very slowly over | | | | now live, doctors encourage the use of |
| thousand of years, always with plenty of time to | | | | multivitamins from a young age, or single |
| adapt to environmental changes. Over the last 2 | | | | supplements, such as folic acid for pregnant |
| centuries, though, and especially the last 50 years, | | | | women, when needed. At least I no longer feel |
| the human body has been bombarded with | | | | like a supplement rebel. |