Health Foods: claims and lies

Do you eat cod liver oil pills to enhance your intellect? Do you take multivitamin supplements like vitamin C because it cures every illness known to man? If so, I regret to form you...

It's all lies.

Well, not exactly, pharmaceutical companies would get in a spot of trouble if they did lie to you - maybe a better term would be misleading. For example, let's look at a study in an English secondary school that looked into the effects of "essential fatty acids" on intellect and behaviour (essential in this sense means the chemical cannot be made by the body). The research found that supplements such as omega-3 increased intellect and behaviour. Wow.

Let's take a closer look at this.

The research I am referring to, which took part in the Durham area, did not include a control group. Already, anybody with GCSE experience will have alarm bells ringing, what use is research data if there is nothing to compare the results to? Lack of a control group also meant that increases due to the placebo effect could not be subtracted from the results - the research was widely followed by the lively British media and the school itself was being invested in heavily by the government anyway (the school was failing). The result of the research? The children's results were improved by roughly 5% by an 80p a day pill supplement (for comparison, the government spends 60p a day per pupil on school meals). Add this to the fact that before the trial the researchers (a phamaceutical company) stated they strongly expected positive results implies that there was quite a bit of conflict of interest. This is a classic case of research by phamaceutical companies missing crucial parts like a control group - so that their research cannot be properly analysed for legitimacy of the effects nor 100% disproved without further research (which is usually very expensive).

Let's look at this whole issue from another perspective. Friendly bacteria, you know those drinks that put "friendly bacteria" into your digestive system? What is the point of said digestive system? To digest stuff, your brain isn't going to say "oh noes, it's good for me, better leave it be" - it's going to put the enzymes apart and tear that bacteria apart as best it can.

On a lot of other products the packaging will include some quite true comments, such as "collogen is an important part of tissue" this is completely true. Unfortunately, smearing cream containing collogen won't mean it will be magically absorbed into your skin. Think about it, the job of the skin organ is to keep stuff out of the body, it's really quite impermeable - you are only take stuff orally. From another perspective, does sitting in a bath of baked beans make you fat? Does your body physically absorb the baked beans into your skin there and then? No. These kind of "true but false" claims are in many expensive moisturiser products, which I like to add are usually no more good than cheap stuff like Vaseline or other stuff you can buy by the gallon without needing a re mortgage.

Another topic are the copious headlines such as "drinking wine causes lower heart disease rates".

Sounds good, but most of these headlines are conclusions drawn by journalists - as in people who usually are without proper science qualifications. Their conclusions often don't take in other factors, they simply assume that wine causes less heart disease. The body doesn't work like that, it's far more complex. Think about it, who drinks the most wine? The middle class and women. Women have lower heart disease anyway, and the middle classes are more likely to be healthier due to more money for better quality foods and healthier stuff too (like fruits and vegetables), also they are more likely to have more leisure time and thus more exercise. All these factors can lessen the chance of getting heart disease.

In conclusion, be skeptical of all claims you read on health products, remember that the body isn't as simple as phamaceutical companies claim. Furthermore, a lot of research findings are cherry picked, don't always believe research by organisations that could include a conflict of interests  - pharmaceutical companies are there to make billions of £s, not reduce the amount of wrinkles on your face!

Oh, and the answer/cure to everything under the sun is definitely not usually contained within a tiny white pill. Or vitamin C/D/E.

I advise reading Bad Science by Ben Goldacre, it inspired me to rant about this topic and is a great read!