Taking Research the Way I Take My Vitamins (Cautiously)

In this Post:

• vitamin D
• vitamin E
• vitamin B
• vitamin C
• vitamins

One of the best things about blogging is that it's so fast-it really is an awful lot like opening your mouth and starting a conversation (with a whole bunch of people). But because of that speed, you're going to read this post long before you see my name on the masthead of the magazine. So let me introduce myself. A new deputy editor at Reader's Digest (one of two), I'm going to be responsible for the magazine's health and medical coverage-the breakthroughs and the blunders, the big-picture questions (what in the world are we going to do to make healthcare more affordable?) and the small stuff that sometimes seems to matter a whole lot more (what kind of thermometer is easiest to use when your kid is screaming at 2 AM?). It's a subject I love. It's always interesting, and only gets more so the longer I cover it. Which is good, because I've been covering it a long time-nearly 25 years, as a reporter and an editor for newspapers, weeklies, and magazines.

One thing I've learned in that time is not to get too fond of theories, no matter how persuasive and no matter how much I'd like them to be true. Because in journalism and in science, great stories have a way of being ruined by pesky facts. That's what seems to be happening now with vitamins. Scientists have had good reason to think that vitamins C and E, along with some of the B vitamins, would protect against heart disease. And there was a really good theory to explain why some vitamins (like some Bs, as well as E and C) ought to help ward off cancer. But earlier this month, a major study concluded that neither E nor C reduced the risk of "major cardiovascular events"-heart attacks, strokes, and the like. (In fact, E seemed to increase the risk of one kind of stroke.) A few weeks earlier, another big study concluded that B vitamins didn't guard women against cancer, at least not those under age 65. And this summer another study delivered a big blow to a really great idea: the notion that folic acid and other B vitamins could protect against heart attack by lowering levels of a substance called homocysteine. Researchers still think homocysteine is bad stuff-high levels have been associated with a higher risk of heart problems. And in the study, the vitamins did bring down homocysteine levels. But unfortunately, that didn't do the volunteers any good, heart-wise.

But don't give up on vitamins just yet-at least, not all of them. This is the year (or maybe the decade) of vitamin D. There's increasing evidence that vitamin may help protect against aches and pains, lower your risk of infection, and help prevent a wide variety of serious ills, including breast cancer, multiple sclerosis, maybe even schizophrenia. In fact, researchers at Johns Hopkins this past August concluded that a lack of the vitamin can substantially increase the risk of death. That's strong stuff-important stuff, especially since there's a lot of research suggesting that a very high percentage of Americans are deficient in D.

I'm not big on taking pills, but I have a bottle of vitamin D tablets in my cupboard and actually manage to remember to take one on a fair number of mornings. As for the other vitamins? The news on them reminds me to take everything else with a grain of salt.

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