There’s been a lot of press lately regarding the safety of nutritional supplements. Let’s look at the facts—and the hype.
First, let’s compare the risks of supplements to the perils of everyday life. Every year in this country, 9,000 people are injured by fireworks. Millions sustain burns, many of them in kitchen accidents, and 4,500 of them die. More than 500,000 people are seen in emergency rooms for injuries sustained while riding bicycles, resulting in an average of 700 fatalities per year. About 3,600 Americans die from choking on food and other objects. Even food itself is risky, causing 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 5,000 deaths a year!
Where do supplements fit in? According to the most recent annual report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers, not a single death was attributed to a nutritional supplement in 2008. You’re more likely to die from lightning strikes, bee stings, dog bites, or diesel exhaust than from nutritional supplements—and you’re far more likely to be harmed by eating food.
There is one class of consumer products, however, that kills more people than handguns, automobiles, street drugs, and every type of poison combined. Each and every year, at least 106,000 patients die in our hospitals from adverse reactions to prescription drugs while under medical supervision. (This doesn’t count the untold numbers who die of medication side effects outside of hospitals.) Going with the conservative in-hospital figure, that’s 290 deaths per day, day in and day out—close to the equivalent of a 747 going down every single day.
Damage is not limited to prescription drugs. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as ibuprofen and aspirin kill 16,500 Americans every year and send 103,000 to the hospital with gastrointestinal bleeding. Now, add to these figures the two million people (5,500 per day) who have adverse drug reactions that require hospitalization or cause permanent damage.
Where is the hue and cry over this? If any other consumer product had this dismal a record of safety, it would be history. Yet we rarely see exposés on the dangers of pharmaceuticals—until one of them kills hundreds of people and is yanked off the market.
Remind me again why supplements are under such scrutiny
