You may have wondered why all the negative supplement stuff released in the press lately. You may have wondered why something like fish oil that has thousands of positive studies and as many human studies has become the whipping boy of the media lately.
You may have wondered why all the TV and internet docs are urging you to “use caution” when supplementing even when the science shows that most supplements are infinitely safer than prescription drugs and in some cases far more effective.
You may have wondered why, like a 2 faced politician people are touting supplements out of one corner of their mouth and vilifying them out of the other. You may have wondered why the “just eat fish” has gained momentum lately in spite of the obvious and documented risks or mercury, arsenic, lead and cadmium. All this in the face of the government’s recent admission that 70% of cancers are caused by environmental toxins.
You may have seen supposedly informed doctors making comments about “the long chain fatty acids in fish are useful the short chain fatty acids in supplements are not! So eat 2 fish meals a week.” If you’ve read my blogs and emails then you already know the ONE isolated study that suggested that was a mouse study not a human study- and mice are herbivores that process and handle Omega 3’s very differently from people. Apparently there aren’t a lot of people who know that and if they do they do not care. They would rather spread misinformation like wild fire.
Why you may ask.
Well here is the answer: money.
Big Pharma is attacking the supplement industry and they have tons more money to spend on advertising. They are also one of the 3 biggest lobbies in Washington next to insurance companies and banks both institutions that have proven totally trustworthy!
They are not stupid. They see the financial lines between money spent on drugs and supplements crossing in or around 2025 and its time for them to protect their strangle hold on your pocket book and your health.
So they attack the safety of supplementation. The implied message is: these things are potentially dangerous and should be regulated. The translation is: we want the money from the supplement industry in our pockets so we think it should be regulated to the level of prescription drugs which we control. And they have a few cases of things like ephedrine where they managed to weakly tie a death to a supplement. The thousands of deaths each year from drugs have hurt their credibility and have caused people to naturally look elsewhere for alternatives. They want to take those alternatives away.
Think I am kidding? A small relatively powerless group of pharmacists is about to either be financially castrated or eliminated entirely based on this very same premise. You may never have heard of a compounding pharmacist but they are out there serving the anti-aging community and have been for over 2 decades. Slowly but surely they are being shackled with onerous rules that in practice make it impossible for them to do what they do. All under the auspices of “unproven therapies that could be dangerous”.
Sound familiar? These same therapies are safe enough for Europeans and Asians but their science and experience does not count here. So much for globalization.
You will see more ridiculous and unfounded fear based “news” released in the coming months and years. Make no mistake it will not be good science and it will not be for the good of people. It will be to confuse and undermine your power to make decisions and take control of your own health and future.
Please educate yourself so you do not allow that to happen without a whimper. These people are very clever and they have incredible amounts of resources to throw at this “issue”.
I know this because I used to be one of them. But you and I do have something they cannot take no matter how much phony fear based nonsense they spew.
Our minds. Don’t let them fool you!
Doc
Dave, just wondering if the #synthetic# tocopherols used to keep some Omega3 supps fresh might be a possible cause of the higher incidence of ProstrateC [in that study for the higher Omega3 group] i don’t know jack by-the-way just wondering. That or mercury etc in the Omega3 rich fish they eat????
Hi, Glenn. These are both good questions. While the word synthetic conjures all kinds of bad things, in point of fact, there is absolutely no scientific data to link synthetic vitamins to anything bad, except perhaps when they are not in the proper mix. For the record, we use mixed natural tocopherols and tocotrienols in all of our products so even if there were it would not be an issue. In addition the “sofgels” do most of the protective work for us as they are airtight and reduce oxidation from oxygen to a large degree so the antioxidant doses (tocopherols and tocotrienols) are very low indeed. As far as the toxins, we know mercury in fish is cardio and CNS toxic. We know that arsenic is poisonous to the coagulation system and we know that cadmium causes shortening of the telomeres and birth defects! These are among the reasons I am cautious with fish consumption or recommending it.
Finally, please be aware there are numerous flaws in the study, the largest of which are the conclusions. I have covered these in my last 5 blogs and refer you there if you are interested. Simply put, the study has neither shown anything nor proven anything. All it has done is confuse and agitate people, which I suspect is the reason it was presented in the first place.
ok Thanks Dave
I’m so grateful for all you do Dr. Dave!
Dr. Dave… Been reading your stuff for years and you amazingly always end up being “right” about it all! Haha
I do have a question about big pharma… How in the world, or should I say America, land of the “free,” did drugs become so controlled? I am a regular supplement user, however, when I do need to use a medication, especially a “controlled” substance, It amazes me that, as an adult man, I have to jump through so many hoops and meet so many requirements just to get that medication! After consulting with a doctor, why am I not “allowed” to decide on which medication, what dosage, and for what reason I wish to use it? Instead, these substances are “locked up” away from us in a separate part of the store called the pharmacy, where it’s “guarded” by a pharmacist, who, depending on which medication I’m prescribed, looks down his nose at me with suspicion, as if I’m a criminal or may not use the medication in a way that he/she deems acceptable. It’s crazy! And now they’re trying to do the same thing with supplements?!?!? How can we stop the madness?