Last year, researchers published new findings from the Women’s
Health Initiative, a long-term study of more than 160000 midlife women. The data
showed that multivitamin-takers are no (36) than those who
don’t take the pills, at least when it comes to the big diseases-cancer, heart
disease, and (37) "Even women with poor
diets weren’t helped by taking a multivitamin," says study author Marian
Neuhouser, PhD, in the cancer (38) program at the Fred
Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, in Seattle. Vitamin
(39) came into fashion in the early 1900s, when it was
difficult or impossible for most people to get a wide variety of fresh fruits
and vegetables year-round. Back then, vitamin (40) diseases
weren’t unheard-of: the bowed legs and (41) ribs caused by a
severe shortage of vitamin D, or the skin problems and mental (42)
caused by a lack of vitamin B. But these days, you’re
(43) unlikely to be seriously deficient if you eat an
average American diet, if only because many packaged foods are vitamin-enriched.
Sure, (44) . "Multi vitamins have maybe two dozen
ingredients--but plants have hundreds of other useful compounds," Neuhouser
says. " (45) ." That said there is one group
that probably ought to keep taking a multi-vitamin: women of reproductive age.
The supplement is insurance in case of pregnancy. (46)
.