DO YOU NEED SUPPLEMENT INSURANCE: A SECOND LOOK AT PILL-POPPING!

Do we all need to be getting more vitamins and minerals than can possibly come in from our daily platter of foods?

Possibly, yes. This fence-straddling recommendation stems from the fascinating ongoing story of vitamins which can be told as a two-part serial. In part I, which spanned two centuries, the most exciting findings related to the fact that diets deficient in certain substances (unnamed at the time) were responsible for some of the most debilitating health scourges known to man: scurvy, beri-beri, rickets, night blindness, fatal anemia. Ensuring a diet that contained these substances — known as 'vital amines', and later, 'vitamins' — put the stopper on these diseases of deficiency, as they were called. Today they are rarely heard of, or seen by most doctors.

Part II of the vitamin story began, in effect, just three decades ago when a clutch of maverick scientists, led by the redoubtable Nobel Laureate, Linus Pauling, started claiming a role for vitamins that went much beyond preventing scurvy or anemia. Vitamins, they said, could prevent or delay some of the most serious/chronic ailments of our time — cancer, heart disease, cataracts, lung disease, even aging! That there was more to their claims than marketing machismo became evident as serious research gradually began backing them up. One group of vitamins — A, C and E — for instance, have become known as the anti-oxidant vitamins. They help to clear our tissues (the theory goes) of damaging substances known as oxidants — for instance, tobacco smoke, pollutants, ultra-violet radiation. The build-up of these toxic substances is said to cause degenerative changes in the DNA of cells, promoting cancer, cataracts, even aging.

So, should we all be popping vitamin supplements to derive these attractive health bonuses? Several doctors and medical researchers privately admit to taking much larger amounts themselves than laid down by the RDAs (the official Recommended Daily Allowances). But few are ready to go public with advice.

Such a prescription waits upon further knowledge. Today we know the vitamin dosages you need to prevent deficiencies (the RDAs mentioned in the table, "Vitamins: WHICH, WHY, HOW MUCH?"). In all probability, you'll need to take higher doses to gain the extended benefits that science is claiming for most vitamins today. But how much higher exactly? No official body is ready to say.

Many physicians and researchers sound a cautionary note because megadoses of vitamins or minerals, say 10 to 100 times the RDA, can act like drugs, with potentially serious outcomes. In large doses, they can upset the normal balance of other nutrients.

Also, a seriously unbalanced diet cannot be corrected simply by popping a vitamin pill.

What is certain, however, is that more and more doctors are reposing less and less faith in that old nostrum that, "You can get all the vitamins you need from the foods you eat."

Special Needs

Liven those doctors who disparage the use of supplements by healthy persons as a "waste of money" do concede that there are cerium times (such as post-convalescence) or habits [such as smoking) when vitamin supplements ma> be needed.

You may need supplements if you:

Smoke: Vitamin C

Drink an excess amount of coffee: Vitamin B. Potassium. Zinc.

Overindulge in alcohol: Vitamin B-Complex. Mineral supplement

Are under severe stress: Vitamin H-Complex. Vitamin C

Have recently undergone surgery: Vitamin C

Have recently suffered from infection: Vitamin C and H-complex

Have suffered exposure to severe environmental pollutants: Vitamin C

Are on birth-control pills: Vitamins B6, B12, B1 C and E

Are menopausal: Calcium tablets with Vitamin D

Are anaemic: Iron

Suffer from heavy menstrual bleeding: Iron

Are a vegan (follow a diet that excludes not only meat and fish but also all dairy products and eggs): Vitamins D and B12, Calcium, Zinc and, especially, Iron.

Your body can often tell you whether you need to take supplements. Look for these signs:

Puffy eyes could indicate a deficiency of vitamins A and C

Dark under-eve circles could be caused by anaemia, requiring iron.

A sore tongue indicates possible anaemia due to lack of iron and B12

A very red, uncoated tongue with a crack in the centre can hint at stomach and kidney problems caused probably by poor nutritional status and a deficiency of certain vitamins.

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