Should I Take Dietary Supplements? Will They Benefit My Health?
Takeaways
While most of us can hit the Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs) for various vitamins and minerals through eating a healthy diet, it would be challenging to hit the Optimum Daily Allowances (ODAs) without supplementation.
A common reason is that modern agricultural and food processing practices have reduced the micronutrient content in our food compared with just a decade ago.
That said, though, it's worth remembering that supplements are not a replacement for eating a healthy diet.
There is no magic pill when it comes to maintaining our health and preventing chronic diseases. When it comes to good nutrition, eating a balanced diet and reducing the amount of saturated fat, trans fat, sodium and sugar we consume are key.
While we are familiar with eating a good mix of macronutrients, many of us do not realize that it is also important to get sufficient amounts of micronutrients, such as vitamins and minerals in our diet. Most of these vitamins and minerals cannot be manufactured by our body, and food is the best way to get your daily fix of vitamins and minerals.
However, it can be hard to consume enough fresh vegetables, fruits, whole grains, fibre, and protein to meet our micronutrient needs. Supplementation, while not a substitute for a healthy diet, can be an effective way to boost your nutrient intake.
For most of us, the amount of food we need to consume to meet our micronutrient requirement would be difficult to achieve. Take fibre as an example, for an average person on a 2000 calorie diet, the recommended fibre intake would be 25g per day. One portion of vegetables contains an average of 3g dietary fibre. This would mean at least 8 portions of vegetables will be needed per day to hit dietary fibre goal.
Moreover, even as we try to eat whole foods as far as possible, with our modern lifestyle and diet, the food we consume is often highly processed. This means we might be getting even less nutrients from the food we eat now, than even just a decade ago, making it even harder to meet our micronutrient needs through diet alone.
What nutrients do we need and how much is sufficient?
While the Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs) have been the widely accepted standards since the early 1940s, recent studies have shown that RDAs fall short when it comes to promoting optimal health and preventing chronic diseases. RDA was initially established to protect people against severe, acute nutrient deficiency diseases such as scurvy for vitamin C deficiency and beriberi for vitamin B1 deficiency, but not to promote good health.
Optimum Daily Allowances (ODAs) would be a better standard given that they are ranges of nutrient doses prescribed by nutrition-oriented doctors. The ranges were concluded based on thousands of published peer-reviewed studies that determined the nutrient levels necessary to prevent and treat chronic degenerative diseases, and promote good health.
Take Vitamin E as an example, while RDA is merely 30 IU, ODA is set to be at least 400 IU. To obtain 400 IU of vitamin E, this would mean consuming 1 kg of almonds, 13 kg of spinach, or 22 kg of butter every day - not something anyone can realistically achieve!
In the diagram below, we see that with a good diet, most of us can meet the RDA benchmark. However, if we want to meet the ODA benchmark, even with a good diet, it is extremely challenging. This is where high-quality supplements would play a role, to help our hit our ODAs sustainably, in the long run.
Source: Patrick Holford
If you have a chronic condition or are on medication, you may be more prone to nutrition deficiencies due to your condition or medication. You may also benefit from supplementation to improve control of your condition. Read this article to learn more.
What are some factors that contribute to reduced micronutrient content in the foods we consume?
Increased processing of food
The food we consume now is increasingly processed. Much of the food we see in the supermarkets are now made from corn, wheat or soybean, which are then processed and flavored. This means that many of the convenience foods or snacks we consume are actually similar in composition and do not actually provide us with the variety of nutrients we need.
Climate change
There is debate about how rising carbon dioxide is depleting nutrients from food crops. This effect is purportedly observed across most plant types, from trees, grasses to edible crops. This results in a decline of essential nutrients in our staple foods that affects almost every single person in the world. It is anticipated that by 2050, hundreds of millions of people will fall below the minimum requirement for nutrients, such as iron, zinc, and protein, needed for basic functional health if this trend continues.
Increasing use of fertilizers
The increasing use of fertilizers and pesticides adversely reduces soil quality and also reduces nutritional content in our plant crops. This happens due to a change in crop cycle - crops now grow to maturity more quickly and are harvested sooner resulting in a decrease in nutritional content.
Summary
Supplements are not a replacement for eating a healthy diet
While most of us will be able to hit the Recommended Dietary Allowances (RDAs) through eating a healthy diet, it would be challenging to hit the Optimum Daily Allowances (ODAs) without supplementation
Modern agricultural and food processing practices have reduced the micronutrient content in our food compared with just a decade ago
