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Comment by wdewind | Hacker News Reader

The reality of supplements is that there is a limited number that are both safe and have strong scientific evidence backing them. Whey protein, vitamin D, ZMA, caffeine maybe a few others. If you buy those from any kind of reputable brand (Optimum Nutrition is a great place to start), there is absolutely zero risk of any of this happening. If you start taking sketchy pre-workout that boasts ridiculous improvements, then yeah you will end up getting a mixed bag of stuff. But the idea that this is hard to avoid is nonsense. Same with athletes who test positive and then blame a supplement. This problem is not at all difficult to avoid, you only find trouble if you're looking for it.

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Forgive me if I'm reading your take wrong, but I believe your general attitude is buyer beware. That is, you're assuming there are bad actors out there, and the onus is on individuals to avoid those bad actors.

My take is that it's unreasonable to expect most of the population to be mostly skeptical of the products they consume most of the time. I think most people have the feeling that things they buy at the drug store or GNC will not actively harm them; I don't think they understand that the supplement industry is essentially unregulated. I think they have about the same level of trust in supplements as they do in, say, buying meat from the grocery store. My position, then, is rather than acceding to the existence of the bad actors, we should use regulation to prevent them from existing.

An editorial from a medical researcher who thinks the FDA is under-performing in even the light regulation they have of the supplement industry: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle...

Let all the people who rely on non-approved drugs just die, lose their minds, or go to prison. They're pathetic fucking illegal-drug using peasants, anyway, amirite.

No that is not my attitude. My attitude is that the only people who are experiencing issues are shopping way outside of normal channels. Nothing you buy at GNC will be tainted with steroids.

The study takes 150 random products and finds issues with 20% of them, I guarantee those 20% are not sold at GNC, VitaminShoppe etc.

This is just really not a big problem for normal every day people.

Every day people probably buy more vitamins by volume at supermarkets and drug stores. But I see no reason to believe any distributor is safer across all products sold.

http://time.com/3741142/gnc-vitamin-shoppe-supplements/

Look at the names of the "supplements" they found issues with:

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/sda/sdNavigation.cfm?...

Literally the only surprising one on the list is Slim Fast, and it's so surprising I'm wondering if they are using extremely old stock or something. The rest of the "supplements" are dick pills with names like "Sexy Monkey."

It's just not even the same market as the weekend warrior crossfit bro who takes whey protein and maybe gasp creatine.

I buy whey protein at the grocery store, and I'm comfortable doing so because it makes no promises other than being something I can use to get some easy calories and protein. But places like GNC have lots more than just protein and creatine under "Muscle builders", "Performance Formulas", "Cleansing & Detox" and "Appetite Control". I consider those to be the same market as a bunch of the stuff on this list.

Testing for tainting with pharmaceuticals is no doubt going to find it mostly in weight loss and sex pills. Heavy metals you'll find in the herbs. Proteins would probably be more contaminated with animal/food related issues like in canning.

The general problem is that whatever you look at you are likely to find a type of contamination that isn't being checked for with the same level of oversight as the food industry or the pharmaceutical industry.

Slim Fast is not on the list.

It's crap, but it's not on the list.

https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/sda/sdNavigation.cfm?...

It is on the list, and now that I look closer, yes the stock they are using is from 2009 when Slim Fast openly advertised that they used sibutramine. They have since stopped, so this list is somewhat suspect.

Sorry, I was referring to the well-known USA SlimFast retail product from SlimFast, owned by Kainos Capital (formerly Unilever).

The "Slim Fast" that is on this FDA list is a knock-off from "Universal ABC Beauty Supply International, Inc."

Ah, I owe you an apology then. I was super confused when I saw it on the list, and found a bunch of stuff related to Slim Fast and sibutramine but I guess I didn't read it close enough. Thanks for the clarification.

No problem. I missed that it was a multiple page list in the first place and missed the "Slim Fast" name altogether.

You are correct that most of the supplements in this study are not sold at retail, as explained in the article:

> Since FDA sampling has focused on dietary supplements found online or through import screenings, this data analysis does not indicate the prevalence of these adulterated supplements at retail locations.

But I would not have confidence in what is sold at retail. A 2015 operation by NY state found problems with supplements sold by GNC, Target, Walgreens and Walmart: https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/02/03/new-york-attorney-... Granted, I don't think they found any actual drugs in the supplements, but many of the supplements did not contain what they claimed to contain, and some of what they did contain are potential allergens.

> Nothing you buy at GNC will be tainted with steroids.

Didn't GNC sell Superdrol and other designer steroids and pro-hormones?

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