> No explanation is given why any supplement is unhealthy. That's the first thing.
An extreme example to illustrate the point: if you eat a random plant and drop dead, I'm not going to look for an explanation, I'm going to avoid eating that plant until I can prove that your death was caused by another factor. Likewise, if taking vitamin supplements appears to result in a negative effect on overall health rather than the expected positive, the smart thing to do is stop taking them until you can demonstrate otherwise, is it not?
> Secondly, the context in which this occurs is that various government agencies and professional guilds want to prohibit the sale of supplements, or impose ridiculous 'standards' on their manufacture and testing.
Source for this?
> However, it's very important that people remain free to choose which non-prescription chemicals to put in their bodies.
Indeed, it's also important that people are well educated in the effects of those non-prescription chemicals and are in full possession of the known facts about their effects. Such is the aim of studies like this.
> Medics and pharmacists don't always get it right, they are difficult to consult, and they are as subject to whim and fashion in their thinking as other professions.
Maybe so, but they know a lot more about the human body than those who don't study it, since that is by definition their job. Besides, the great thing about science is that anyone can dive in and have a go at proving or disproving something so if you disagree with the conclusions in this article, run some research of your own and prove them wrong.
> Meanwhile, only a handful of people die annually from vitamin overdose, whereas hundreds of thousands people die who take prescription drugs (yet we don't say that there's no justification for prescription drugs).
Sources for either of those statements?
Your issue with prescription drug-taking is entirely separate; you might as well argue that thousands of people die driving yet we don't say there's no justification for driving.