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Comment by JoeAltmaier | Hacker News Reader

Ok, now to protect my health I should be taking this drug (Metformin?), taking aspirin, drinking a glass of wine, eating blueberries... what have I missed? Maybe a pill that combines all that? There's an actionable startup idea!

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Gullibitor, for people who don't question all those newspaper headlines about the latest wonder drug breakthrough. Though I will admit blueberry wine sounds like a good idea.

You're only going to take metformin if you have risk factors and/or metabolic syndrome/diabetes. Metformin has side effects. It's not as simple as aspirin.

(I'm not on it, but my wife was after our first kid was born and there was a concern about gestational diabetes).

I might be wrong, but my understanding is that metformin is remarkably safe. I know you shouldn't take it if you have kidney or liver disease, and you mentioned the risk for women who are or might become pregnant, but except in those cases, I think gastrointestinal upset is about the only side-effect.

The gastrointestinal upset is very prevalent, especially when people start taking it. It is also a good idea to avoid alcohol completely while on metformin. Metformin isn't a miracle cure - it helps reduce sugar absorption and generation by a (little) bit. Good old fashioned diet and exercise are far better, with metformin just taking the edge off. The best way of affecting long term public health is to address diet and exercise rather than giving everyone 5c pills.

Also not mentioned is that metformin can severely reduce B12 uptake. Lack of B12 can result in nervous system issues, and is very similar to neuropathy.

You have a store of several years of B12 so it can take quite a while before depletion sets in.

FWIW, the dreams of the 'end-all pill' fall short for a wide variety of reasons - one of the major ones being volume of ingredients necessary. For many recommended doses of vitamins / minerals, you simply need more than the total weight of those ingredients than can fit into a pill. The magnitude of this depends upon which supplementation schools of thought you believe in, but there is a limit to how much you can cram into a pill you can swallow.

  Fry: I can't swallow that.
  Prof. Farnsworth: Good news! It's a suppository!

Remember the aspirin has to be low-dose...

It's not a good idea to take it preemptively. Only take low-dose aspirin if you've been diagnosed with heart problems or likely to have problems in the future.

But the Internet told me it was a good idea!

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