The vitamin industry is big and growing. Last year alone, the ‘vitamin & supplement manufacturing industry’ took in $40.9 billion, a 2.2% increase from 2022. The NIH estimates that about one-third of all US adults take multivitamins and about one-quarter of children and adolescents do too.

Rays of Hope?

While the efficacy of multivitamin is disputed by some, recent studies have touted their efficacy. In a study published in the American Journal of Clinical nutrition, researchers found the benefits of a daily multivitamin to help prevent “cognitive decline among older adults.”  However, the study was funded by Pure Encapsulations, a multivitamin company, and Pfizer INC, the global pharmaceutical company.

Vitamin D

During cold and flu season, one immune-boosting vitamin stands out – Vitamin D. Dr. Sean O’Mara, MD noted that vitamin D is “actually a hormone and it has an enormous role in our health overall health [including] immunity.” The vitamin also helps to regulate “calcium and phosphate to keep your bones, teeth and muscles strong and healthy,” according to Forbes Health.

Unfortunately, over one-third of Americans have a vitamin D deficiency. While many take the vitamin in a pill form, the best “sources of vitamin D really come from sunshine,” said O’Mara. Of course, sunshine comes in short supply during winter months in some states. In that case, foods become the best way to get vitamin D, not through an artificially produced supplement. O’Mara lists egg yolks, sardines, mackerels, salmon, grass fed beef, and beef liver as the best sources of vitamin D.

Not everyone has access to good food, though. “The food source that we have today is not the food source that our ancestors had thousands and thousands of years ago,” O’Mara said. In those cases, the doctor does recommend taking vitamins.

To find out if you have the right levels of vitamin D, O’Mara recommends getting tested. “It’s so affordable that most doctors and insurance plans will allow you to do that.”

 

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