The use of dietary supplements containing antioxidants increases the death rate
Last reviewed: 16.10.2021
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The use of supplements containing antioxidants, increases the mortality rate, both patients with various diseases, and healthy people. This conclusion was reached by an international group of researchers led by Christian Gluud (Christian Gluud) from the University Hospital of Copenhagen, Denmark.
Glyud and his colleagues from Italy and Serbia analyzed the data of 78 studies, in which almost 300,000 volunteers took part. About 80 thousand of them suffered from digestive, cardiovascular, excretory, nervous and endocrine diseases, as well as eye and skin diseases.
More than 180 thousand participants of the study on average received biologically active supplements (BAA) with antioxidants, including vitamins A, E and C, beta-carotene (provitamin A) and selenium for two years. The control group included 113 thousand volunteers.
According to the results of the study, 11.7 percent of the members of the first group died. In the control group, lethal outcome was recorded in 10.2% of participants. More pronounced differences in the proportion of deaths were obtained for specific supplements, in particular for vitamin E (12 and 10.3 percent, respectively) and beta-carotene (13.8 and 11.1 percent). In the case of taking vitamins A and C, as well as selenium, the difference in mortality with the control group was statistically insignificant.