
Vitamin B6 and B12 Supplements Appear to Cause Cancer in Men - helloworld
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2017/08/b12-energy/537654/?single_page=true
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zengid
I take a cheap men's Daily Vitamin with:

    
    
                   Amount per serving:    % Daily Value:
        Vitamin B6               3 mg               150%
        Vitamin B12            18 mcg               300%
    

which seems about typical for daily vitamins. The article states that: _The
U.S. Recommended Dietary Allowance for B6 is 1.7 milligrams per day, and for
B12 it’s 2.4 micrograms._

and that chances of cancer were found to be higher in men taking much higher
doses:

 _Lung-cancer risk among men who took 20 milligrams of B6 daily for years was
twice that of men who didn’t. Among people who smoke, the effect appeared to
be synergistic, with B6 usage increasing risk threefold. The risk was even
worse among smokers taking B12. Using more than 55 micrograms daily appeared
to almost quadruple lung-cancer risk._

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EwanG
They suggest not taking more than 55mcg, while common store varieties are
around 1000mcg.

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lkjasldfasd
Very misleading title, and terrible article. And you can't actually read the
studies, but the synopsis is far more informative then the article. And I'm
guessing excessive folate is not a good thing when you have cancer cells.

EDIT: Seriously, the title is complete fraud. Is there no honest journalism?

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nwah1
There are different forms of B6 and B12, and no actual relationship between
vitamins that share the "B" name. Almost all categories invented in nutrition
are bunk, and each individual molecule affects us differently.

P5P (B6) has different effects than the usual pyridoxine hcl (B6).
Methylcobalamin (B12) has different effects than Cyanocobalamin (B12).

Sometimes different isomers of the same molecule affect us differently.

This study is behind a paywall, but the abstract doesn't seem to mention what
forms were used. How unfortunate.

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true_religion
> Brasky: But he deferred and said he hoped this article wouldn’t be about
> regulation. “I don’t want to pick a fight with the vitamin industry for any
> reason.”

The researcher does not want an article about regulation.

Thus:

> So that falls to me.

The author of course disregards everything that an expert in his field says
about the expected outcome of an article about regulation...

Why do journalists do this? Do they want scientists to begin saying "no
comment" as much as politicians?

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nikolay
Just eat enough raw/runny egg yolks [1]: "Eggs contain 0.89 micrograms of
vitamin B-12 per 100 grams, or 15 percent of the daily value of 6 micrograms.
Each large egg contains 0.44 micrograms of vitamin B-12, or 7 percent of the
DV. This makes eggs the most concentrated source of vitamin B-12 by weight
when compared to milk and chicken."

[1]: [http://healthyeating.sfgate.com/vitamin-b12-eggs-milk-
chicke...](http://healthyeating.sfgate.com/vitamin-b12-eggs-milk-
chicken-5518.html)

~~~
theonemind
eating 14 large egg yolks per day doesn't seem feasible. this daily value
seems pretty hard to reach without supplementation.

~~~
nikolay
Well, I eat 4-6 and drink raw milk. I wonder how our predecessors survived
without supplements... In general, the daily values are not very precise! In
some cases, they are too low (vitamin C and D), and, in others, too high. It's
very similar to the recommended water intake - can you imagine people not
living near a stream getting 2-3 liters of water a day?

~~~
euyyn
> I wonder how our predecessors survived without supplements

They survived worse. Worse health, smaller size, lower lifespan.

~~~
nikolay
When you clean data from violent death, child mortality, and pandemics, our
predecessors did not live much shorter lifespans!

~~~
euyyn
Guess which body heals faster from a wound and epidemics, and is more likely
to survive childhood: one with modern nutrition, or one with our
predecessors'?

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nikolay
"Modern" nutrition is poor nutrition. Just because everybody's sipping on
(anti-nutrient-rich) kale smoothies today, it doesn't mean that we have better
nutrition. In fact, every meat has been grass-fed in the past, every fruit and
vegetable - local and organic, and there're studies that plants today (even
those that are local and organic) are much less nutritious than in the past.

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crshstsh
goodbye lovely ZMA

~~~
therein
I loved ZMA. It used to give me such a boost.

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lgats
In addition to B12, Vitamin K also increases the risk of lung cancer in
smokers.

I didn't find any evidence linking B12 to cancer by itself though, only Folic
Acid (B6).

