A-It depends on where you are coming from and what culture. Again if you get variety in your diet there is probably no need for vitamin and mineral supplement.

Most people get enough variety in their diet so they don't need a supplement but there are exceptions to that rule. If you are pregnant or lactating or if there is some other need for vitamins and minerals then it is probably a good idea. You kind of need to go off your doctors recommendations.

Q- Would age be a factor?

A-Yes, there are quite a few areas where you may need a supplement. You know supplements can be expensive. Some may be dangerous. It depends on the kind of vitamins and minerals you are talking about.

You know they break down into water soluble and fat-soluble and there are the vitamins they call oil soluble. There are four of them, vitamins A, D, E, and K. Typically there is more concern with the oil soluble vitamins because they are not excreted from your body, unlike the water soluble vitamins like B and C, the excess will get flushed but with the oil soluble vitamins the excess is retained in your body.

That can get to be a problem if you are for some strange reason taking excessive amounts of let's say vitamin D for example. I think the recommendation is 400 international units. Well there have been people that have taken many multiples of that like 25,000 international units of that and there are health consequences for doing that.

It comes down to someone not having a balanced background and information to fall back on and they just do it because they are naïve. You know it may start out as a doubling of the recommended daily allowance and they think, "well I'm not seeing any results so I will triple it." Some of the vitamin companies that manufacture these are no help because they will introduce products in the marketplace and where one capsule will deliver a mega dose of the product it can be confusing to people. You know if one is safe to take then why are they marketing those products in that amount in the first place?

It just gets to be like a power struggle even with the manufacturers of those products. People will think that if a little bit in a tablet is good then more will be better and we go back to that philosophy well how much can we get for our dollar then we start to think in terms of mega dose amounts.

I don't understand that whole thought process. There are very well documented cases of overdoses and the consequences of taking too much of one vitamin and minerals in the medical journals. It isn't a mystery it is out there and you just have to be careful. Most supplements if you will look on the labels will tell you how much to take.