“Health supplements” could adversely affect health: report

So called ''healthy supplement'' could negative consumers' health, reports US consumer magazaine Consumer Reports.

Supplement makers are mostly not required to prove that their products were safe or that they worked as advertised. They also do not  have to prove that packages contained what the labels said they did. According to commentators given the weak regulations, dietary supplements could be contaminated, ineffective or spiked with illegal or prescription drugs, which could cause harmful side effects.

Fifty per cent of US consumers believed that supplement makers test their products for effectiveness, a survey has found. Also 38 per cent believed that supplements were tested for safety by the Food and Drug Administration.

However, according to the Council for Responsible Nutrition representing supplement manufacturers, supplements were adequately regulated and that the vast majority were safe.

However, Consumer Reports identified 15 supplement ingredients that have been linked to serious health hazards.

For instance, people used yohimbe for obesity, sexual dysfunction and depression, but were nat aware that it could raise blood pressure and heart rate, and cause headaches, panic attacks, seizures, liver and kidney problems, and possibly death.

The magazine found 15 supplement ingredients in products sold by major retailers such as GNC, Costco, CVS, Walmart and Whole Foods.

The report said the best way to protect the public was to have stronger federal regulation of supplements.

An independent panel of doctors and dietary supplement researchers had found that it could  raise your blood pressure, cause rapid heart rate, as also increase the risk of seizures, liver and kidney damage, heart problems, panic attacks and death.

More than 90,000 vitamins, probiotics, minerals, herbs, botanicals as also a growing list of ''natural'' substances crowded drugstore shelves today, however,  there was little to prove they had any real health benefits.

In a 2013, report, The Annals of American Medicine even told shoppers to  ''Stop Wasting Money on Vitamin and Mineral Supplements''.

According to the report there was not evidence to support the idea of supplements having positive effects - and in fact, some were harmful.