LEILA FADEL, HOST:
Vita maxxing, fibermaxxing, biohacking. All these health trends are, by and large, powered by nutritional supplements. Do they actually work? Our Planet Money podcast team dug into the business of supplements. Here’s Sarah Gonzalez and Jane Black.
SARAH GONZALEZ, BYLINE: There are more than 100,000 different supplement pills, powders, gummies for Americans to choose from. Supplements are a $70 billion market and growing fast.
JANE BLACK, BYLINE: It’s fueled in part by influencers, hyping everything from echinacea to creatine and, according to TikToker Mari Llewellyn, the new it supplement colostrum.
MARI LLEWELLYN: It’s basically like nature’s superfood. It comes from cows.
GONZALEZ: And our love of a supplement silver bullet is not new. We have been here before.
BLACK: Melanie Benesh is a lawyer at the nonprofit Environmental Working Group. She says supplements always thrive in times when Americans feel less confident in government and institutions. It happened in the 1970s, and it’s happening now.
MELANIE BENESH: You can use these natural herbal remedies. You don’t have to go to your doctor. Your doctor might be in the pocket of the pharmaceutical industry, and this is a way for you to be in charge of your own health.
BLACK: But there’s little science to back up the bold claims that supplements and their influencer fans are making.
GONZALEZ: For example, manufacturers do not have to provide scientific proof that their pills or powders or gummies actually do what they claim they do.
BLACK: Yeah. They can make all kinds of claims on their labels without actually proving they are true, as long as they only use certain words to do so.
BENESH: Impermissible, lowering serum cholesterol levels. Permissible, helping to maintain cholesterol levels already within the normal range. Impermissible, relieves painful joints. Permissible, helps maintain proper joint function.
GONZALEZ: Little news you can use if the front of your supplement bottle says, supports X or promotes Y, that should be a signal to you that it is not actually proven to do anything.
BLACK: Marion Nestle is a professor emeritus of nutrition at New York University. She said it’s not only about the claims, either. It’s also about what’s in the bottle. Take turmeric supplements.
MARION NESTLE: You turmeric supplement may or may not have turmeric in it.
GONZALEZ: What? Don’t you check the ingredient list and say, does it say turmeric as an ingredient?
NESTLE: It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t have to have in it, what it says on it.
GONZALEZ: The FDA doesn’t require anyone to test what is in the bottle before a product goes to market. So, she says, that’s why you can’t always trust what’s even in there.
NESTLE: Nobody has the resources to check and see whether those supplements have in them what it says on label unless somebody sues the company.
GONZALEZ: And who’s going to sue the company?
NESTLE: If there’s no lawsuit involved, there’s nobody minding the store.
BLACK: So why do Americans keep buying all those supplements? We talked to a lot of people, and we found Marion Nestle’s theory the most persuasive.
NESTLE: Supplements make people feel better. There’s absolutely no question about that.
GONZALEZ: She says there is plenty of evidence that supplements are fabulous placebos.
NESTLE: In fact, I can tell you a story about a study that proved that, but it doesn’t matter. Life is really hard these days. (Laughter) And if all it takes is a supplement pill to make people feel better, I’m not going to argue too much about it.
BLACK: For NPR News, I’m Jane Black.
GONZALEZ: And I’m Sarah Gonzalez.
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