At last - notes - Brief Article

Better Nutrition, Sept, 2002 by John Monahan

It was news of sorts when, last June, the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) finally acknowledged that taking a multivitamin every day is an inexpensive and effective way to help guard your health. BN, of course, has been recommending this for the past 63 years, so it's nice to know that JAMA has caught up with us.

Nobody at the store where you picked up BN is going to be surprised that, as JAMA wrote, "it's prudent for adults to take vitamin supplements." Nor will they be startled to learn, as JAMA further observed, that many Americans don't get all the nutrition they need from their diets and, thus, require supplements for optimum health.

About the same time as the JAMA study was published, the Council for Responsible Nutrition published a 100-page report titled The Benefits of Nutritional Supplements. It goes way beyond JAMA's overdue announcement (see "Updates," p. 22).

In this issue of BN, we report on dietary supplement quality, testing and approval ("Raising the Supplements Question," p. 34). It's a solid piece of journalism you won't find in any other healthy living publication.

Let us know how you like it. And, if you're so prompted, drop us note about how you use natural products. We'd love to share your story with other readers, as we do in our piece about Sunny Manning ("Sunny Days," p. 55).

Elsewhere in this issue ("Zach's Story," p. 46), you'll read about Zach Garcia, a Colorado boy who's overcoming childhood obesity, which has become a national epidemic.

Besides JAMA's overdue announcement, another long wait is over: The college football season has finally arrived. For many of you this may not be an important milestone. But for me, it's the equivalent of--oh, I don't know what--maybe a nice hot bubble bath with soft music, candles and chilled white wine. No, it's better.