Folic acid supplements no help for the heart

Still think they have any idea what an effective supplement is?

Supplements containing folic acid are known to cut levels of a protein in the blood implicated in heart disease, but a large new analysis suggests that does not translate into a lowered risk of cardiovascular disease, cancer or death.

One in every three U.S. adults reports taking multivitamins containing folic acid. The B-vitamin has long been known to help prevent anemia and to reduce the risk of birth defects such as spina bifida.

More recently, folic acid was found to have a bonus benefit: lowering levels of a protein the body makes after eating meat - homocysteine -- which has been linked to cardiovascular and other health problems.

The connection seemed to suggest that the vitamin could also be a powerful ally in the fight against heart disease, as well as stroke and cancer.

"The homocysteine hypothesis of cardiovascular disease attracted considerable interest as homocysteine is easily lowered by dietary supplementation with folic acid and other B-vitamins," lead researcher Dr. Robert Clarke of the University of Oxford, in England, told Reuters Health in an e-mail...

However, no meaningful differences between the two groups were seen in the rates at which outcomes occurred, the researchers report in the Archives of Internal Medicine.

Of the more than 9,000 first-time vascular events in the study group, for instance, 24.9 percent were in individuals taking folic acid and 24.8 percent in those on placebo. Major coronary events were also split evenly between the vitamin group (11.4 percent) and the placebo group (11.1 percent).

Well, they don't.