by Dr.Harald Wiesendanger– Klartext
What the mainstream media is hiding
Dietary supplements for children are “all superfluous,” says Stiftung Warentest after testing 18 products. They criticize overdoses and the monetization of fear. Is this justified? This blanket criticism lacks a serious level of expertise.
Stiftung Warentest, notorious for being an all-powerful “danger-mongering company,” has once again delved into the colorful world of children’s nutritional supplements and found that of the 18 products tested, 17 were deficient, and 15 contained overdoses. Not a single one is recommended. Particularly piquant: four products exceed the recommended maximum amount of vitamin A, which can lead to headaches, skin, and liver problems in children. Another product contains copper, which has no place in children’s products and can cause nausea or even liver damage if consumed in excess. The testers concluded: A healthy child who eats a reasonably varied diet doesn’t need additional nutrients from cans. Parents should, therefore, invest in fresh fruit and vegetables instead of overpriced pills and juices.
Are the testers spot on with this blanket assessment?
“Nutritional supplements are superfluous with a perfect diet,” even admits one guidebook from the alternative health camp. The catch: What child has a perfect diet? Broccoli battles at the dinner table, fries instead of apples, cornflakes instead of wholegrain porridge – everyday life looks different. And so, an entire industry has emerged that reassures parents with “healthy sweets” and powders.
The global market for nutritional supplements is booming. Sales of these products in Germany now reach two billion euros per year, and by 2033, this could grow to over nine billion. The global market for dietary supplements was valued at approximately 361 billion US dollars in 2022; by 2031, it is expected to grow to a staggering 613 billion dollars.
But it’s not just manufacturers and sellers of supplements who believe that some products can be beneficial even for minors; numerous nutrition experts also believe that some products can be beneficial even for minors.
A child’s room full of pill boxes
Mom places a brightly colored vitamin gummy bear on her son’s plate in the morning. “For the immune system,” she says with a wink. The child munches the candy contentedly as if it were part of his daily cereal. At the same time, experts on the morning show are once again proclaiming that nutritional supplements for children are entirely unnecessary – in fact, a fad among concerned helicopter parents. Who is right? The parents who want to play it safe? Or the experts who exasperatedly warn that they’ll just produce expensive urine?
As so often, the truth lies somewhere in the middle – hidden between marketing, ideology, and documented deficiencies.
While nutritionists in the pharmacy magazine Umschau are lecturing about why multivitamins for little ones are more marketing than medicine, a completely different story is brewing on the internet. Relevant websites – from Center for Health to GreenMedInfo to Mercola.com – are teeming with success stories and studies that supposedly prove: Nothing works these days without extra vitamins. US physician Dr. Joseph Mercola, doyen of the online wellness world, tirelessly warns that the number of children with vitamin D deficiency has increased by over 200% in the last decade. Many doctors and parents are unaware of how important vitamin D is for children – yet even the British Health Authority recommends a daily vitamin D supplement for all children under five. Mercola finds it scandalous that hardly anyone has heard of this. He denounces the “worrying ignorance” and cites examples: Four out of five parents in a survey were unaware that winter sun in England does not provide vitamin D. And indeed, British authorities issue a corresponding recommendation – only hardly anyone has heard it. The result, according to Mercola, is that rickets are on the rise again, and pediatricians are treating vitamin deficiency diseases that would have been confined to the last century.
GreenMedInfo, a popular portal for natural medicine, also eagerly lists studies that portray vitamins as miracle cures. For example, children who took multivitamins before their fourth birthday are said to be less likely to develop food allergies and hay fever. According to GreenMedInfo, other research suggests that cod liver oil plus a multivitamin reduces the number of doctor visits for respiratory infections—in other words, children with colds are more likely to stay healthy. Even the notorious middle ear infection, a scourge of many kindergarten children, occurred less frequently in one study when the little ones received vitamin supplements and omega-3 oil.
That sounds almost too good to be true. No wonder many parents start to wonder: Can it really hurt to give it a little extra boost when it potentially benefits?
Battle of the ideologies: Big Pharma, “Health Freedom,” and the truth in between
The debate about nutritional supplements for children is no longer a purely scientific discourse – it resembles a bitter proxy war. On one side are the proponents of the classic doctrine: “Eat your vegetables, then you won’t need pills!” – flanked by warnings of hypervitaminosis. HuffPost cites a report by the Environmental Working Group, a non-profit organization for health and environmental protection, stating that many children are oversupplied with certain micronutrients because food manufacturers enrich breakfast cereals and the like to the maximum, and parents also give them supplements. However, too much vitamin A can damage the liver and cause hair loss, and too much zinc can weaken the immune system. The message: Less is more. When in doubt, avoid taking extra pills to avoid overdose. This cautionary attitude dominated for decades – nutritional supplements were considered unnecessary and, in the worst case, even dangerous.
On the other side, a diverse coalition has formed that has adopted “health freedom” as its motto. Their unifying bond is distrust of pharmaceutical companies. In relevant Facebook groups with names like AntiPharma, Big Pharma is portrayed as the enemy: They want to force their overpriced medications on us, so they badmouth everything natural. In these circles, vitamins are considered safe, “natural,” and suppressed by the evil pharmaceutical industry. The Dr. Rath Foundation, for example, founded by the German vitamin apostle Matthias Rath, openly speaks of a “war” by the pharmaceutical lobby against vitamins. At the international level, for example, in the Codex Alimentarius panel of the United Nations and the WHO, attempts are being made to portray vitamins as dangerous and to strictly regulate their dosage. Dr. Rath calls instead for “vitamin freedom.” In 2003, he celebrated a partial success when a planned ban on health advertising for vitamins was postponed. His message: Here, natural preventative measures should be deliberately kept in small quantities so as not to jeopardize the business of disease. That sounds like a conspiracy – but it certainly resonates with many who feel patronized by school doctors.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his Children’s Health Defense strike a similar tone. Their tenor: Instead of always relying solely on vaccinations and pharmaceutical products, children’s natural defenses should be strengthened. CHD, for example, points out that hardly any child consumes all the necessary nutrients in the ideal amounts every day. Theoretically, this is possible, but in practice, it would require a strictly planned diet, which is utopian in everyday family life. Depending on the child, supplementation could therefore be quite useful, CHD concludes – for example, vitamin D for children who hardly get any sunlight, or vitamins C and A for notorious fruit and vegetable refusers.
Even the American Academy of Pediatrics – not usually a fan of supplements – recommends vitamin D drops for breastfed babies and individual micronutrient supplements for certain genetic absorption disorders.
These are isolated cases, of course. Such admissions, however, demonstrate that even conventional medicine must admit that deficiencies are a risk without any supplements – so why the general suspicion of all vitamin supplements?
Fact check: Do children actually have deficiencies?
Let’s shift from the debate to the harsh reality: How common are nutrient deficiencies in children?
Vitamin D is a perennial topic in this discussion. The human body produces vitamin D itself with the help of UV radiation. But what if children hardly play outside anymore? During pandemics, little ones were sometimes banished indoors for months. Doctors for Enlightenment, a critical alternative medical group, warned that lockdowns had literally deprived many children of the sun: They were said to lack vitamin D, which increased their general susceptibility to illness and even raised the risk of severe COVID-19 cases.
In fact, intensive care physicians observed during the COVID-19 years that younger patients more often had vitamin D deficiencies. Cause and effect are not clear here, but the objection has substance: Our latitudes already favor winter vitamin D deficiencies, and those who constantly stay indoors may end up lacking calcium in their bones and immune system strength. A US study found a massive vitamin D deficiency in 40% of critically ill children in intensive care units. The connection between low levels and life-threatening illness was so striking that the authors referred to it as an “alarming risk factor.”
This demonstrates that vitamin deficiency is not a theoretical speculation in certain situations but a reality. Many pediatricians, therefore, now recommend vitamin D supplementation at least during the first year of life – in Germany, babies are given Vigantoletten as standard. And, given changing lifestyles, there are considerations to give older children vitamin D supplements in winter if blood tests indicate a deficiency. In such cases, “completely unnecessary” quickly becomes “medically sensible.”
Another example is vitamin A. In our latitudes, children rarely suffer from severe vitamin A deficiency – in developing countries, however, it is one of the main reasons why measles is so often fatal. The main risk factor for severe measles consequences is malnutrition, especially vitamin A deficiency, even emphasizing a source that is otherwise critical of vaccination. The WHO, therefore, recommends high-dose vitamin A supplementation for measles, which can reduce mortality by up to 80%. That’s a dramatic number: Four out of five children could be saved – with a simple vitamin! Measles complications are now far less common in this country. But this number demonstrates what is possible in exceptional situations. It’s no wonder that alternative media outlets point to this: Instead of relying solely on the measles vaccination, one should also consider the nutritional situation. Molecular immune protection in a spoonful, so to speak.
Stay away from artificial supplements.
Many dietary supplements consist of synthetically produced vitamins and isolated minerals. But our body distinguishes very clearly between natural and artificial substances. Although synthetic substances appear chemically similar, they often differ in small details, such as their spatial structure. This phenomenon is similar to a plaster cast: Although the right and left hands appear structurally identical, only the one for which the cast was created fits – analogously, our body recognizes natural vitamins as “suitable,” while synthetic forms are often rejected or poorly processed.
Scientific studies that appear to demonstrate health risks from vitamin supplements often use synthetic vitamins. For example, synthetic vitamin E doesn’t have the same effect as natural vitamin E, as our body detects even the slightest structural differences. Furthermore, synthetic supplements often lack important constituents such as vitamin C or trace elements, which further reduces their effectiveness.
Conventional vitamin supplements often contain questionable additives: toxic dyes such as azo dyes (sunset yellow FCF), potentially harmful sweeteners (aspartame, cyclamate), and even aluminum compounds, which have been linked to Alzheimer’s disease. Other problematic substances include synthetic antioxidants (butylhydroxytoluene), parabens, and artificial flavor enhancers such as monosodium glutamate, which could trigger allergies or increase the risk of cancer.
It is therefore recommended to always choose natural supplements when purchasing vitamins – especially for children. Vitamin complexes made from plant powders or fruit extracts contain vitamins and minerals in an optimal natural composition and avoid dangerous chemicals. Naturally occurring mineral combinations, such as those found in coral powder, in particular, ensure optimal bioavailability without side effects. Those who want to avoid health risks should check packaging carefully and prefer products based on natural ingredients.
The dose makes the poison.
However, even “natural” preparations have pitfalls. When a measles epidemic recently broke out in the southern United States (see KLARTEXT “Measles Horror – Once Again”), Secretary of Health Robert F. Kennedy Jr., America’s most prominent vaccine skeptic, made a media-friendly case of the use of vitamin A, citing the WHO guidelines mentioned above. Parents of unvaccinated children boldly resorted to cod liver oil, rich in vitamins A and D. The results were, to say the least, suboptimal. A Texas children’s hospital reported several young measles patients with vitamin A poisoning. The children had received such excessive doses due to their home-based activism that their liver function values were disrupted.
This reveals the downside: The dose makes the poison. What can save lives as a short therapeutic boost under medical supervision can create a new problem if overdone on your own. So, as is so often the case, the truth lies somewhere between the extremes. Yes, vitamin A saves children with measles – but only those who actually had a deficiency, and only in the correct dosage.
Short Legs, Long Teeth: Growth, Nutrition, and Modern Lifestyles
This raises the question: Have our current living conditions led to children generally being deficient? Think of omega-3 fatty acids, which are important for the brain and eyes. For many families, fish ends up on the plate at most as fried fish sticks from Captain Iglo. The Center for Health reports on a Mexican study that showed that children with daily omega-3 supplementation performed significantly better in concentration and memory than children without. Omega-3 “makes children smart,” according to the catchy title. These fatty acids are also repeatedly mentioned in the context of ADHD – essentially brain oil for hyperactive fidgets. Such findings are not undisputed, but they fuel the suspicion that the average diet – high in sugar, lots of white flour, little greens, nuts, and fish – may be wasting cognitive development opportunities. Critical minds counter: One could simply introduce the child to salmon and walnuts more often instead of pills. But what teenager would voluntarily reach for walnut and spinach salad when the alternative is “chicken nuggets”?
The fact is: Some essential nutrients are anything but highly valued by children. Vitamin-rich vegetables are shunned, but the little ones are enthusiastic about pasta with ketchup – high in calories, but meager in micronutrients. Here, supplement manufacturers sell their products as an insurance policy: to ensure that no gaps arise despite the picky phase. Strictly speaking, you would be more likely to make carrots appealing to the child than multivitamins. But let’s be honest – in theory, parents are always patient, but in practice, vitamin bars end up in the shopping cart again simply because it’s less stressful.
Another aspect is individual predisposition. Some children have increased needs or have difficulty absorbing them. Genetic polymorphisms can cause, for example, folate from food to be less effectively absorbed – this is also emphasized by Children’s Health Defense and advocates for considering each child’s organism individually.
There are also children who follow specific diets, such as a vegan diet, from an early age. Such children absolutely need vitamin B12 supplements, as it is lacking in plant-based foods – this is also recognized by nutritionists. In these cases, it is not only “sensible” but absolutely necessary to prevent developmental disorders.
The same applies to children who have a very one-sided diet due to allergies or illnesses. A child with celiac disease who is intolerant to gluten often struggles with nutrient deficiencies until a diagnosis is made. In such cases, dietary supplements build bridges.
As you can see, it is too simplistic to simply claim that “vitamin pills for children are all unnecessary.”
However, it would be just as simplistic to simply stuff every child full of supplements. A quick look at blood work helps keep things in perspective. Many children actually do wonderfully well without supplements. But not all children all the time. Life isn’t a laboratory with a perfectly balanced diet but rather a sequence of convenience meals, colds, and growth spurts.
Irony of fate: Who profits from the pill box?
A little irony is allowed against hypocrisy: Some vocal critics of “pharmaceutical profiteering” are themselves doing a brisk business with vitamins. Dr. Mercola cheerfully sells children’s multivitamins in his online shop – naturally without “toxic fillers” and with that special something, but at a special price. Dr. Rath offers “VitaKids” as chewable tablets, carefully tailored to the child’s immune system – of course. The highly acclaimed “Center for Health” finances itself, among other things, through advertising for selected products on its website. Fear of deficiency can generate sales just as easily as fear of illness. The market for pills for our little ones is competitive: While the editors of the pharmacy magazine Apotheken-Umschau assure that no normally nourished child needs such a product, pharmacies are also happy to cash in on the boom. And in the supermarket, an “Immune Booster Kids” juice with an extra dose of zinc and vitamin C is displayed on every corner. Because parents want the best for their little ones, many would rather reach for the shelf one too many times than one too few. The result? Colorful, iridescent urine – and the vague feeling of being on the safe side.
But safety is relative. Many religious wars over vitamins obscure what the focus should actually be: children’s health, not ideology. Instead of blanket recommending or condemning pills, one could, for example, ensure that schoolchildren are served truly nutrient-rich food in the cafeteria. How paradoxical that at the same time, there are discussions about making school cafeterias meat-free – in Freiburg, a standard green menu without meat or fish is to be served – or even glossing over insects as protein sources in children’s comics, while vitamin pills are considered the work of the devil. Focused on climate and zeitgeist issues, some seem to forget that, in the end, the right nutrient supply must be ensured. Whether this comes from natural foods or – where necessary – supplements, parents should decide pragmatically, not dogmatically.
Conclusion: Neither the devil’s work nor a miracle cure
Readers have long suspected this: The truth is complex. Nutritional supplements for children aren’t inherently harmful – but they’re also not fundamentally necessary. Those who claim that all of them are superfluous ignore the real deficiencies that do occur. Conversely, those who act as if every child needs a supplement every day overlook that Mother Nature provides most little ones with everything they need through a reasonably healthy diet. The trick lies in a differentiated perspective: If a child has a proven deficiency – or a proven risk of developing one – supplements can be a blessing – it would be negligent to forgo them. Otherwise, the rule is: food before pills. An apple provides more than just vitamin C, plus fiber and phytochemicals – a whole cocktail of healthy nutrients. Vitamin tablets are not a substitute for a balanced diet; at most, they are insurance when your nutritional balance is off.
A cautious rethink is gradually emerging. Even authorities that once categorically dismissed the idea are now allowing exceptions. The Federal Institute for Risk Assessment continues to emphasize that supplements are generally unnecessary for healthy children – but adds: with a few exceptions. These exceptions concern precisely the cases mentioned above: vitamin D in the first year of life, vitamin B12 in vegan diets, possibly iron in cases of medically diagnosed anemia, iodine and folate in teenage girls with deficiencies, etc. No rushed action on suspicion – but targeted supplementation when necessary.
Rephrased with a wink: Vitamin pills for children are as superfluous as umbrellas – on a sunny day. With radiant health and top nutrition, you can safely save the money. But beware, when clouds of deficiency appear – then you’ll be glad to have an umbrella at hand. The trick is to recognize when it’s drizzling. And until then, the following applies: Let the children play outside – provide vitamin D; cook fresh food from time to time – it provides almost everything, and stay calm. The multivitamin-fed high-flyer is just as much a myth as the rickety child who inevitably fails without pills. “It depends,” as always. A pinch of irony, a few drops of common sense, and, yes, the occasional vitamin drop can’t hurt. The main thing is that we keep our perspective on the pill jungle – for the good of our children.
One thing should be clear: Instead of hastily feeding their children a supplement they may not even need, with the best of intentions, parents should first seek the advice of a specialist in nutritional medicine, an experienced naturopath, or a nutritionist with a degree in nutritional science. Better safe than sorry.
(Harald Wiesendanger)
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