Can high doses of antioxidants be bad for us?

[bananabas]

I recently came across a news article relating high doses of antioxidants with prostate cancer. They refer to this study.

I quote their conclusions

Administration of high doses of lycopene, GTCs, and selenium in men
harboring HGPIN and/or ASAP was associated with a higher incidence of PCa at re-biopsy
and expression of microRNAs implicated in PCa progression at molecular analysis. The use
of these supplements should be avoided.

It seems a bit far-fetched to imply "high dose antioxidants cause cancer" just based on this study, what do you guys think?

 

[adreno]

To my knowledge, ROS kills cancer cells. So antioxidants might not be good if you already have cancer.

On the other hand, I suspect ROS is too high in ME, so for us it might be a different story.

 

[maryb]

ROS??

 

[adreno]

Reactive oxygen species.

 

[alex3619]

Too high a dose of anything is going to cause issues.

Its also the case that many of your immune cells use an oxidative burst to destroy cancer cells. So antioxidants might inhibit the immune system effectiveness. So if you already have cancer, or get unlucky and develop it while on treatment, the immune reaction might be less than otherwise.

What they showed, tentatively, was that a particular mix of antioxidants led to higher risk. Its not clear why. Its not clear this would happen with a different combination. Its not clear this would happen at a lower dose. We cannot be certain this would happen in a large study.

Keep in mind every single one of these men were at high risk, they were already patients. The already had cancer or were precancerous.

Also keep in mind that this finding might not generalize to other disorders.

What does seem clear is that this particular antioxidant treatment protocol might not be good for prostate cancer, and it would pay to avoid it.

 

[barbc56]

Here is a resource that has the latest studies on antioxidants as well as other supplements. It mainly deals with Cancer. You can do a search on the site for more information but atm, I don't have the time
https://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/vitamins-and-cancer-risk/

 

[Gondwanaland]

Understanding ROS & insulin sensitivity

 

[Ecoclimber]

You might want to watch PBS FRONTLINE investigation into the Vitamin and Supplement industry.

The New York Times and the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation examine the hidden dangers of vitamins and supplements, a multibillion-dollar industry with limited FDA oversight. According to the program, Nature Way is closest to compliance to the ingredients via DNA analysis. The progtam talks about the dangers of antioxidant treatment and the lack of peer review research on vitamin supplementation and the lack of regulatory oversight.

PBS FRONTLINE: Supplements and Safety