Originally Posted by
terrymorse
Tell it, comrade! To paraphrase that great German scientific philosopher, "Alkohol ist das Opium des Volkes".
10-12 subjects? To be fair, that's a pretty common size -- for an athletic performance study (which is why we should all be skeptical of those findings).
I can think of one big and powerful group that would benefit: the health insurance industry.
This is why I really don't take or recommend any supplements except vitamin D or other essentials that may measure out as deficient in some cases (like iron, B12, folate amongst others) as every few years there is some expose about that industry basically mostly selling what amounts to grass clippings if not much more harmful substances. Supplement industry = scam basically.
Regarding health insurers it's one of those cases that what's good for the goose is also good for the gander as there's nothing wrong with having incentives align. Years ago people were pretty stupid about coming in for their physical, getting colonscopies/mammograms done that sort of stuff. Now I (the physician) am starting to lose money on non-compliant patients who don't do that health maintenance stuff as the insurer takes it off the top at the end of the year if more than handful of patients don't check off those boxes. It's simple logic if you get your health maintenance addressed and diseases treated you'll do better. The patient will be healthier, happier and have a better outcome which also means the insurer saves money. When everybody wins there is nothing wrong with that.