Supplementary Death

Life is not a long-term business. Sooner or later, some time within the next 100 years or so, every single human being alive today will pop their clogs. Consequently, death is not something to be feared. Rather, it is a natural process, a part of life, and something to be accepted with good grace - after all, who're you going to complain to, anyway?

I've held this view for a very long time, and the deaths of many close friends and relatives haven't changed it, nor is it likely to ever change. So it is with something of a sneer that I watch the common-or-garden Health Fascist / Freak going about their daily routine, swigging down vitamin supplements with a fresh orange juice chaser, eating only the food that is supposed to be good for you today (it will be bad for you tomorrow, of course, but that doesn't stop 'em!), eschewing the pleasures of tobacco and alcohol and generally making their bid for immortality.

Today, however, my habitual sneer has been displaced by howls of (probably quite inappropriate) mirth. For, according to the Telegraph, "Vitamin pills 'increase risk of early death'". Yes, as contrary to formerly received wisdom as it may appear, it seems that healthy folks who knock back antioxidant supplements, including vitamins A through E, may be increasing their risk of an early death by up to 16 per cent.

Personally, I think this bit of research should have been kept secret, on the basis that those who seek immortality are the least suitable people to attain it; the world could well do without at least 16 per cent of its vitamin chomping Health Fascists, and giving them advance warning of their imminent demise seems altogether too sporting. Still, the cat's out of the bag now, and I fully expect the financial impact upon the supplement manufacturers to be catastrophic. They, unlike the Health Fascists, have my sympathy - after all, they're only supplying demand, and if the Health Fascists will insist on trying to live longer, healthier lives by buggering about with their own immune systems, they have only themselves to blame. Buyer Beware!

Billy Seggars.