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A vitamin trial in 18,314 smokers and asbestos workers was stopped early because the people taking the supplements were getting more lung cancer, not less.
The Beta Carotene and Retinol Efficacy Trial (CARET): a multicentre, randomised, double-blind, placebo-controlled primary prevention trial of 30 mg of beta carotene plus 25,000 IU of retinol daily against placebo in 18,314 smokers, former smokers and workers exposed to asbestos, reported by Omenn, Goodman, Thornquist and colleagues.
Observational data had linked high dietary carotenoid intake to lower lung cancer risk, and the trial was built to convert that correlation into a preventive intervention. It did the opposite, and it did so at the same time as the Finnish ATBC trial found the same direction of harm. CARET is the standing answer to any proposal to move a nutritional association into a supplement without randomising it.
Supplements are drugs, and drugs have to be tested. A plausible mechanism, a consistent observational signal and a safe-sounding intervention still produced measurable harm in the people it was meant to protect.
Shares Cancer prevention roadmap: tobacco control and vaccines → biomarker-guided chemoprevention → interception in carriers, Prevention we already have is not deployed, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares Cancer prevention roadmap: tobacco control and vaccines → biomarker-guided chemoprevention → interception in carriers, Prevention we already have is not deployed, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares Cancer prevention roadmap: tobacco control and vaccines → biomarker-guided chemoprevention → interception in carriers, Prevention we already have is not deployed, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares Cancer prevention roadmap: tobacco control and vaccines → biomarker-guided chemoprevention → interception in carriers, Prevention we already have is not deployed, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares Failures are hidden, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares Failures are hidden, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares New England Journal of Medicine, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.
Shares Prevention we already have is not deployed, Lung cancer (all types), Non-small-cell lung cancer and the tag lung-evidence.