The one thing Dr Anthony Fauci takes to boost his immune system, and other supplements with health benefits
- US infectious diseases expert Dr Anthony Fauci believes most immunity-boosting supplements do ‘nothing’, but he makes one exception
- Unlike the food and drug industries, supplements makers are largely unregulated, so choose yours carefully and keep in mind other medical issues you may have
We’re all ears for the utterances of Dr Anthony Fauci, the American infectious diseases expert and immunologist who has been at the forefront of Covid-19 news for months.
Last month, during an Instagram interview with the actress Jennifer Garner, he said that most “so-called immune boosting supplements” actually do “nothing”. Kind of a blow for the multibillion-dollar vitamin trade, then.
Fauci though, does, advocate taking a couple of vitamins, especially with a pandemic still raging and given we all need to shore up our defences. “If you are deficient in vitamin D, that does have an impact on your susceptibility to infection. So I would not mind recommending it,” he says.
Aged 79, he takes vitamin D himself. A September 2020 study by the University of Chicago Medicine lends weight to his advice: it found a link between vitamin D deficiency and vulnerability to Covid-19.
Sally Poon, a Hong Kong-based dietitian, notes that dietary supplements, as their name suggests, “are intended to supplement the diet”. There are circumstances where one may benefit from taking them, she says, and cites as an example people with allergies or food intolerances. People with lactose intolerance may be calcium deficient, for instance.