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Research fails to show a reduction in risk of coronary heart disease events, strokes or premature death by taking folate supplements. Folic acid's a B vitamin and people have held great hope for it as a supplement to prevent heart disease and stroke. The reason is that folate - it's other name - reduces the levels of a substance called homocysteine in your blood. And homocysteine is thought by some to be a coronary risk factor. That's been undermined in recent years by disappointing research which has not found the link to be as strong as suggested. Anyway that doesn't mean that folic acid supplements aren't worth taking for heart disease, which is why a group of researchers brought together the results from 12 trials of folate supplements involving about 17,000 people who'd had a heart problem, stroke or kidney disease already and wanted to prevent another event happening. The combined analysis failed to show a reduction in risk of coronary heart disease events, strokes or premature death from any cause. There are still some large trials going on so the last word hasn't been said. But it may be another example of a recurrent theme with supplements which is that we didn't evolve to swallow vitamin pills. Take your goodies in fruit and veges.
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