Consumer Group Calls Bayer on Prostate Cancer Vitamin Claims

Bayer AG, the pharmaceutical giant that eight years ago agreed to pay $14 million to settle allegations that it encouraged health care providers to
submit fraudulently inflated reimbursement claims, now stands accused of fraudulently inflating something else: assertions that its One A Day Men’s 50+ Advantage and Men’s One A Day Men’s Health Formula multivitamins, both of which contain selenium, reduce the risk of prostate cancer.
WebMD reports that the Center for Science in the Public Interest has complained to the FTC and has threatened to sue Bayer because the claims are not supported by major scientific studies. Web MD tells us that some early studies did suggest that selenium, an antioxidant, could have some
protective effect against cancer, but a seven-year, $118 million government-sponsored
trial published in January concluded that selenium did not prevent
prostate cancer in a population of healthy men.
“Bayer is exploiting men’s fear of prostate cancer just to sell more
pills,” said CSPI senior nutritionist David Schardt in a CSPI press release. “The largest
prostate cancer prevention trial has found that selenium is no more
effective than a placebo. Bayer is ripping people off when it suggests
otherwise in these dishonest ads.”
CSPI says the prostate cancer claims for One A Day supplements violate a consent decree the company signed with the FTC in 2007. That
year Bayer paid a $3.2 million fine related to weight-loss claims made
on behalf of One A Day multivitamin WeightSmart, and agreed not to make
unsubstantiated claims in the future.
Unfortunately for Bayer, the unsubstantiated claim habit appears to be in deep. Very deep. According to Wikipedia, a 1934 history of the German company gives credit for the development of the first aspirin formula that did not upset the stomach to the German chemist Felix Hoffman, who was not Jewish, rather than to Arthur Eichengrun, the German-Jewish scientist who actually did the work.
Read more about the prostate cancer complaint from the Center for Science for the Public Interest.