I live not far from the intersection of 23rd St and 8th Ave, a fairly busy intersection in New York. When a long-neglected Hagen Daas store on the corner was closed down and a giant, wrap-around store was implied by the construction I was curious what would replace it. On the other corners are a Gap, a new bakery, and a large, popular BBQ restaurant. It turns out the new corner will hold a vitamin shop. Is that all? Just another vitamin shop? ‘I hope that fail within months to be replaced by something better‘ was the thought I had.

Are supplements really so popular? Looking around I realized they were sold in a lot of places. Then I read Miracle in a Bottle in the new New Yorker, and the whole, giant world of nutraceuticals was exposed to me. It turns out this stuff is incredibly popular and highly unregulated, our laws not being what they once were: ‘One recent Harris poll found that most people believe that if a supplement is on the market it must have been approved by some government agency (not true); that manufacturers are prohibited from making claims for their products unless they have provided data to back those claims up (no such laws exist); and that companies are required to include warnings about potential risks and side effects (they aren¹t).‘