Is This Better Than That?”? Tomatoes Or Give Them Lycopene Or a Tuna, Which Has Less Mercury

SPECIAL FEATURE

Is this better than that ? BY DAVID SCHARDT

D ecisions, decisions. What we eat often comes down to weighing whether IS KRILL OIL BETTER THAN A is better than B. Fried or baked? Butter or margarine? White meat or dark? REGULAR FISH OIL? Organic or conventional? Name-brand or generic? Krill oil is “a slam dunk winner over fish oil,” claims Joseph Mercola’s popular Web In some cases, the answers are no-brainers. In others, not so much. Here’s a site mercola.com (where, not surprisingly, little help with a few you may have wrestled with. you can buy krill oil). Bayer, which owns One A Day, appar- ently agrees. The supplement giant dove lowered cholesterol only in combination director of the Osteoporosis Research into the market this year with its Arctic with a statin drug. For those not taking a Center at Creighton University in Omaha, Wonder Krill Oil (“Better than fish oil to statin-like drug, krill oil was no better than Nebraska. That’s true even for people who support your health”). a placebo.4 And no one else has tested the take drugs for acid reflux like Tagamet or effects of krill oil on PMS and arthritis. Prilosec, which reduce stomach acid. “There’s certainly no convincing evidence What’s more, calcium carbonate is that the health benefits of krill oil are supe- cheaper and less bulky. To get the same rior to those of regular fish oil,” says Harris. amount of calcium, you need to take Is krill oil better? NO. twice as much citrate as carbonate. A recent analysis of past studies sug- IS CALCIUM CITRATE BETTER gested that taking calcium supplements THAN CALCIUM CARBONATE? is linked to a slight increase in the risk of Only company-funded studies have con- heart attacks.5 (See Quick Studies, p. 10.) cluded that krill oil is better. “There is a difference between calcium Until more is known, shoot for no more supplements,” claims the Citracal Web than the Recommended Dietary Allowance Krill are shrimp-like crustaceans that site. “Citracal is made with calcium ci- (RDA)—1,000 milligrams a day from food occupy a spot near the bottom of the Ant- trate. Unlike calcium carbonate (the main and supplements combined for women arctic Ocean’s food chain. They are eaten ingredient in many other calcium supple- 50 and under and men 70 and under, and by whales, seals, penguins, squid, and ments), calcium citrate does not need 1,200 mg a day for people older than that. fish. Krill oil, like all fish oil, contains EPA stomach acid to be broken down.” And there’s no point in taking more and DHA, the two omega-3 fats that help That’s true. So if you typically take than 500 mg of calcium at a time, since the prevent sudden cardiac arrest. calcium on an empty stomach, citrate is intestinal tract can’t efficiently absorb more “There’s some evidence that maybe 20 or the way to go. than that in a single dose, says Recker. 30 percent more EPA and DHA is absorbed Is calcium citrate better? DEPENDS. from krill oil than from regular fish oil,” says omega-3 expert William Harris of the IS EATING EARLIER IN THE DAY University of South Dakota’s Sanford School BETTER THAN EATING LATE? of Medicine. “But it’s not that much more to warrant krill oil’s much greater cost.” Weight Watchers and the Atkins and South The DHA and EPA in krill oil cost at Beach Diets have all told dieters to limit least 10 times more than the omega-3s the food they eat at night. For generations, in regular fish oil (which typically comes To get 500 mg of calcium, it takes two people have believed that food eaten when from menhaden, sardines, and herring). citrate pills but just one carbonate pill. they’re less physically active is more likely Claims that krill oil can lower cho- to be stored as fat than burned for energy. lesterol, reduce symptoms of PMS, and “But if you take your calcium supple- But that’s not based on hard evidence. we Kils (krill), Jorge Bach (pills). U relieve the discomfort of arthritis are based ment with a meal, there’s no significant When researchers tracked the eating on studies funded by a Canadian manu- difference between calcium carbonate and habits and body weights of more than 1-3

Photos: © facturer, Neptune Krill Oil. But krill oil calcium citrate pills,” notes Robert Recker, 7,400 U.S. men and women for 10 years,

8 NUTRITION ACTION HEALTHLETTER ■ JUNE 2011 SPECIAL FEATURE

1½ ounces a week for every 50 pounds they group get prostate cancer. But that kind of weigh. And they should limit canned light study is expensive and difficult to pull off, tuna to a total of no more than 12 ounces a so it isn’t likely to be done. week. Others can probably safely consume “We do have impressive animal studies, up to three times that much of each. though,” says lycopene researcher John If you’re willing to spend more, you can Erdman of the University of Illinois at find albacore with mercury levels much Urbana-Champaign. closer to those of light tuna, says Michael In one, rats exposed to a prostate- Morrissey, director of the Oregon State cancer-causing chemical who consumed a Eating late doesn’t add pounds University Seafood Laboratory in Corvallis. diet containing finely ground dried whole unless you overeat. It comes from smaller, juvenile Pacific tomatoes were 26 percent less likely to for example, the percentage of their daily albacore that are pole- or troll-caught in die of prostate cancer than rats who got calories that they ate after 5 p.m. had no the coastal waters off northern California, lycopene or a placebo.8 And when Erd- bearing on changes in their weight.6 Oregon, and Washington state. The ju- man and his research group transplanted “I know of no credible evidence that the veniles, which haven’t had as much time prostate tumors into rats, the tumors grew time of day has any impact on the storage to accumulate mercury as larger albacore, more slowly in those given tomato pow- of fat,” concludes Albert Stunkard, an obe- average about 0.14 ppm of mercury. der, but not in those given lycopene.9 sity expert at the University of Pennsylva- Northern Pacific pole- or troll-caught nia School of Medicine in Philadelphia. albacore is one of just six “Best of the Best” On the other hand, if you eat extra species on the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s calories because you’re tired or bored or “Super Green” list. Green-list species are stressed (and nighttime is when you’re low in mercury and PCBs, rich in omega-3s, more likely to do that), expect those to and “abundant, well-managed, and caught eventually show up around your waist. or farmed in environmentally friendly Is eating earlier better? NO. ways.” (The other five species: wild-caught Alaska salmon, farmed rainbow trout, wild- Lycopene isn’t the only important com- IS CANNED LIGHT TUNA caught Pacific sardines, farmed oysters, and pound in tomatoes. BETTER THAN ALBACORE? freshwater coho salmon farmed in inland tank systems in the United States.) “It looks like you may need an array of Light tuna typically has much less mer- Several brands of canned northern Pacific bioactive ingredients that you find in the cury than white (albacore) tuna. That’s albacore—including Raincoast and Wild whole tomato,” says Erdman. “Lycopene because albacore is a larger, more preda- Planet—are available at some groceries, is one of the important components, but tory species than skipjack tuna, which is direct from the companies, or on Amazon. it’s not the only one.” canned as light tuna. For more brands, see albatuna.com or Of course, rats aren’t people. “Eating to- In January, Consumer Reports magazine pacificalbacore.com. matoes may or may not protect men from analyzed 42 cans and pouches of tuna Is light canned tuna better? YES. prostate cancer,” concedes Erdman. “Still, purchased in the New York metropolitan they’re a nourishing food.” As for lyco- area. The light tuna samples averaged 0.07 pene pills, “it doesn’t make sense for men omugnero Silvana/fotolia.com (tomato sauce). C

ARE LYCOPENE PILLS BETTER parts per million of mercury, while the THAN TOMATOES? to take them in place of eating tomatoes.” albacore averaged 0.43 ppm—six times as To absorb the most carotenoids from much. The results are consistent with past Tomatoes and prostate cancer have been tomatoes, eat them cooked, says Erdman. surveys of canned tuna from other cities. linked since 1995, when Harvard research- Or, if they’re in a salad, make sure the Young children, as well as women who ers reported that among the nearly 48,000 dressing or the rest of your meal contains are pregnant or nursing or who might be- men in their Health Professionals Follow- at least 10 grams (two teaspoons) of fat. come pregnant within a year, should limit Up Study, those who ate at least 10 serv- Are lycopene pills better? NO. itch Bain/fotolia.com (tuna), © K canned albacore tuna to no more than ings of tomatoes (including tomato sauce) 1 a week were one-third less likely to be Altern. Med. Rev. 9: 420, 2004. 2 Altern. Med. Rev. 8: 171, 2003. diagnosed with prostate cancer than those 3 J. Am. Coll. Nutr. 26: 39, 2007. who ate fewer than 1½ servings a week.7 4 Lipids 46: 37, 2011. 5 BMJ 342: d2040, 2011. Since then, however, most studies that 6 Int. J. Obes. Relat. Metab. Disord. 21: 407, 1997. tracked the eating habits of large groups of 7 J. Natl. Cancer Inst. 87: 1767, 1995. 8 men for years have seen no link between J. Natl. Cancer Inst. 95: 1578, 2003. 9 Cancer Res. 67: 836, 2007. prostate cancer and either tomatoes or lycopene, the major carotenoid in tomatoes. learviewstock/fotolia.com (fridge), ©

c Have a question for a future Ideally, researchers would feed men Canned light comes from smaller skipjack “Is this better than that?”? tomatoes or give them lycopene or a tuna, which has less mercury. E-mail [email protected].

NUTRITION ACTION HEALTHLETTER ■ JUNE 2011 9