“From a practical standpoint, this study does not change the fact that the majority of consumers could benefit from taking an affordable multivitamin,” said Andrew Shao, vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs with the council. “It is better to meet these recommendations than not, and consistently taking a multivitamin over the long term could help fill these nutrient gaps and may help consumers lead healthier lives.”
Yes, I saw that. But that was from the vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs for the Council of for Responsible Nutrition, which is a vitamin industry trade group.
The article ended with a conclusion from the study's author:
Dr. Neuhouser said she realizes that many people who are devoted vitamin users will be skeptical of the finding that they are receiving no benefit from a daily multivitamin.
“I don’t want to disparage people who take multivitamins — it’s their choice as a consumer,” Dr. Neuhouser said. “What we’re presenting is the science showing it’s neither beneficial nor harmful. If they want to choose to spend their dollars elsewhere this might be a good place to do so. Perhaps they can buy more fruits and vegetables.”
My take-away from these studies is that unless you have a vitamin deficiency, taking multivitamins does nothing. And if you have a specific vitamin deficiency, then you may be better off just taking supplementation of that vitamin; a general multivitamin will only help because it happens to contain what you are deficient in.
You'll often find such mealy-mouthed conclusions in write-ups of studies where the evidence doesn't confirm the author's hypothesis, and especially in anticipation of controversy. (in this case, your quote doesn't come from a study author, I guess)
If there's no benefit on average, then there's no reason to recommend on average (disclaimer: I take a chewy multivitamin because I remember being convinced by evidence that manganese is a bad thing to supplement, and most multivitamins have 2mg of it).
“From a practical standpoint, this study does not change the fact that the majority of consumers could benefit from taking an affordable multivitamin,” said Andrew Shao, vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs with the council. “It is better to meet these recommendations than not, and consistently taking a multivitamin over the long term could help fill these nutrient gaps and may help consumers lead healthier lives.”