If red wine's good, are resveratrol pills even better?

Such is the thinking, though not the proof. Resveratrol supplements are a prime example of how hope, buzz and profit can distort science.

By Melissa Healy
LA Times

July 13, 2009

In August 2003, when scientists first revealed the life-extending powers of trans-3,4,'5-trihydroxystilbene-- also known as resveratrol -- its earthly form had all the allure of an apple in the garden of Eden.

Ruby red, delicately fragrant, shapely in a rounded nest of glass, red wine can deliver as much as 1.5 milligrams of the plant compound resveratrol per four-ounce serving. At concentrations present in a person's blood after two glasses of red wine, resveratrol has been found to suppress the formation of blood clots and boost the efficiency of immune system cells.

Much larger doses of resveratrol increase the life span of yeast, flies, fish and roundworms, studies have shown. A feeding regimen that includes the good stuff found in red wine makes obese mice just as healthy, spry and long-lived as those who have been raised on near-starvation diets.

So leave it to American entrepreneurs to gin up a thriving market for a resveratrol supplement rather than urge consumers to enjoy the food -- or in this case, savor the drink -- linked to better health and longer life, says Dr. Gerald Weissmann, director of New York University's biotechnology study center.

(More here.)