Evidence is mounting that folic acid, along with B-6 and B-12, has the power to protect against heart attacks, and possibly strokes, too. "It looks like getting B vitamins--from food or supplements--is nearly as important as stopping smoking, lowering high cholesterol, and controlling blood pressure in preventing a heart attack," says epidemiologist Eric Rimm from Harvard University. Last February Rimm and his colleagues reported that women who got ample folic acid and B6 suffered heart attacks only about half as often as women who took in meager amounts.

So you could get all you need from a daily bowl of fully fortified cereal, which delivers 400 mcg of folic acid. But could you stand the monotony? You could vow to eat more lentils and spinach and to drink more orange juice, and more power to you.

As for B-6, it's found in a wide variety of foods including chicken, turkey, bananas, watermelon, and potatoes. Nevertheless, many people don't get enough--15% of young women and up to half of women over 50, according to the government panel.

Vitamin B-12 is also thought to play an important part in sweeping your body clean of homocysteine. Moreover, researchers long ago established that it is crucial of red blood cells as well as in the functioning of the nervous system. A severe deficiency can produce symptoms that range from irritating to horrifying--from tingling or loss of feeling in the hands and feet to irreversible dementia.

To serve you well, these vitamins must be in the proper balance. An overload of folic acid can disguise symptoms of B-12 deficiency, for example. Besides, excessive doses of some B's can be dangerous in their own rights.

The title of a recent editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine summed the facts up this way: "Eat Right and Take A Multivitamin."
 
"The Vitamin Revolution: B,D,E", Harriet A. Washington, Health, September 1998