She came in with a plastic container.

Not a pillbox — but a full storage bin, the kind you’d expect to hold kitchen supplies or holiday decorations. Inside were neatly arranged bottles: vitamins, antioxidants, herbal extracts, powders, capsules with names that sounded scientific, others that sounded almost magical.

“Doc,” she said, half-apologetic, half-hopeful, “I just want to be healthy.” 

She is not alone.

In recent years, supplements have quietly become part of daily life for many Filipinos. A capsule for immunity. A tablet for the liver. Gummies for sleep. Powders for energy. Pills for memory. Most are taken not because of disease, but in the hope of preventing one.

And that, perhaps, is where the conversation needs to begin.

Because the idea behind supplements is not wrong. In fact, in medicine, we prescribe them all the time — calcium and vitamin D for bone health, iron for anemia, folic acid in pregnancy. These are not optional. They are necessary.

But beyond clear deficiencies, the landscape becomes less certain — and often, less honest.

Many supplements promise more than they can prove. They are marketed as natural, safe, and essential, when in reality, most are not required by the body in the absence of a specific deficiency. Unlike medications, they are not always subjected to the same level of rigorous clinical testing. Their benefits are often extrapolated, not demonstrated.

And yet, patients take them — faithfully, consistently, and sometimes at great cost.

Part of this is driven by fear. Fear of aging, of illness, of decline. Supplements offer something medicine cannot always guarantee: control. The feeling that one is actively doing something to stay well.

Social media is also a strong driver for this infatuation with supplements.  Influencers touting miracle cures, patients abandoning their prescribed medications for “healthier” options.  “Experts” who list down their own concoction of tablets “proven” to make everything better.

But more is not always better.