Airborne Crashes

Earlier this month, makers of the herbal supplement Airborne agreed to pay $23.3 million to settle a class-action lawsuit over false advertising. The popularity of this supposed cold preventing supplement, with it's "The One Designed By A Teacher" slogan, has been enormous. So who is right? The millions of consumers who swear that it works? Or the legal plaintiffs who claim that it doesn't? And should the average person have been at least a little skeptical of this product without knowing all the complicated science behind it?

Ungullible Clues
Let's start with the last question. Is there anything about the product that should have made the average person at least a little skeptical of it? What questions could you have asked before purchasing Airborne, without needing a scientist to help you answer it?

Clue #1: The Slogan Impresses You? Really?
Airborne's slogan is "The One Made By A Teacher," and a little digging into the Airborne website explains that a 2nd grade elementary school teacher researched and tested several different herbal supplement concoctions, and settled on the Airborne formulation to reduce her exposure to colds in the classroom. No offense to elementary school teachers (my wife is one), but being exposed to hundreds of snotty nosed 7 yr olds every day does not qualify one to research, design, and test cold medications. The fact that the makers of Airborne would highlight the fact that it was designed by an elementary school teacher should be your first clue to begin digging deeper with more questions.

Clue #2: Herbals Are Food, Not Drugs
I know that herbal supplements and other "alternative" medications are quite popular these days, so this clue may generate a fair bit of angry responses, but here's why you should always be at least a little bit skeptical of herbal supplements. Herbal supplements are treated by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) as if they were food, not medicine. What this means is that all they have to prove is that the supplement is safe to ingest. They do NOT have to prove that it is effective as a medication. So making an "herbal supplement" instead of a medicine is a favorite way for manufacturers to avoid the scientific process of proving that their product works, and instead relying on flawed anecdotal experiences to market their product.

Clue #3: Drug Company's Greed Benefits You
So you don't trust the big bad FDA and money grubbing drug companies either? OK - I can understand some of the mistrust in these companies, but sometimes that mistrust is misplaced or overblown. Sometimes the greed of the drug companies does conflict with the consumer's needs, but here's one place I think it benefits us. Drug companies are constantly looking for newer and better drugs to sell you. They have to keep discovering or making new products to survive. So if there was any truth to the claims of these herbal medicines, don't you think that the drug companies would be furiously working to discover, extract, and greedily patent the key medicinal ingredients for sale? Even if they couldn't patent it, it still would be valuable for them to discover the active ingredients because they could then purify and possibly improve upon it, making a drug that was more effective than the herbal source. And being able to call something an "FDA approved medication" would then make the drug far more marketable than it merely being an "herbal supplement." So in this instance we both win - the drug companies get to make more money, and we get better assurances that we aren't buying snake oil. The fact that the big drug companies are largely ignoring herbal supplements is another reason to be skeptical of any medical claims made by them.

Now Let's Dig Deeper
OK - so far we have provided a few clues as to why we should approach this product with a healthy amount of skepticism, but we haven't provided proof (or even a large amount of evidence) that the product doesn't work as claimed. Is there any harm in using it, just in case the product's claims are true? Here's what a little more digging on the internet uncovers:

Answer #1: Real Science
The Psychology Department at the University of Vanderbilt researched and summarized several studies of the main ingredients of Airborne: Vitamin C and echinacea. Their conclusion? There is no evidence that the product prevents colds at all, and the dosage for reducing the duration of a cold is too small to be effective. So at a minimum, the product harms your wallet by wasting your money. While it's true that a healthy immune system helps to fight disease, it seems that maintaining a healthy body and washing your hands frequently prior to a cold, and getting plenty of rest during a cold, would be a far more effective and cheaper method than the use of these herbal supplements.

Answer #2: Bad Science
The study most often cited in support of Airborne was sponsored by the company that makes the product (source). Does that sound like a conflict of interest to you? Do you honestly think they would pay for a test unless they knew they were going to get the results they wanted? Wait... it gets better... The company that performed the tests were later found to not have any scientific facilities, not have any scientists on staff, and not have any doctors on staff. In fact, the company consisted of only two men who started the company for the sole purpose of performing this one test (article). If that doesn't smell fishy to you, then I have some week-old sushi on sale that you might be interested in.

Answer #3: Do No Harm?
One of medicine's main goals is to help, not harm people. We've established in Answer #1 above that this product appears to not prevent nor even reduce the duration of colds. But does it do any harm? The product contains 1gram of vitamin C, and instructs you to take one tablet every 3 hrs at the onset of a cold. Although it's inconclusive, some scientific studies suggest that vitamin C doses this high might contribute to kidney stones and constipation. Also, pregnant women are advised by the product to avoid it's use because it's vitamin A content can lead to birth defects.

Conclusions:

The product has given us many reasons to not trust it. It has changed it's claims over time to avoid regulation under the FDA, it continues to make claims that are not supported by scientific testing, and it has employed the research of fake testing labs to try to lend credibility to it's product. In addition to not benefiting anyone but the manufacturer's wallet, it may also be harmful to some people at higher doses (but still within prescribed limits). I don't know about you, but I'm going to continue washing my hands frequently to prevent the spread of germs, but I'll keep my money in my wallet when it comes to this product.

If you are interested in getting a settlement refund on your Airborne purchases (up to 6 bottles without receipts), visit the official settlement website. If you are interested in learning more about recognizing snake oil medicines and bad science, then Ungullible recommends the following reads...