Key facts
- Menopause supplements costing over £400 annually are no better than a £22 multivitamin, according to Which?.
- Many popular menopause supplements lack meaningful quantities of key nutrients, costing up to 20 times more than standard multivitamins.
- The global menopause supplement market is valued at nearly $17 billion and is expected to reach $25 billion by 2030.
- Which? found that none of the 26 studied supplements contained the correct nutrients in the right doses for menopause.
- Asda’s A-Z Multivitamins & Minerals contains essential vitamins plus 200mg of calcium and 100mg of magnesium for 6p a day.
- Love Mushrooms’ Empower costs £1.33 a day but lacks menopause-specific nutrients like magnesium and calcium.
Menopause supplements costing more than £400 a year are no better than a £22-a-year multivitamin, according to analysis by the consumer watchdog Which?.
Which? found that many popular supplements aimed at women going through menopause or perimenopause lack meaningful quantities of key nutrients, yet cost 20 times more than standard multivitamins. The global menopause supplement market is valued at nearly $17 billion and is expected to reach $25 billion by 2030.
Research by Which? indicated that none of the supplements studied contained the correct nutrients in the right doses to support their use for menopause. Shefalee Loth, a public health nutritionist at Which? and co-lead of the research, expressed concern that the supplements industry has become unregulated, with companies cashing in on health anxieties.
Nutritionists examined 26 popular supplements and found that a high-quality multivitamin alongside targeted supplements where needed was often cheaper and potentially more effective than all-in-one menopause blends. For example, Asda’s A-Z Multivitamins & Minerals costs 6p a day (£22 a year) and contains essential vitamins plus 200mg of calcium and 100mg of magnesium. In contrast, Love Mushrooms’ Empower costs £1.33 a day (£485 a year) but does not contain menopause-specific nutrients such as magnesium and calcium. Similarly, Wild Nutrition’s Women’s 45+ Daily Multi Nutrient costs £1.27 a day (£468 a year) but contained significantly under-recommended daily amounts of vitamin D, calcium, and magnesium.
Vitabiotics’ Menopace Max, the highest-scoring menopause supplement analysed, cost 93p a day (£340 a year). These findings align with previous research by UCL, which found that less than half of 201 supplements sold in the UK contained vitamin D and calcium, and most ingredients were not specifically recommended by major menopause societies.
Dr Xand van Tulleken, an honorary associate professor at the UCL Institute for Global Health, stated that annual spending on menopause supplements far exceeds spending on menopause research, and there is no persuasive evidence of their significant effect on symptoms, with some being dangerous and their pricing and marketing exploitative. The Health Food Manufacturers’ Association, represented by Martin Last, encouraged manufacturers to formulate supplements according to food regulations, noting that life stages like menopause may create increased nutritional demands.