The supplement waste line
₹1,00,000 a year is what an urban Indian spends on supplements they may not absorb. B12, D3, omega-3 — half of it rides on genes you have not read. Stop guessing. Test what you absorb.
The supplement aisle has scaled faster than the science underneath it. Multivitamins, B-complexes, D3, omega-3, magnesium — most urban Indians take at least one, many take four or five, and almost none of them know if their body absorbs any.
Where the money leaks
Variants in VDR change how you convert and use vitamin D. FUT2 and MTRR change how you handle B12. FADS1 changes how efficiently you turn plant omega-3 into the long-chain form your brain actually uses. The same dose can move blood levels in one person and barely register in another.
Test before you stack
Two cheap blood panels — vitamin D, B12, ferritin, homocysteine — give you the actual deficit before you start spending. A wellness DNA panel then tells you whether you need the standard dose, a higher one, or a different form.
The default to walk away from
A daily pill that no one prescribed and no one measured. Replace it with two months of food-first eating and a single targeted blood test. The decisions get cheaper from there.