Earl Kitchenerasked Her Majesty's Government:
What information they have concerning the number of British people who have taken higher dose vitamin B6 supplements in each of the last 10 years for which figures are available; and whether they will indicate for each of those years the number of incidences of death or serious adverse reaction which have been recorded.
§ Lord DonoughueThe Government have no information concerning the number of British people who take higher dose vitamin B6 supplements, nor is there any established reporting procedure for adverse effects arising from consumption of dietary supplements sold under food law. However, the UK Yellow Card Adverse Drug Reaction (ADR) reporting scheme administered by the Medicines Control Agency has reports associated with medicinal products. These are provided voluntarily by doctors, dentists and pharmacists and indirectly by pharmaceutical companies and are not a complete record of the ADR's occurring in the population.
From 1964 to date there have been a total of 649 reports of 1,181 spontaneously reported adverse reactions associated with products containing vitamin B6, of which 16 were fatal. The majority (63 per cent.) of reactions are associated with products containing a number of constituents, 410 reactions being associated with products containing only vitamin B6, most at doses below 100mg daily.
A summary of reactions reported with single constituent products containing vitamin B6 in each of the last 10 years is given in the table below.
Table of Yellow Card Reports from 1987 to 1996 for Vitamin B6 Year Total reactions Serious Fatal 1987 7 3 0 1988 4 1 0 1989 8 3 0 1990 2 2 0 1991 3 2 0 1992 6 4 0 1993 5 2 1 1994 1 0 0 1995 5 5 0 1996 1 1 0 Total 1987–96 42 23 1 The inclusion of any one reaction in the table does not necessarily mean that vitamin B6 caused the reaction. Other factors such as the temporal relationship between medicine and reaction, any concomitant medication and the possibility of underlying disease must also he considered.