Pregnant women and people who need regular supplements due to a deficiency should talk to their doctor before relying on expired vitamins. The FDA doesn't require an expiration date, which means most vitamins don't have any in the package, but they do expire. However, it's still safe to take vitamins after their expiration date. Like foods and beverages, vitamins and supplements have an average lifespan of about two years.
The purpose of vitamin expiration dates is to provide you with the information you need to ensure that you use the products in a timely manner and that you receive the amount of each vitamin listed on the label. Ask your doctor before taking vitamins to make sure they're right for you. Florida SNAP benefits help low-income seniors, people with disabilities who live on fixed incomes, and other low-income households supplement their monthly food budget. That means that the closer the expiration date comes when you buy a bottle of vitamins, the less potent they will be, according to the Health and Fitness Association IDEA.
If your vitamins have expired, talk to your doctor to find out if you can continue to use them or if you should buy a new bottle. In most cases, taking an expired vitamin doesn't produce any side effects, and expired supplements aren't usually dangerous. Throwing them away allows supplements to leak into the water supply, and throwing them away can cause accidental poisoning in children and animals, according to the U. So, if you're taking expired vitamins, you may not be getting all the nutrients your baby needs for proper development, especially if you already lack certain nutrients in your diet.
The problem is that if you rely on a vitamin supplement to ensure you get a certain dose to help treat a medical condition or vitamin deficiency, a less potent vitamin may not be providing you with enough. There is no consensus on when vitamins may expire or start to lose their potency, since each vitamin expires at a different rate. For example, don't be tempted to double your intake of a vitamin after the expiration date to make sure you're getting enough of it. After two years or after the expiration date stamped on a bottle of vitamins has passed, consider replacing the vitamins.
The Food and Drug Administration will market its products, but the FDA will intervene if a supplement is considered dangerous, according to the Colorado State University Extension. If stored away from heat, light, and moisture, supplements usually last about two years after the date of manufacture before concentrations fall below 100 percent of the amounts listed on the label. Take expired vitamins to your doctor or pharmacy for proper disposal; do not throw them away or flush them down the toilet. Therefore, vitamin manufacturers are not required to provide expiration information, but many voluntarily stamp an expiration date on their products.
Expiration dates for vitamins and dietary supplements are extremely conservative to ensure that consumers receive quality products.
