Offit left out information on why he started to advocate vitamins in the first place. He was diagnosed with Bright's Disease. One cause of Bright's disease is a lack of Vitamin D. Taking vitamins was the right course of action in his specific case. He most likely wanted to share his success with others, which is probably why he started advocating vitamins. It's unfortunate that he pushed vitamins as a cure as far as he did. It would be interesting to learn why he took the stance he did from people who knew him personally.
p.s. I do agree with the author in that I do believe taking Vitamins is largely unnecessary if you are eating a healthy diet w/lots of vegetables, legumes and fruit. :)
Just to clarify, (1) Bright's disease is a historical catch-all for essentially all renal diseases, and (2) the causal arrow points from kidney disease to hypovitaminosis D, not the other way around. Low vitamin D is a common consequence, not cause, of kidney disease.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bright's_disease
Another good example of misleading information is the last sentence: "In 1994, Linus Pauling died of prostate cancer."
He left out the part where he was 93 at the time of his death (1901-1994). Both the incidence and mortality rate for those over 80 are very high.
http://www.medinfographics.com/cancer-statistics/prostate-ca...
p.s. I do agree with the author in that I do believe taking Vitamins is largely unnecessary if you are eating a healthy diet w/lots of vegetables, legumes and fruit. :)