Magnesium is having a second. Touted as the most recent cure-all by wellness influencers—and their more and more sensible AI clones—the mineral is flooding social media feeds with guarantees of higher sleep, much less stress, and longer lives. However medical consultants say the development is stuffed with misinformation, and probably harmful.
Promoted by people and AI-generated avatars throughout TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube, magnesium dietary supplements are being bought as catch-all cures for anxiousness, insomnia, and weight achieve. Some dietary supplements pack as much as 700mg per dose—practically twice the really helpful most—and that has medical doctors elevating pink flags.
“AI ‘physicians’ are giving testimonials which might be direct, black and white: ‘If in case you have this downside, that is the way it works.’ It’s convincing in case you don’t understand it’s AI,” Dr. Steven Chen, affiliate dean for scientific affairs on the USC College of Pharmacy, advised Decrypt. “What worries me about these fast snippets is that they don’t point out the dangers.”
Chen mentioned that whereas magnesium does have authentic makes use of—reminiscent of managing bowel regularity and easing muscle pressure—these advantages are being cherry-picked and exaggerated.
As AI-generated pictures turn into extra superior, consultants say the road between truth and fiction is changing into more durable to identify.
Most adults want not more than 400mg of magnesium per day, and that’s simply dealt with by meals reminiscent of peanut butter, cashews, chia seeds, hen breast, and salmon. However viral dietary supplements are being bought like efficiency enhancers—quick, simple, and algorithm-approved, with some dietary supplements promoting drugs providing greater than twice that degree.
Whereas magnesium itself isn’t unlawful or regulated like a drug, the best way it’s being bought—via algorithm-driven promotion and generative AI testimonials—has remodeled it right into a profit-churning well being product marketed with little oversight.
Picture: Magnesium adverts on TikTok
An excessive amount of magnesium will be particularly dangerous, particularly for folks with coronary heart, digestive, or kidney issues.
Widespread unwanted effects of magnesium dietary supplements embody diarrhea, nausea, abdomen cramps, flushing, complications, and muscle weak point. Nonetheless, in folks with kidney issues–who can’t excrete extra magnesium effectively—the mineral can construct as much as harmful ranges, inflicting low blood stress, hassle urinating, confusion, issue respiratory, an irregular or gradual heartbeat, and even cardiac arrest.
Aiming to offer their adverts extra legitimacy, some use AI to make medical consultants seem to make optimistic claims about magnesium dietary supplements, a follow that Chen known as “harmful and unethical.”
“Everybody needs easy and fast,” he mentioned. “However relating to severe well being wants, there isn’t any fast repair for good sleep, train, and good diet.”
Picture: Magnesium adverts on Instagram
The seek for a long life fast repair has led to a increase within the complement business. In 2024, the dietary complement market was price $189 billion. In line with market analysis agency Priority Analysis, by 2035, that quantity is anticipated to succeed in $402 billion.
When requested about ads that includes AI-generated medical testimonials and questionable well being claims, the social media platforms supplied restricted explanations of their insurance policies. A YouTube spokesperson pointed to its medical misinformation pointers, which prohibit content material that contradicts native well being authority steering, reminiscent of selling dangerous various therapies or discouraging skilled medical care.
A consultant for Meta additionally declined to remark instantly on the adverts, however pointed to their promoting insurance policies, which prohibit misleading or deceptive well being claims, promotion of unsafe dietary supplements, exaggerated health-related guarantees, and ads that includes destructive self-perception ways or unauthorized makes use of of medical professionals’ likenesses.
TikTok didn’t reply to Decrypt’s request for remark.
“Folks love these platforms for freedom of speech and the flexibility to say no matter they need,” Chen mentioned. “However we want a dedication to affected person security, ensuring folks don’t pursue one thing that’s not solely unhelpful, however would possibly trigger them to disregard a severe situation. In the event that they delay searching for assist, it might be too late.”
In line with Dr. Zhaoping Li, director of the UCLA Heart for Human Vitamin, whereas magnesium is now generally promoted for sleep and muscle assist, its broader use stems from a extra particular medical software.
“For ladies with preeclampsia, it was used to calm down uterine muscle tissue throughout contractions and forestall untimely start,” Li advised Decrypt. “From there, folks started utilizing it extra broadly for muscle leisure. Whereas not extensively studied, small research recommend advantages for stressed leg syndrome and for enjoyable muscle tissue earlier than mattress.”
Magnesium deficiency is frequent in folks with poor diets or continual alcohol use, Li defined, which is why it’s usually replenished in scientific settings.
“When you got here to the emergency room, they’d have given you key vitamins—magnesium is one in every of them,” she mentioned. “Primarily based on that background, folks now extra freely advocate it for varied well being advantages, however the actual profit depends upon what you utilize it for.”
Chen and Li each mentioned that sure types of magnesium are higher absorbed and could also be helpful in particular instances. However merchandise labeled as “complexes” with a dozen sorts are largely advertising.
“If we actually had been doing it for everybody’s profit, I might advocate taking extra pure meals with excessive magnesium,” Li mentioned. “The profit is way, way more than taking a complete bunch of drugs.”
Li argues that the actual promise of AI in well being lies not in advertising dietary supplements, however in understanding meals.
“If we actually need to use AI, we have to examine meals altogether,” she mentioned. “Not isolate one mineral and throw it right into a capsule.”
