Vitamins are essential nutrients that mainly come from foods.

Each performs various roles in the body, and deficiencies of different vitamins can harm health in different ways. Aim to get vitamins from a balanced, varied diet that contains plenty of fruits and vegetables.

Minerals are naturally occurring elements or compounds.

Most are inorganic solids (apart from liquid mercury and a few organic minerals) and defined by their chemical composition and crystal structure. By weight, 99.5 per cent of minerals are formed from only 12 of the natural elements.