Considering the earliest signs of scurvy start at the one month mark, I don't consider suspicion of a 30 day trial to be overly cautious.

What are the early signs of scurvy? I didn't see mention of that in the Vice article.

A feeling of general crumminess, tired all the time. Then comes the breathing problems and bone aches.

Per usual, there's a very informative wiki link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scurvy#Symptoms