VITAMIN OVERLOAD
It is widely accepted that that the Standard American Diet (S.A.D.) is woefully deficient in nutrition and even the source fruits and vegetables are much less nutritious than 50 years ago. This is due to many factors including soil depletion, crop selection, intensive farming methods and pesticide use just to name a few. Commercial food processing however vastly compounds the problem removing much of the nutrients to improve marketability such as cost, appearance, taste, transportability, preservatives, pest and disease resistance… but never nutritional content.
So it seems to make sense to supplement our diet to make up for nutritional deficiencies and according to commercial advertisements, all we need is “vitamins” and we’re good (fade in healthy beautiful people). Gee, I wish I looked like that!
Over 50% of Americans supplement their diet with vitamins and minerals. Most take these vitamins in the belief that they contribute to better health which is an admirable goal. Others take them to stave off colds or flu or whatever pandemic is the hot topic on the news at the moment. Most would subscribe that more is better and diligently check that their vitamins supply many times the recommended daily allowance (RDA).
The reality is that vitamin supplementation will not compensate for poor eating habits and bad diets. And… not all vitamins are created equal. The sad truth is that almost all vitamins on the market today are synthetically derived and typically use compounds and chemicals in the processes that are themselves toxic e.g. Coat tar, acetone, ammonia and hydrochloric acid just to name a few. Even those vitamins that carry the “natural” label only need to have 10% natural sourced ingredients to carry this label.
There are numerous problems with synthetic vitamins including:
a. Toxicity with mega doses
b. Bioavailability (does the body recognize this substance and can it be used by the
body).
c. Synthetic vitamins are “isolates” and contain only a single portion of the natural
vitamin complex it is trying to replace. Missing are enzymes and other nutritional
cofactors that enable us to utilize and assimilate the vitamins.
d. Enzymatic reactions within the body require the correct shape of the molecule to
proceed with the reaction. Synthetic vitamins may have the same chemical
composition but the incorrect shape which would make it non-biologically
available.
The best source of vitamins is from food, and if supplementation is desired, then by far the best sources are vitamins derived from whole foods. These vitamins do not contain mega doses as they are not available or desirable in nature. But they will be in the correct amount and balance to be used by the body as intended by nature. Check out the following websites for more information.
https://www.precisionnutrition.com/all-about-vitamin-supplements
https://sunwarrior.com/blogs/health-hub/whole-food-vitamins-vs-synthetic-vitamins-the-difference-may-astonish-you. (Good article but does have a commercial pitch at the end).