It is especially significant that the supplement-takers consumed a lot of tablets every day, not merely a multivitamin. More than half of them took, in addition to a multivitamin/mineral, extra B-complex, vitamins C or E, carotenoids, calcium with vitamin D, omega-3 fatty acids, flavonoids, lecithin, alfalfa, coenzyme Q10 with resveratrol, and glucosamine. Women in the study also consumed gamma-linolenic acid and a probiotic supplement; men took zinc, garlic, saw palmetto, and soy protein.
WHAT ARE FOOD SUPPLEMENTS?
Food supplements are those essential constituents of food that are present in very small amounts, do not provide calories, and are essential components of or companions to enzymes. They are needed in relatively small amounts because enzymes are able to transform much larger quantities of substrate and there is little waste.
Plants and animals differ in their need for food supplements, but all living tissues share the same basic nutrients. This is how animals can live on plants and other animals. Plants synthesize every organic molecule, the final product and the enzymes. A plant requires only water, carbon dioxide, oxygen, the necessary minerals, light, and some stability in order to make every natural compound present, except vitamin B12, which can be made only by bacteria. Animals are not able to make the same nutrients—this is why they must have organic foods.
The first major evolutionary change occurred when cells began to engulf other cells. The predator cells became the unicellular animals, our ancestors. The other cells remained as plant ancestors. This was advantageous to the predator cells, since they immediately found a ready source of food that they did not need to make. The saving in energy and in chemical synthetic apparatus was enormous. A plant cell, which must make everything, has no energy left for locomotion. The energy saved by the ready food supply led to locomotion. Animals could not have existed without this separation into plant and animal life. Vitamins are needed by plants, but they make what they need, and only mineral supplements are required by both plants and animals.
In the natural state, vitamins and minerals are combined with other food constituents into a complex, three-dimensional form. For example, pure vitamin B3 is not found in nature—it is present in nucleotides. These may be so firmly bound that the vitamins are released very slowly and sometimes in inadequate amounts when they are consumed. Adding vitamins to food does not simulate natural food; vitamins and minerals are released slowly from natural food in the gastrointestinal tract, while vitamins and minerals added to food are released quickly. Thus, niacinamide added to flour may be absorbed into the blood long before the wheat starch is converted into sugar and absorbed. This is not harmful but it is important to know.
Vitamins and minerals are food artifacts and therefore must be used intelligently. They are generally helpful, in contrast to sugar, but they can be overly relied on. A good, natural (unprocessed) foods diet must be the basis for any good health plan. “Supplement” means just what the name says.
TYPES OF FOOD SUPPLEMENTS
Vitamins are organic molecules necessary for a large variety of chemical processes that occur in every tissue of the body, including the brain. For example, it has been found that vitamin C and niacinamide have a direct relationship with receptors in the brain. By definition, vitamins cannot be made in the body, are required in very tiny amounts, and serve to catalyze reactions in the body.
A few vitamins do not meet this definition but have been thought of as vitamins for so long that it is hardly likely they will ever be reclassified. Ascorbic acid is required in large or gram doses, which is not characteristic of a vitamin, nor should it be so considered, according to some researchers.10 Niacin and niacinamide can be made in the body; about 60 milligrams (mg) of tryptophan will yield 1 mg of vitamin B3 by means of the nucleotide cycle. Therefore, B3 is by a very strict definition not exactly a vitamin. Vitamin D3 is made in the skin by the influence of ultraviolet light and should not be listed as a vitamin. It is more aptly looked upon as a hormone. Perhaps the whole vitamin concept should be dropped and each vitamin be designated by its name only or as an accessory factor or food supplement. The vitamin concept has served its purpose, but today it is detrimental to orthomolecular nutrition and to medicine.
Minerals are divided into two main classes: toxic (such as mercury) and essential trace minerals (such as selenium or zinc). No mineral can be generated in the body—all have to be provided by our water and food.
“Vitamin supplements are safe. I have never seen a serious reaction to vitamin supplements. Since 1969, I have taken over two tons of ascorbic acid myself. I have put over 20,000 patients on bowel tolerance doses of ascorbic acid without any serious problems, and with great benefit.” —ROBERT F. CATHCART, M.D.
NATURAL VERSUS SYNTHETIC
People using vitamins have been confused by claims that natural vitamins are healthier than synthetic ones. It is important to understand what these various terms really mean. Vitamins are all organic molecules, whether made by plants or humans—they are in every way identical. The only difference is that vitamins made by plants and still present in the plant do not contain trace additives, which are present in human-made vitamins. But when plant-made vitamins are extracted and purified and made into a crystalline powder or into tablets, they also contain traces of all the chemicals used in the process. They differ from synthetic vitamins only in having different trace additives. The only way to ensure additive-free vitamins is to use food only, but this is unreasonable advice for those who require more than food can supply.
TESTS FOR DETERMINING NUTRIENT LEVELS
Laboratory tests for determining which vitamins are required and in what quantities have only been moderately helpful. The main reason is that measurable changes occur long after a very serious deficiency is present. In pellagra, a fatal disease, vitamin B3 blood levels are normal at onset and it also appears in the urine. Total nucleotides in the red blood cells are also normal. There is, however, an increased proportion of mononucleotides that may rise from 2–3 percent to around 12 percent of the total. The dinucleotide nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD) is the active antipellagra factor, while mononucleotides have no vitamin function. The ratio of mono- to dinucleotides is not measured in clinical laboratories. If one waits for definite abnormalities, one has waited too long before instituting vitamin therapy.
A second reason vitamin assays have been inefficient is that a measurement of body fluids gives only a very crude indication of the levels present within the tissues and cells. We can only guess how much vitamin C is present in the brain, the humors of the eye, or the adrenal cortex by the amount in blood or by the amount that spills into the urine. Vitamin levels in blood are not helpful in determining how much should be taken each day. Very low levels certainly are proof that a deficiency is present, but normal values do not mean that no supplements should be used. Many people with normal blood values became well after supplementation with the vitamin apparently already present in “normal” quantities.
Another way is to measure reactions that depend upon vitamins—with a deficiency, this reaction becomes abnormal. However, these reactions are not nearly sensitive enough. The deficiency must be very severe before abnormal reactions become apparent. A number of laboratory procedures (tests) are available from a few specialized laboratories to help the nutritionally oriented physician be more precise in formulating the nutrients required. They are also helpful in persuading patients that they should try the treatment program.
Until these problems are solved by finding measures that