The relationship between vitamin C and health is controversial.
Double Nobel Prize winner, Linus Pauling, argued that ascorbate could prevent or cure heart disease, stroke, cancer and infections.
Conventional experts disagreed, disparaging supplements in favour of fruits and vegetables.
This book presents a new model, describing the action of vitamin C in health and disease.
It demonstrates conclusively that the establishment has misinterpreted the evidence, potentially resulting in epidemic levels of avoidable disease.
The dynamic flow model explains the current results and points the way for future experiments.
Vitamin C supplementation could eradicate many diseases.
In pharmacological doses, it could cure the major killers of the industrialised world.
to test these ideas may condemn countless people to chronic illness and premature death.
The most impotant thing I took from this book was the fact that that half life of vitamin c once absorbed into the body is so very short. Ideally time release or sustained release may spread the absorption over a longer time frame and avoid it all going down the loo in on your next visit.
I haven't tried them and the only science I can find supporting this form is from the company making them so they would say that wouldn't they. So I am more than a little skeptical however it is an alternative that may be worth considering.
The hype may have an element of truth.
I have found plain old ascorbic acid very effective for eliminating colds and other minor diseases quickly, like in 24 hours or less if taken to bowel tolerance.
So in cost analysis, which I am always thinking of
What does a 500mg tablet of alma cost and exactly how much vitamin c does it provide?
Can it compare to a standard bottle of ascorbic acid.
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So in cost analysis, which I am always thinking of
What does a 500mg tablet of alma cost and exactly how much vitamin c does it provide?
Can it compare to a standard bottle of ascorbic acid.
You would need to take much less amla than vitamin C.
Amla contains approx. 20 times more Vitamin C than oranges, is 10-20 times better assimilated than USP Vit. C and has a unique antioxidant profile including healthy tannins which work synergistically with its Vitamin C content for stability. https://www.iherb.com/Paradise-Herbs-...Caps/4458?at=0
Amla Berry, the Indian gooseberry, provides the highest concentration of vitamin C of any natural source. This whole food vitamin C with naturally occurring bioflavonoids is 12 times more assimilable than synthetic vitamin C.
Amla, revered for over 5,000 years in Ayurvedic medicine for its anti-aging and immune enhancing properties, contains a superior source of vitamin C as well as high levels of the antioxidant Superoxide Dismutase (SOD) and tannins which inhibit the degradation of vitamin C and act as cellular protective agents against oxidative stress. Research shows that Amla increases protein synthesis.
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- Jim
Life is just one damned thing after another - Elbert Hubbard
100 gm. of Amla contains about 700 mg. of vitamin C.
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Researchers have also shown that just 8.7 mg of natural vitamin C from Amla is equivalent to 100 mg of synthetic vitamin C. (for equivalence)
Excessive ascorbic acid does not cause kidney stones, that is a myth. The truth is that vitamin c will prevent kidney stones. There was a large study done to prove this.
I am not a big fan of synthetic vitamins, however as stated earlier, it is not possible to consume enough vitamin c from fruit. It is also important to take natural vitamin C "rings" in order to work in a synergistic manner.
You are right about synthetic E, however, the worst synthetic vitamin is vitamin A, in the form of Palimate and Acetate. These are found in cheap multivitamins, and are not beneficial to health. These are not the same as beta carotene.
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Excessive ascorbic acid does not cause kidney stones, that is a myth. The truth is that vitamin c will prevent kidney stones. There was a large study done to prove this.
I'm on your side PBD. That's why I said the excess would cause problems for people who have kidney problems. Those problems can cause them to not eliminate/flush properly.
Chemist here (and I post on this board so you know I am not a big pharma or GMO fan).
Oh good, now we're cookin'! In order to convert glucose into ascorbic acid we need 4 essential enzymes to complete the task. Since we already have 3, (and there's enzymes manufactured for everything else) why do you suppose L-gulonolactone oxidase, the 4th enzyme needed to complete the biochemical pathway, hasn't been marketed?"
Quote:
Originally Posted by saved1986
But Vit C in the form of straight synthesized ascorbic acid is ok (IMO).
Could you explain that, plz? In my mind synthetic ascorbic acid is not Vit C. The FDA gave the green flag to call it Vit C, but that doesn't change the fact that synthetic ascorbic acid is merely a fraction of natural Vit C. If Bioflavonoids, Factor K, Factor J, Factor P, Rutin, Tyrosinase, Ascorbinogen, and mineral co-factors are not present, there's no vitamin activity. Since ascorbic acid has been described as being the shell protecting the functional parts of the vitamin, how is okay to take alone? You figure when some of the other components are present, the body will draw on its own stores of the rest to make the vitamin complete. Over time, wouldn't taking synthetic ascorbic acid eventually cause deficiencies?
Vitamins are supposed to assist the body and it seems logical to me that it would be less taxing on the body to consume the whole complex.
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~Voltaire~
Pauling showed us that ascorbic acid is not only beneficial in large doses, but is completely safe. Remember, he took straight ascorbic acid, not the more gentle ester C, nor did he take Quercetin, rose hips, camu, acai, etc.
Oh good, now we're cookin'! In order to convert glucose into ascorbic acid we need 4 essential enzymes to complete the task. Since we already have 3, (and there's enzymes manufactured for everything else) why do you suppose L-gulonolactone oxidase, the 4th enzyme needed to complete the biochemical pathway, hasn't been marketed?"
Could you explain that, plz? In my mind synthetic ascorbic acid is not Vit C. The FDA gave the green flag to call it Vit C, but that doesn't change the fact that synthetic ascorbic acid is merely a fraction of natural Vit C. If Bioflavonoids, Factor K, Factor J, Factor P, Rutin, Tyrosinase, Ascorbinogen, and mineral co-factors are not present, there's no vitamin activity. Since ascorbic acid has been described as being the shell protecting the functional parts of the vitamin, how is okay to take alone? You figure when some of the other components are present, the body will draw on its own stores of the rest to make the vitamin complete. Over time, wouldn't taking synthetic ascorbic acid eventually cause deficiencies?
Vitamins are supposed to assist the body and it seems logical to me that it would be less taxing on the body to consume the whole complex.
Of course its better to have the natural form for the co-factors , but straight ascorbic acid is fine. The only thing I will say (IMO) is if you take a natural form you will need less.
It is the 10th anniversary of the death of Linus Pauling and his most controversial scientific conjectures about the health benefits of vitamin C are being confirmed. The weight of evidence may yet force the medical establishment to accept his ideas on nutrition and health.
Linus Pauling's claim, that he knew a cure for heart disease, cancer and infections, was greeted with ridicule. His remarkable health claims concerned the substance we know as vitamin C. Now, ten years after his death on 19th August 1994, his revolutionary ideas are finally on the way to vindication. Given his history, it should not surprise us if Pauling was right all along. He was, after all, the leading chemist of the last century and, arguably, the greatest ever American scientist. He remains the only person to have won two unshared Nobel Prizes, the first for Chemistry (1954) and the second for peace (1962). In addition to being one of the greatest scientists ever, he was a renowned humanitarian.
By the time of his death, the medical establishment had branded Pauling a quack, because he advocated the use of high doses of vitamin C to treat many diseases. Irwin Stone first introduced Pauling to vitamin C, and explained that it wasn't really a vitamin at all, but an essential substance we could no longer manufacture in our bodies. Most animals make their own vitamin C, in large amounts. In humans, the gene for this ability has mutated and no longer works properly.
When Pauling looked into Stone's claims, he found that conventional medicine had long ignored evidence from respected physicians and scientists. This research suggested that high doses of vitamin C might be a cure for many illnesses, including cancer and heart disease. However, when he explained these findings in his wonderfully constructed books "Vitamin C and the Common Cold" and "How to Live Longer and Feel Better", the medical profession was incensed, implying that a mere chemist could not possibly understand the intricacies of medical science.
If Pauling was correct, vitamin C could help overcome the major killers in the industrialised world. This sounded so unlikely that a lesser scientist making the claim would probably have been ignored; the medical world had already disregarded similar reports of vitamin C. Linus Pauling had a reputation for being 20 years ahead of other scientists.
He may well have been years ahead in other fields but, in medicine, the insiders considered such a thing to be impossible. Pauling battled with the medical authorities and convinced a lot of the public of the benefits of high dose vitamin C. He took on the medical establishment because the implication for health was enormous: an end to premature death and unnecessary suffering from heart disease, infection and many cancers.
Since Pauling's death, the medical establishment has reclaimed the scientific position with a series of experiments on vitamin C. In particular, the NIH measured the distribution of vitamin C in the body and claimed that Pauling was wrong about the need for high doses, as the blood could be saturated at low doses [Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 93, 3704-9.]. They added that doses higher than one gram were potentially dangerous. From this point on, the high dose vitamin C lobby were on the defensive.
If the body could be saturated at low doses, the argument went, higher doses were simply a waste or even potentially dangerous. However, clinical reports of the utility of high dose vitamin C had been repeated in the literature for over 50 years. These reports continued, particularly in the fields of heart disease, infections and cancer, contradicting the NIH conclusions. Either the clinical reports of the efficacy of high doses were incorrect, or the NIH experimental work was flawed.
Taking note of this inconsistency, Drs Steve Hickey and Hilary Roberts decided to investigate the data for a book ("Ascorbate, the science of vitamin C", www.lulu.com/ascorbate). They began by looking at the apparently ludicrous claims for the medical effects of vitamin C. Pauling had stated that the substance could cure cancer and that shortage was the major cause of heart disease. Among his many scientific advances, Pauling had made occasional errors: perhaps he had done the same with vitamin C. If he was wrong, his hypotheses should be easy to refute.
When they examined the evidence, Hickey and Roberts found background evidence for Pauling's ideas from independent scientific and medical reports, covering half a century. The findings in these papers could neither be dismissed as placebo effects nor easily explained. The reports included remission of AIDS, cures for cancer, and the immediate recovery of children at the point of death from septic shock. The claims seemed so out of the ordinary that they were hard to believe. However, Hickey and Roberts could find no counter examples in the scientific or medical literature.
If these positive reports were indeed wrong, no-one had shown this to be true. The scientific evidence was consistent with Pauling's ideas, with a few notable exceptions. The primary exception was the NIH data on blood and tissue saturation. The medical establishment accepted the NIH conclusions and held them in the highest regard. The US Institute of Medicine had based their official recommended dietary allowance (RDA) on these results. If the NIH was correct, then Pauling was wrong and the positive reports of high doses must be invalid.
The NIH conclusions were not correct, however. Hickey and Roberts examined their experiments and found them to be full of errors. For example, the researchers had given a dose of vitamin C, waited until it had been excreted and then measured blood levels. Using this procedure, they found that increasing the dose did not greatly increase the blood levels. Instead of realising that this was because the dose had been excreted, the NIH claimed it was because the body was saturated, so higher doses were redundant. They then used white blood cells as a model for normal cells, to see how they absorbed vitamin C from their surroundings. These white blood cells are specialised to absorb vitamin C, even when supplies are low. If other body cells were similar to white blood cells, we would normally have a reserve of 40 grams in our bodies. In this case, given the proposed RDA of 200mg, it would take 2-3 years to fill a depleted body. This is demonstrably incorrect: the classic example is that James Lind's sailors recovered from scurvy in a matter of days when they were given citrus fruits containing small amounts of vitamin C.
These mistakes were gross and unsupportable. In order to check their re-interpretation of the data, Hickey sent emails to the NIH, the Institute of Medicine and every scientist he could contact who was associated with the RDA, asking them to provide a reasonable scientific response to these errors. No-one was able to provide such a response. Since it is normal scientific practice to explain and defend your ideas, the hypothesis that people only need small amounts of vitamin C looks increasingly shaky.
Even the NIH's subsequent data contradicts their earlier work. The NIH vitamin C group published a series of papers on vitamin C and cancer [Ann Intern Med, 140(7), 533-7.]. In these papers, they suggested that repeated doses of oral vitamin C would produce blood levels of at least 220 microM (a measure of the concentration) , which is three times greater than the 70 microM maximum "saturated" value they claimed in their RDA papers. While their own papers clearly showed that their low-dose claims were wrong, the NIH appeared not to notice. Instead, they suggested that intravenous doses could produce higher blood levels, which might be effective against cancer. Even though their data were coming closer to Pauling's findings on the use of vitamin C in cancer, the NIH took the opportunity to mount another attack on Linus Pauling, suggesting he did not know the difference between oral and intravenous (IV) vitamin C.
Pauling had performed a series of trials with Dr Ewan Cameron, a Scottish cancer specialist, showing that intravenous vitamin C allowed cancer patients to live much longer than expected. Numerous other studies confirmed this effect, particularly the work of Dr Abram Hoffer and Dr Hugh Riordan. The Mayo Clinic tried to refute this research but failed, as they used low, oral doses, making their results invalid. In their own cancer paper, the NIH researchers claimed that Pauling and Cameron's use of the IV route was "serendipitous", implying that Pauling did not know the difference between injected and oral doses. In fact, Pauling had written explicitly about this difference, so the NIH criticism was misplaced.
A new scientific theory, called the dynamic flow model, explains all the observed responses to vitamin C in the literature. This model is described in the book "Ascorbate", mentioned above. According to the model, people should ideally be in a state of dynamic flow, which means they should ingest more vitamin C than they need, in the form of divided dose supplements. The extra ascorbate flows through the body and is excreted in the urine. It is not wasted, however, as the excess acts as a reservoir when extra vitamin C is required. Dynamic flow is the closest we humans can get to restoring our physiology to how it was before we lost the ability to make vitamin C in our bodies, as most other animals still do.
It is difficult to imagine what Linus Pauling would have made of all this had he lived. Hickey and Roberts like to think that he would have pointed out the NIH errors earlier. He might have had fun explaining that the NIH could not perform a simple experiment, yet tried to blame him for the deficiencies in the Mayo Clinic's research. It is now 10 years since Pauling's death. Biologist Ren� Dubos suggested that the mainstream converges with Pauling twenty years later. If so, we only have another decade to wait until the medical establishment can admit that Pauling was right all along.
The fallacy of medicine is that if you do not get enough Vit C you get scurvy. It ends there! But the fact is although 50 mg a day of ascorbic acid prevents scurvy, 500mg a day lowers heart disease, cancer etc and higher doses are great for other issues. But pharma cannot make $$$ of of Vit C.
The fallacy of medicine is that if you do not get enough Vit C you get scurvy. It ends there! But the fact is although 50 mg a day of ascorbic acid prevents scurvy, 500mg a day lowers heart disease, cancer etc and higher doses are great for other issues. But pharma cannot make $$$ of of Vit C.
Same story with vitamin D and magnesium.
Magnesium consumption intake is only 68% of the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) of magnesium for adult women and 80% of the RDA for adult men (National Research Council 1989). The average pregnant woman in the United States consumes only 34�58% of her RDA for magnesium (Franz 1987).
and those are old studies, since then more junk food is bought now and junk food is almost always magnesium deficient. Krispin has good magnesium information
I don't suppose I have to remind readers here the current RDA for vitamin D is grossly inadequate. Most people require 1000iu daily per 25lbs weight. On average5000~6000iu/daily is needed to get around 60ng/ml ~ 150nmol/l
Oh good, now we're cookin'! In order to convert glucose into ascorbic acid we need 4 essential enzymes to complete the task. Since we already have 3, (and there's enzymes manufactured for everything else) why do you suppose L-gulonolactone oxidase, the 4th enzyme needed to complete the biochemical pathway, hasn't been marketed?"
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