Thoughts by Ruben Lancia, CEO
iHEALTHe Wellness
Vitamin C
Perhaps 100 years ago we could get all the nutrients we need from food alone, before the dominance of the agriculture business and processed foods. Nowadays this is becoming an increasingly naïve notion. Food supplements are no substitute for eating correctly, however they can be a wonderful enhancement to it.
Humans, apes, guinea pigs, and fruit eating bats all suffer from a genetic mutation whereby they are unable to produce ascorbate (vitamin C) in their livers the way other mammals and birds do. This means that we must depend fully on external sources for these vital nutrients. What we call vitamin C is really a liver metabolite that participates in many biochemical pathways in the human body. Essentially a VITAL nutrient!
Ascorbate (Vitamin C) plays an active part in a few things:
- Manufacturing of collagen, the glue that holds bodily cells together.
- Strengthening of blood vessels.
- Manufacturing of hemoglobin and red blood cells.
- Secreting of adrenal hormones.
- Protection against viral and bacterial infections.
- Assimilation of iron.
- Performance as an antihistamine.
- Producing of interferons, an internal anti-cancer agent.
- Manufacturing of lipoprotein lipase, an enzyme that dissolves fats, including those that build up as plaque on artery walls.
Sounds rather important, doesn’t it? Here is the challenging part, however: It takes 40 oranges to yield 2000 mg of Vitamin C per day, which is the minimum amount that each human body would produce internally if it could, to support all of these systems. Supplementation makes more sense and is much more cost-effective than eating 40 oranges!
One simple way to know if you’re getting enough vitamin C is to look at your urine. Take enough Vitamin C to produce brightly colored urine at least twice per day. This could be anywhere between 1000 mg and 6000 mg per day.
