WHY USE FOOD SUPPLEMENTS?

By Lawrence Wilson, MD

© June 2008, The Center For Development

Few subjects are as controversial as the value of food supplements. For a few years, I believed, as I was trained to believe as a physician, that most food supplements are rarely needed, especially if one eats well.

However, after extensive reading, personal experience and reports from thousands of patients, I am convinced of their great value. Before discussing supplements in detail, here are some basics.

TYPES OF SUPPLEMENTS - HERBS

Commonly used food supplements include over one thousand herbs. Many come from ancient Chinese, Native American or other healing traditions. Herb texts describe many ways to use herbs for healing and nourishment of the body.

Cautions With Herbs. Problems with herbs include the following:

1. They may be toxic. This is more of an issue in some cases than others. For example, aluminum-containing herbs include peppermint, spearmint and wintergreen. They are helpful to settle an upset stomach, but it is for a reason that is not helpful in the long run.

Using these herbs on a daily basis is not wise due to the aluminum content. This is just one of many examples of herbs that contain either toxic metals in excess, or other compounds that may be harmful if consumed in excess. We have found that the non-,American grown herbs have the greatest tendency to be either contaminated with toxic metals or to contain them as well as part of their natural constituents.

This is not a reason not to use herbs at all, although I am quite leery of any Chinese or Ayurvedic (East Indian) herbs, because these are almost always produced outside of the country and may not be subject to much scrutiny by the health authorities or anyone else. One must be particularly cautious with herbs for this reason.

2. Quality can vary tremendously. This problem is getting worse as more people want to use herbs, and there are fewer places to grow them that are free of chemicals and other soil contaminants. So it is wise to know your source of herbs and to beware anyone selling them too inexpensively as well.

3. Since quality varies, dosing of herbs can be difficult. This means that one does not always know how much to take. If the herb is very potent, much less is needed. This can lead to overdoses. Once again, this is not a reason to avoid herbs, as most are quite safe. In fact, they are much safer than simple drugs like Aspirin, in general. However, it is a reason to beware when you take herbs or any type or any kind such as liquids, tablets or powders.

4. Combinations of herbs can be even more toxic or may not mix well in other ways. This is somewhat of a problem with herbs, as it is with medical drugs, too. Many herbal combinations can oppose each other or impact one another in harmful ways. Once again, they are much safer than most drug combinations, which can be lethal.

Herbs, however, save millions of lives every year. All four reasons above are not intended to keep one away from all herbs. However, use caution, especially if you take herbs daily and moreso if you take more than one at a time. If possible, find a knowledgeable practitioner who has studied them well.

HOMEOPATHIC REMEDIES

Homeopathic remedies are another common group of supplements. These are very dilute compounds of minerals and other chemicals that may have effects on the body often way out of proportion to their low concentration.

Homeopathic remedies are generally much safer than pharmaceutical drugs. However, use them with caution as well. Some can have detrimental effects at times.

In fact, one can use homeopathic remedies in many ways. Here lies the problem as well. For example, are they being used purely to remove a symptom or is it a “constitutional remedy”, which is much less symptomatic?

In short, there are many ways to use homeopathic remedies, as there are with all these food supplements. Once again, a knowledgeable practitioner may be most helpful. However, there is nothing wrong with trying a product at the health food store for sleep, for example, or to cure a cold faster. Most homeopathic medicines are harmless and may help a lot in some cases.

VITAMINS, MINERALS AND OTHER SCIENTIFICALLY CREATED PRODUCTS

This is a very large group of supplements. Most all of them have a track record of safety, which is our number one concern. However, new and often exciting ones come on the market each month. For this reason, keeping up with the research is a daunting task for anyone, even those knowledgeable in these type of remedies.

Some supplements are naturally derived such as dried plants or vitamin E made from wheat germ oil. Others are semi-synthetic such as vitamin C made from corn or sago palm. A few are synthesized copies of natural molecules such as most B-complex vitamins and some hormones sold in health stores. All are basically naturally-occurring molecules that fairly easily and safely metabolized by the body.

For comparison, pharmaceutical drugs are patent medicines. Simplistically defined, they cause symptoms in the body that antagonize or oppose other symptoms. Drug companies often research herbs and vitamins. However, since these cannot be patented, the company must alter the natural substances in some way. They hope the result will not prove toxic for the body.

We use nutritional supplements of all types in our nutritional balancing programs. However, this category of health products are used most often. Seven reasons why are given below.

1. Supplements help nourish the body From ancient times humanity has used special foods, extracts and herbs to nourish the body. They supply not only nutrients, but other kinds of subtle energies to our bodies. We still have much to learn about nutrition and herbology, and new findings emerge daily.

Today, more than ever our bodies are commonly deficient in the electrolytes such as calcium, magnesium and potassium. They are most often even more deficient in trace elements including iodine, selenium, zinc, manganese and others as well that are less known such as lithium and cobalt. This is due to our refined food supply, our deficient forms of mass agriculture and more.

Thus, taking supplements literally supplement our dietary needs. It may offend some readers, but I estimate that 80% or more of our food is of poor nutritional quality. Briefly, here is why. The references offer more details.

· Hybrid Crops. Our food today is hybridized and often genetically-altered to yield the maximum bushels per acre. Crops are also bred to be attractive and easy to harvest. Superior nutrition is rarely a concern of most farmers. For example, we grow over 10 times as much wheat per acre as was grown 100 years ago. However, the soil does not contain 10 times the amount of trace minerals. Therefore the crop is much lower in vital nutrients.

· Pesticides, Insecticides and Other Chemical Treatments. Most food is smothered with a number of pesticides, herbicides, growth stimulants, antibiotics and other chemical substances that alter and can even ruin its nutritional quality. Many chemical treatments escape food labels, so you have little or no idea what has been applied to your food.

· Food Processing. This is a major industry and health destroyer. As an example, refining wheat to manufacture white flour removes between 30-80% of the trace minerals and vitamins in the whole wheat. Refining rice and sugar have similar nutritional effects. Oddly, the most nutritious part of your meal may be the salsa on your chips or the mustard on your hot dog roll.

· Poor Eating Habits. Many people do not absorb their food well because they routinely eat on the run, eat while driving, eat standing in front of the refrigerator or while working.

· Bad Health Information. Sadly, medical schools and the mass media still teach that one need not be concerned about nutritional deficiencies unless one has signs of scurvy, pellagra or beriberi. These are pernicious lies. Deficiency states are far more widespread and symptoms are often vague such as fatigue or depression. While supplements may help this enormous problem, however, they are never to be considered a substitute for quality foods.

3. Supplements For A Toxic World. Thousands of toxic metals and other chemicals litter our environment. We cannot escape them as they are found in all our air, water and food supplies. We also are in direct contact with many of them through dental fillings, various items we touch throughout the day, even our synthetic and natural clothing and much more.

Food supplements can greatly reduce the harmful effects of some of these environmental toxins. They can do this by enhancing our body’s ability to eliminate poisons, by directly countering some toxic effects and by strengthening the body’s ability to handle the toxins as well.

4. Supplements For Special Needs. although not at all understood well by the medical profession, many people require far greater amounts of some nutrients than others. For example, it is well-known that pregnant and lactating mothers need more of some vitamins and minerals.

Supplements can provide added nutrition in cases of “special nutritional needs”. Here are some of those with increased needs:

· Children, the elderly and anyone under a lot of stress

· Anyone who is ill, and in particular those with a chronic condition

· Pregnant women and those who are breastfeeding as well.

· Anyone who is taking certain medications such as blood pressure pills or anti-depressants or birth control pills, for example.

· Anyone who eats refined foods or chemical additives

· Those who eat in a hurry, eat in their cars or have other eating habits that impair the absorption of nutrients

· Anyone using over-the-counter drugs often has extra nutritional needs.

· Millions more have impaired digestion and absorption of nutrients. They may think they are healthy, but in fact, they benefit greatly from a nutrient program tailored for their individual body chemistry. To read more about this, see the other articles on this website.

Add up the numbers in these groups and you have most of the population of our world, in fact. Yet few health professionals are taught that almost everyone has special nutritional needs in our nation and around the world.

5.Nutritional Supplements For Healing Illnesses

The use of food extracts, isolates and even synthesized vitamin and mineral supplements for healing is extremely well-documented, even if it is denied by some “authorities”. Here are just two examples:

· Orthomolecular medicine is the use of nutrients, mainly in a symptomatic fashion, to reverse disease conditions in the body. The phrase was coined by no less than Dr. Linus Pauling, winner of two Nobel Prizes in medicine. He and others developed protocols for healing many conditions using only natural food supplements such as vitamin C and others.

· Nutritional balancing science and other balancing methods such as applied kinesiology are additional ways to use supplementary nutrients but in a way that is not simply symptomatic. That is, nutrients can be used to steer the body back toward a healthful balance, remove toxic metals, enhance one’s energy and much more.

Many medical conditions, even difficult ones such as some cases of cancer, kidney stones, high blood pressure, aneurisms and others can be stopped and even reversed with these methods.

Much more is written on this site about these methods. Here we just want to introduce the concept of using isolated nutrients for healing purposes.

6. Supplements For Mental And Emotional Healing.

This is another huge area of research. Many brain injuries, emotional problems and neurological conditions such as epilepsy and many others also respond very well to our nutritional balancing programs.

This is another area of nutrition that is sadly overlooked by the psychological professions as well as by modern psychiatry. Their dependence on drugs is for one reason only. They do not understand the connection between nutrients in the brain and behavior. If they did, they would jump on this science, as it is so powerful and, in most cases, quite simple.

If they at least acknowledged the toxicity to the nervous system of common metals like copper, cadmium, mercury and others, we would all be far better off. The drugs are a very poor substitute for fixing brain chemistry, which, as stated above, is often not so difficult if one is trained in this area.

In this context, I will add that offer training to any practitioner who wishes to learn this. Also we offer a Diploma program for anyone who wishes to become a practitioner in nutritional balancing science.

7. Supplements For What We Call Spiritual Development. This has to do with helping everyone on earth to live to fulfill their true potential as a human being. Millions do not do this because they are out of balance, toxic and nutritionally depleted. Most, in fact, are infected with various ailments and hidden infections, for example, as a result of their poor state of health.

Supplements can help, though it also requires an excellent diet, enough rest and perhaps other factors along with it. Results with this combination are often quite rapid. This can never happen in the same way using toxic drugs or with just the older methods such as relaxation or meditation.

This is a desperate need for planet earth at this time, for which reason I use the words spiritual development. We will only stop wars, starvation and many other problems when most people are functioning at high levels to solve important problems on earth or just being creative.

As long as most are in bondage to dictators and the rest are quite ill besides, no health care system will succeed very well and the planet is in danger of another world war over resources or for other reasons.

SUPPLEMENT LEGISLATION

Food supplements in the United States are protected from excessive regulation by the FDA by the Dietary Health and Supplement Education Act of 1994. Though it has been amended, this law essentially classifies supplements differently than drugs as “foods for special use”. Drug companies and their cronies make every effort to regulate supplements out of existence, as supplements often directly compete with drug profits.

Recently, laws were passed in both houses of Congress, led mainly by Ted Kennedy, Dick Durbin, Hillary Clinton and Henry Waxman. The bill requires supplement companies to comply with the same adverse reporting requirements as drug companies. The cost of implementing this bill could drive many smaller supplement companies out of business. And that is the unspoken goal.

The Codex Alimentarius is a second push by international drug companies and some others to reduce our health status further. This way there will be far more demand for patent remedies, which are drugs.

Codex would also regulate the supplement industry and perhaps eliminate it altogether unless one has a doctor’s prescription. It could reduce the allowable over-the-counter dosages of all vitamins and minerals to levels so low the products won’t be worth producing.

Food supplements often provide 10 to 100 times the Recommended Daily Allowance of a nutrient. They must do so to offset the poor absorption and extra needs of thousands of people.

The Codex rules are already law in parts of Europe and scheduled to begin to take effect in the United States of America in 2009. If we value our freedom to choose and our health, these and similar efforts must be stopped.

References

Many books and websites provide documentation for this article. Listed below are just a few of them:

1. Atkins, R., Dr. Atkins Health Revolution, Houghton Mifflin, Boston, MA, 1988.

2. Fitzgerald, R., The Hundred Year Lie, Dutton, Penguin Group, New York, 2006.

3. Hall, R.H., Food For Naught, The Decline in Nutrition, Vintage Books, New York, 1974.

4. Illich, I., Medical Nemesis, Bantam Books, New York, 1976.

5. Jensen, B. and Andereson, M., Empty Harvest, Avery, Pnguin Putnam, New York, 1990.

6. Pfeiffer, C.C., Mental and Elemental Nutrients, Keats, Publishing, New Canaan, CT, 1975.

7. Santillo, H., Natural Healing With Herbs, Hohm Press, Prescott, AZ, 1989.

8. Schmidt, M., Smith, L., and Sehnert, K., Beyond Antibiotics, North Atlantic Books, Berkeley, CA,1993.

9. Wilson, L., Nutritional Balancing And Hair Mineral Analysis, LD Wilson, 2005.

Websites. Among many useful websites are www.mercola.com, www.healthfreedom.net and www.thenfh.com. Other articles by this author are at www.drlwilson.com.

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