Do Humans Really Need More Vitamin C?
The official U.S. Government position is that most people get enough Vitamin C in their daily diet. Some researchers point to the inefficient uptake of traditional Vitamin C supplements and the diarrhea associated with mega doses of the substance as proof the body does not need more than a small amount of the nutrient.
The government’s Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) for Vitamin C is based on the amount of ascorbate believed necessary to prevent acute scurvy.
Physicians and scientists on the other side of the argument present a different picture.
In their book Ridiculous Dietary Allowance: An open challenge to the RDA for Vitamin C, Dr. Steve Hickey and Dr. Hilary Roberts present a devastating case against the lack of science or even basic logic in the establishment of the RDA for Vitamin C. They argue that to base dietary allowance solely on the amount required to prevent a deficiency disease is patently ridiculous. If the same standard were applied to water, people would be counseled to drink just enough water to prevent death from thirst.
Dr. Levy comes at the argument from an entirely different direction. He demonstrates that even though the diagnosis of acute scurvy is very rare in this country, many of the end-stage symptoms of life-taking diseases and poisons are identical to that disease. He suggests the real cause of death in these cases may in fact be undiagnosed scurvy.
Dr. Levy also believes that millions of Americans suffer with undiagnosed localized scurvy — even when overall body stores of ascorbate are within what is considered to be normal range.
In his book, Stop America’s #1 Killer!, he cites periodontal disease and cataracts as two forms of localized scurvy. He also lays out a very persuasive argument and cites hundreds of references to prove that Coronary Heart Disease is always initiated by a localized scurvy in the coronary arteries.
Dr. Levy is not alone, nor is he even the first to suggest the relationship between scurvy and many of the ills that plague mankind. Notables like two-time Nobel Laureate, Linus Pauling; Mathias Rath, MD; Robert Cathcart, MD; Julian Whitaker, MD; pharmacologist Steve Hickey, PhD and others make similar claims and emphasize the importance of high levels of Vitamin C supplementation for maintenance of coronary health.
If these physicians and researchers are correct, humans often require in excess of 100 times the RDA of Vitamin C to remain healthy.
Supplementation at these levels with traditional tablets, capsules, and powders can be very inconvenient as well as stressful for the digestive system. Liposomal Encapsulation Technology (LET) provides an alternative, oral delivery system that removes much of the expense, inconvenience, and discomfort from administering large, orthomolecular doses. This is possible since nearly 100 percent of Vitamin C encapsulated in liposomes, regardless of the amount taken, seems to move directly across the intestinal barrier into the bloodstream.
