Vitamin

“ One reason vitamin therapies frequently do not work as well as they might is that, having been intimidated by AMA propaganda that has created largely false fears in the public mind about harmful effects of vitamin overdoses, the person may not take enough of the right vitamin. The minimum daily requirements of vitamins and minerals as outlined in nutrition texts are only sufficient to prevent the most obvious forms of deficiency diseases. ”

“ In neutral and acid solution it is perfectly safe to assume little destruction of this vitamin through heat and it is now common practice to boil sources with the extracting reagent and to use the steam bath freely to concentrate and evaporate these extracts. We have recently investigated the effect upon cabbage of cooking in a pressure cooker at eight pounds pressure. The cabbage so cooked, when dried and mixed so as to form 10 per cent of a basal vitamine free diet, yielded all the "B" vitamine necessary to produce normal growth in rats. ”

“ These days, farming technology with its focus on bulk yield and profit, degrades the nutritional content of our entire food supply. Even commercial organically grown food is no better in this respect.
Sub-clinical, life-long, vitamin and mineral deficiencies contribute to the onset of disease; the malnourished body becomes increasingly enervated, beginning the process of disease. Vitamin supplements can increase the body's vital force, reversing to a degree the natural tendency towards degeneration. ”

“ Vitamin fat soluble A and water soluble B remain practically the same, but water soluble C vitamin is diminished. Babies fed on dried milk will thrive, but orange juice or some other food containing antiscorbutic properties must be given to compensate for the loss of vitamin C. Dried milk provides an adequate supply to many parts of the country and to the cities, where it is difficult to obtain fresh milk. ”

“ Vitamin supplements can actually slow or even to a degree, reverse, the aging process. However, to accomplish that task, they have to be taken in amounts far greater than so-called minimum daily requirements, using vitamins as though they were drugs, a therapeutic approach to changing body chemistry profiles and making them resemble a younger body. ”

“ Vitamin AVitamin A is particularly important to general well-being. It is stored in the body and seems to build a positive resistance to disease. Recent experiments have shown the importance of carrying a wide margin of insurance in the consumption of foods containing good supplies of vitamin A. Children lacking a sufficient amount of this important vitamin, while displaying an appearance of good health while young, at adolescence revealed marked tendencies toward lung disease, and their general resistance to infections was extremely low. ”

“ If that body receives 50 milligrams per day from a vitamin pill, to the medical doctor it could not possibly be deficient in this vitamin. However, over time, the insidious sub-clinical deficiency may degrade some other system and produce a different disease, such as colitis. But the medical doctor sees no relationship. Let me give you an actual example. Medical researchers studying vitamin B 5 or pantothenic acid noticed that it could, in what seemed to be megadoses (compared to the minimum daily requirement) largely reverse certain degenerative effects of aging. ”

“ That the binding is not difficult to break is shown by the fact that when vegetables are eaten as a source of vitamine the body is able to separate the complex. It is further evident that the body does separate this complex and stores it in animal fat from the experiments with cow feeds and feeding. Milk for example is rich or poor in vitamine according to the supply of the latter in the food given to the cow. ”

“ There seems to be little doubt, therefore, that yeast also contains something comparable with the so-called water-soluble vitamins of the diet. A specific need for yeast can scarcely be predicated on this fact, however; for any well selected human dietary containing the usual variety of animal and vegetable foods is not likely to be devoid of the widely distributed water-soluble type of vitamin. We mention this to check premature enthusiasm for a new vitamin.— (Editorial from The Journal A. M. A., Sept. 8, 1917.) ”

“ And this is as good a point as any to mention that just like broccoli is not broccoli, a vitamin is not necessarily a vitamin. Vitamins are made by chemical and pharmaceutical companies. To make this confusion even more interesting, the business names that appear on vitamin bottles are not the real manufacturers. Bronson's Pharmaceuticals is a distributor and marketer, not a manufacturer. The same is true of every vitamin company I know of. These companies buy bulk product by the barrel or sack; then encapsulate, blend and roll pills, bottle and label, advertise and make profit. ”

“ And the principal protein retained lacks one of the greatest essentials for growth while the vitamines have all been practically eliminated with the grain germ. Intelligence tells us then that if, having formed the habit, we will persist in our appetite for white flour we must see to it that the protein deficiency of the latter and its lack of vitamines is compensated for by supplementing the diet with the food-stuffs in which these are rich. ”

“ In other words, yeast and other vitamin containing foods have specific growth promoting qualities only when the stunting is due to lack of vitamin. A minute amount of this substance suffices to produce maximal results. More is of no use. ”

“ The importance of the vitamines in nutrition has been very clearly demonstrated in experiments upon animals, and these experiments have been repeated a sufficient number of times to be conclusive. Animals have been fed upon pure protein, fat, carbohydrate, and salts, but with vitamine removed or destroyed; and although receiving calories enough, they fail to keep up their nutrition. With a simple change of dietary to include a small amount of food containing the vitamine, without any change in the total calories eaten, their nutrition improves quickly, and they come back to a normal state. ”

“ When brewers' yeast is used as a source of the "B" vitamine it is first dried over night in an oven at 110°C. and then subjected to the same purification process as the casein and the starch to remove all trace of the "A."
The reasons for the special precautions just described have arisen from some recent work of Daniels and Loughlin who claim that commercial lard contains enough "A" vitamine to permit rats to grow, reproduce and rear young. ”

“ Gillett advises, as a safe rule, the use of one, and preferably two foods known to be rich in the fat soluble vitamine, in each day’s food allowance, milk and leafy vegetables, for example. If the foods containing phosphorus, calcium, and iron are taken in sufficient quantity, the second, or “B” vitamine needs, will probably be adequately covered, but the presence of the “C” vitamine must be carefully attended to; some fresh fruit or vegetables (see table) is obligatory each day to insure the individual against the development of scurvy. ”

“ They advance the idea that preliminary treatment with alcohol is a process which will materially assist in breaking the attachment of the vitamine and render its removal with the fat solvent effective. Butter-fat rich in the "A" vitamine has been conclusively shown to be free of nitrogen and phosphorus and it is generally assumed that the "A" vitamine is a nitrogen-free and phosphorus free compound. ”

“ It is recognized that although vitamins are undoubtedly widely distributed in food products, they occur for the most part in very minute amounts, and the various foods differ in the proportion which they contain. If the diet is made up of substances which are poor in vitamins, or rendered so by their mode of preparation, abnormal metabolic processes have been found to follow. ”

“ The experiments by which it has been hoped to associate many dis-eases with vitamins have not proven satisfactory, and while it is a recognized fact that they play an important part in the bodily metabolism yet dis-ease can not be corrected by a scientific endeavor to supply the needed vitamins through diet. ”

“ The stimulation they produce is much more healthful than that of condiments, drugs, or alcoholic beverages and should receive the preference.
Vitamines are substances necessary for both growth and health. A child deprived of the foods containing them is usually not well and does not grow nor develop normally. These substances are also required in the diet of adults in order to maintain the body in a healthy condition. The leafy vegetables and milk are the foods that yield the greatest supply of vitamines. ”

“ Animal experiments seem to bear out this conception of the vitamine whether we regard them as dynamic or as indispensable tissue elements in the structural sense.
A closely-related but less fundamental question is that of the ability of man to store vitamines—whether the tissues can hoard an excess of these factors, or whether, in this respect, we are carrying on a precarious hand-to-mouth existence in regard to cellular nutrition. It is of course clear that at all times the various organs and tissues must contain a certain amount of the vitamines. ”

“ In other words I believe it is possible with intelligent selection based on such tables as are given in Chapter IV for people to secure from the butcher and the grocer all their requirements of these vitamines as a part of their regular palatable diet. To those who have neglected this selection and find remedy in concentrates, that fact should lead them to reconstruct their diet rather than persist in dependence on the medicine to correct faulty diet. ”

“ White flour and polished rice are notable examples of deficiency of "B" vitamine due to this milling process. Fruits such as oranges, tomatoes, and lemons are good sources and there is a fair amount present in the apples and grapes and other common food fruits. Many vegetables show it in fair abundance, notably potatoes, carrots, and turnips, but the rule is not general for beets are extremely poor in this factor. Nuts are also good sources. Eggs, milk and cheese contain it in fair abundance. ”

“ The practice has been condemned by many scientists who are making experiments along these lines, on account of its destructive power upon the “B” vitamine. Chick and Hume in England claim that when the amount of food given contains originally just sufficient vitamines to cover the growth factor the use of soda in the cooking water does serious harm to these vitamines. This is a point well worth remembering. It is often difficult to persuade certain individuals to eat vegetables in appreciable quantities ”

“ Our own experiments at present make us still firm in our belief that one of the factors and perhaps the most important factor in the stimulation effect is the vitamine but until we can devise a basal medium that is comparable to that used in rat feeding experiments, i.e., one that contains all the elements for optimum growth of yeasts except vitamine "B" it will be unsafe to draw conclusions from the test as to vitamine content. ”

“ Vitamin A, pro-carotene, is heat-stable and insoluble in water but is subject to a minor loss caused by autoxidation. Therefore, losses in home preserved foods are insignificant.
Of the water-soluble vitamins, ascorbic acid (C) and thiamin (B1) are subject to serious loss upon heating foods. Riboflavin (B2) is subject to loss when raw or preserved foods are exposed to light.
Removing the skins from peaches before canning.
Significant losses of water-soluble vitamins and minerals occur when food contacts water, such as in washing, blanching, cooking or canning foods. ”

“ Moreover, the British Medical Journal, in its leading editorial for February 11, reiterates that an abundant supply of vitamins exists in all fresh vegetables, and that a considerable quantity occurs in milk and meat, provided the latter substances are obtained from animals fed on fresh foods. “A normal adult,” it says, “living on an ordinary diet containing a reasonable proportion of fresh vegetables is, therefore, certain of obtaining a plentiful supply of vitamins.” ”

“ I. INFANT NUTRITION The limited character of the infant's diet has made the consideration of vitamine content in his diet much more important than in the case of the adult with the latter's wide variety of choice. It is evident from the previous data that a growing infant must not only be provided with a sufficient supply of calories, nutrients and salts, but must also have a liberal supply of the three vitamines. Milk has in general been classed as adequate in all these features, but the vitamine researches have forced us to reconsider our views in regard to this staple. ”

“ Dutscher, Hart, Steenbock, and other biological chemists have done extensive work to show the essential importance of vitamines and minerals in the diet. Their results indicate that animals cannot thrive and breed normally when fed a diet composed solely of the products of one plant. There must be variety, and there must be not only a correct nutritive ratio, but the mineral and vitamine content must be present as well. ”

“ Science has gone even further than this, as has just been demonstrated, and has proven that without the substances known as vitamines the normal growth and development in the young would be arrested, and that the maintenance of the adult body would be impaired. It has also proven that certain diseases owe their development to deficiencies in the vitamine supply to the body. ”