Jenna’s Lyme Blog

Dr. Tim O’Shea has written the most amazing article about Vitamin C that I have had the pleasure of reading, (although in general I don’t find articles about vitamins “pleasurable.”)

In addition, this article was perhaps the most shocking article I have read in a long time about anything.  The scam of the 21st Century – propagated by trusted vitamin consultants, alternative holistic doctors and caring, sensitive, licensed practitioners around the world.

Ascorbic Acid is Not Vitamin C.

For those of you who never read labels and just buy the bottles or jars that say “Vitamin C” (or something to that effect.)  Well, you are about to learn more than you ever thought you needed to know about Vitamin C.

But trust me, you need to know!

So, ascorbic acid is not vitamin C.

Alpha tocopherol is not vitamin E.

Retinoic acid is not vitamin A.

And so on through the other vitamins.

Vast sums of money have been expended to make these myths part of Conventional Wisdom.

If you have several college degrees and all this is news to you, don’t feel bad. Unless you think your education ended at Commencement. Which is generally true.

Vitamins are not individual molecular compounds.

Vitamins are biological complexes. They are multi-step biochemical interactions whose action is dependent upon a number of variables within the biological terrain. Vitamin activity only takes place when all conditions are met within that environment, and when all co-factors and components of the entire vitamin complex are present and working together.

Vitamin activity is even more than the sum of all those parts; it also involves timing.

Vitamins cannot be isolated from their complexes and still perform their specific life functions within the cells. When isolated into artificial commercial forms, like ascorbic acid, these purified synthetics act as drugs in the body. They are no longer vitamins, and to call them such is inaccurate.

A vitamin is: “… a working process consisting of the nutrient, enzymes, co-enzymes, antioxidants, and trace minerals activators.”

- Royal Lee “What Is a Vitamin?” Applied Trophology, Aug. 1956

Dr. Royal Lee was the pioneer researcher in the field of whole food vitamins. For decades he documented the basic facts summarized in this chapter. His work has never been scientifically refuted. Anyone who seriously undertakes the study of vitamins today corroborates Lee’s work.

His story is a fascinating study in itself, a study of indomitable perseverance in the pursuit of true principles. Jensen tells us that Royal Lee’s work will not be appreciated until the next century.  Hasn’t happened yet.

Lee felt the full weight of organized drugs/medicine bearing down on him.

Reading like something out of Schindler’s List, we learn that the FDA not only persecuted Lee for challenging the economics of synthetic vitamins, produced by giant drug companies, but that he was actually ordered by a court to burn all his research of the past 20 years! Burn his research! When has that ever happened in this country? They didn’t even do that to Larry Flynt.

Going off on a tangent, ever wondered how the FDA attained its present position as attack dog for the drug companies and food manufacturers? It’s another whole story in itself. The precursor of the FDA was the Bureau of Chemistry. Up until 1912 the Bureau of Chemistry was headed up by a man named Dr. Harvey W. Wiley.

Here’s a quote from Dr. Wiley that illustrates where his interests lay:

“No food product in our country would have any trace of benzoic acid, sulfurous acid or sulfites or any alum or saccharin, save for medical purposes. No soft drink would contain caffeine or theobromine. No bleached flour would enter interstate commerce. Our foods and drugs would be wholly without any form of adulteration and misbranding.

The health of our people would be vastly improved and the life greatly extended. The manufacturers of our food supply, and especially the millers, would devote their energies to improving the public health and promoting happiness in every home by the production of whole ground, unbolted cereal flours and meals.”

- The History of a Crime Against the Pure Food Law, 1912

Now obviously we can’t have a dangerous lunatic like this in charge of the public nutrition, can we? Dr. Wiley actually filed suit against the Coca-Cola company in an attempt to keep their artificial product out of interstate commerce, and off the market. Fortunately Wiley was eventually replaced by a saner individual, more attuned to the real nutritional needs of the American people, as determined by the experts who knew what was best for us: the food manufacturers. This was Dr. Elmer Nelson, and in his words we get an idea of the change in philosophy that marked the transformation of the Bureau of Chemistry into the FDA:

‘It is wholly unscientific to state that a well-fed body is more able to resist disease than a poorly-fed body. My overall opinion is that there hasn’t been enough experimentation to prove that dietary deficiencies make one susceptible to disease.”

- Elmer Nelson MD, Washington Post 26 Oct 49

Bernard Jensen illustrates how the tobacco industry and the food giants like Coke were indirectly behind the legal persecution of Royal Lee. Cigarette ads in the 40s and 50s showed medical doctors promoting the digestive benefits of smoking Camels. Or the advertising of Coke and other refined sugar foods stating that “science has shown how sugar can help keep your appetite and weight under control.” (Empty Harvest)

During this same period, Royal Lee was kept in courts for years, fighting to keep the right to advertise his vitamin products, because he was a threat to the food manufacturers. Lee knew they were poisoning the American public.

He proved that refined sugars and devitalized, bleached flours were destroying the arteries and the digestive system, causing heart disease and cancer.

Most sources equate vitamin C with ascorbic acid, as though they were the same thing.

They’re not.

Ascorbic acid is an isolate, a fraction, a distillate of naturally occurring vitamin C. In addition to ascorbic acid, vitamin C must include rutin, bioflavonoids, Factor K, Factor J, Factor P, Tyrosinase, Ascorbinogen, and other components as well.

ascorbinogen
bioflavonoids
rutin
tyrosinase
Factor J
Factor K
Factor P

In addition, mineral co-factors must be available in proper amounts.

If any of these parts are missing, there is no vitamin C, no vitamin activity. When some of them are present, the body will draw on its own stores to make up the differences, so that the whole vitamin may be present. Only then will vitamin activity take place, provided that all other conditions and co-factors are present.

Ascorbic acid is described merely as the “antioxidant wrapper” portion of vitamin C; ascorbic acid protects the functional parts of the vitamin from rapid oxidation or breakdown. (Somer p 58 “Vitamin C: A Lesson in Keeping An Open Mind” The Nutrition Report)

For vitamins you can trust, Premier Research manufactures to the very highest standard.  Investigate yourself.

Also, if you are on the Salt/Vitamin C Lyme protocol, you should consider making adjustments immediately.  Read Salt& Apples for a whole food alternative.  Download here.

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Posted on March 31st, 2010 under Chronic Lyme Disease, Coping with Lyme Disease, Product Reviews, Treatment Protocols • Tags: ascorbic acid, critical healing vitamin, Salt/C Lyme protocol, Vitamin C. • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback