Multivitamins

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By James Keough

It’s finally time to get healthy, so off you go in search of a good multivitamin. It doesn’t take long, however, to get overwhelmed by your options. Given a choice between one-a-day or three-to-six-a-day; tablet, capsule, powder, fizzy, chewable, or liquid; synthetic, food-based, or whole-food varieties—not to mention multis designed for kids, women, men, seniors, and the athletes among them—it’s a wonder anyone can make a decision, let alone an informed one.

But worry not. Armed with some basic knowledge about which vitamins and minerals you need and in what quantities—and with the lowdown on how these various products are made—you can steer your way down any supplement aisle with confidence.

Why we need supplements
The National Institutes of Health has identified 13 vitamins—A, the B complex (B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, B12, and folate), C, D, E, H (biotin), and K—and 14 minerals—calcium, chromium, copper, fluorine, iodine, iron, magnesium, manganese, molybdenum, phosphorus, potassium, selenium, sodium, and zinc—they consider essential for human life. Theoretically, we get as much as we need from the food we eat. But in reality, some 92 percent of Americans are deficient in one or more essential vitamins and 70 percent lack sufficient zinc, says Mark Hyman, MD, author of The UltraMind Solution (Scribner, 2009). Why is that? Because in this age of industrial agriculture, depleted soils no longer supply enough raw materials for plants to create a full spectrum of nutrients and farm animals no longer eat their natural diets. Plus the way the food industry processes and prepares foods strips out or burns off what minerals and vitamins they do have. Simply refining wheat into white flour, according to John Neustadt, ND, coauthor of A Revolution in Health Through Nutritional Biochemistry (iUniverse, Inc., 2007), wipes out 50 to 80 percent of the various B vitamins, 86 percent of the vitamin E, 85 percent of the magnesium, and 60 percent of the calcium. No wonder flour needs to be “enriched.”

Many of us also contribute to our own vitamin deficiencies by eating what the big food conglomerates and fast-food outlets offer up, instead of building our diets out of the whole foods typically found along the edges of the supermarket—in produce, dairy, seafood, and meats. Choosing organic offers up even more nutritional benefit. A recent study by Washington State University researchers concludes that organically grown plant-based foods contain 25 percent more nutrients on average than those that are conventionally grown.

But even conscientious eaters need supplements. Taryn Forrelli, ND, a North Andover, Massachusetts, naturopath and director of medical education at supplement manufacturer New Chapter, explains why: “The ideal diet would require us to buy fresh produce every day, prepare the meals ourselves, and eat them in a relaxed state of mind so our digestive systems can do their job of breaking down foods and absorbing nutrients...

Author: James Keough

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