Minerals comprise just a small portion of your body weight, only 4 percent. Most of your weight is made up of hydrogen and oxygen (which together make the water in your tissues), carbon, and nitrogen. Calcium is the next most abundant element, chalking in at a hearty 2 percent. Phosphorus—calcium’s bone-building partner—comes in second in the mineral tally with 1 percent. The remaining 1 percent of your weight is comprised of all the other minerals put together.1
So to say that calcium is your body’s chief mineral is no exaggeration. To say that it is the principal component of your bones and teeth, where 99 percent of your calcium resides, is also not an overstatement. Without calcium and phosphorus, your bones would be soft and spongy; in fact, you would be unable to stand on your own two feet, so to speak. But don’t get the wrong idea—the roughly 1,200 grams of calcium in your bones don’t just sit there like rock; they are in constant motion.
Every minute of the day, calcium moves in and out of your bones and teeth. Here is how it works: The bones’ foundation is a protein base called the matrix. Within the matrix are collagen (“nature’s nylon”) cells that are in a constant state of flux, just like every other cell in your body: they are constantly breaking down and constantly being replenished. Attached to this “intercellular cement” is calcium, which accounts for the hardness of your bones. When the collagen cells disintegrate, the calcium in them flows into your cellular fluids and the bloodstream. When the collagen cells are replaced, the calcium is reabsorbed.
There is another reason for calcium’s constant motion: if your foods are not supplying enough for the needs of the other tissues in your body, they draw calcium from your body’s “bone bank” for their own use. If you have a plentiful supply of calcium, there are actually storage deposits of calcium in your bones—like a savings account. Under normal healthy conditions, up to 700 milligrams of calcium might be withdrawn from your “bone bank” and be redeposited, all in a single day. If you are under emotional or physical stress—as in an illness—the flow of calcium between your bones and your bodily fluids will be even greater.2
There is also a tiny amount of calcium (1 percent) that is not stored in your bones and teeth.3 This amount may sound infinitesimal, but even so, your cells need it desperately as an important compound of the cellular membranes, vessels, and organelles (the cells’ “energy factories”). Calcium is also a vital component of the liquid that bathes your cells, both inside the membranes and out. The watery part of your blood (called serum) also contains some of this 1 percent of your calcium supply.
As a matter of fact, the bloodstream needs calcium so much that your body is designed with homeostatic mechanisms to keep the calcium level stable throughout your life. If there is surplus calcium from your diet, the hormone calcitonin (manufactured in your thyroid and parathyroid glands) puts it away in your bones’ “savings account” of calcium. If you don’t have enough calcium in your diet, another hormone, parathormone (which the parathyroid also makes) makes a trip to your bone bank and draws out a deposit of calcium for your blood.4
Why is calcium so important that the bloodstream’s supply must be kept stable? For one thing, it is one of the raw materials used in the manufacture of hormones like estrogen, androgen, and cortisone, produced in your sex glands and adrenal cortex, respectively. The principal raw material used in this manufacturing process is cholesterol.5 But to break the cholesterol down to build hormones, you need calcium.4 In another part of the hormone factory—the adrenal medulla (inside your adrenal glands)—the basic raw material is not cholesterol but proteins. But calcium is used here, too, not in actually making the hormones but in releasing them (adrenaline and noradrenaline) into your bloodstream when you need them to help you cope with stress.6
Calcium also plays an active role in your enzymatic system. Like many of the other minerals, calcium’s part here is twofold: it is an active ingredient of some of your body’s many enzymes, while for others it is a coenzyme—an enzyme stimulator. For example, both the impulse transmissions of your nervous system and the contractions of your muscles are controlled by calcium-stimulated enzymes.7 In another arena, calcium helps your digestive system absorb fats by activating an enzyme in your pancreas called pancreatic lipase.8
Calcium must also be supplied before you can store glucose as glycogen in the “energy bank” of your muscles.9 Glycogen is the starch trapped by ATP when your cells burn glucose; without this “energy bank,” you would have to eat a meal every ten minutes to keep your body going. Glycogen serves yet another purpose: it must be present before your muscles can contract. So although most of us think of calcium first as the bone-builder of our bodies, it is at least as important to our muscles.
Calcium, along with several other minerals, also helps to maintain the pH of the blood, protecting it against overacidity.10
Every day, some of your body’s calcium store—up to 400 milligrams under the best of conditions—is lost in your urine and feces.11 This loss can be even greater if you do not pay attention to the intricate interrelationships between calcium, vitamin D, phosphorus, magnesium, and protein. If there is an imbalance, the result of malnutrition, poor nutrition, or just ignorance of your dietary needs, you can lose quite a lot of your valuable calcium supply. If you are under stress or ill, the loss can be even greater.12
Calcium is the prime component of your bones and teeth, as we already know. Yet throughout many areas of your body, it works at jobs that are just as important to your health as the strength of your skeletal system. Here are some of the places where calcium works.
• Bones. Your skeletal system needs a steady supply of calcium to keep your bones hard and durable. You may be lucky enough to have been well nourished in childhood and to have a strong skeletal system as a result. But if in your adolescence and adulthood you have insulted your system by eating a lot of sugar and refined carbohydrates, drinking alcohol to excess, or taking antacids, your bones will tell the story. All those activities destroy your stomach’s hydrochloric acid. What does that have do to with your bones? Quite a lot. Calcium in your foods and supplements cannot be broken down unless your stomach has the hydrochloric acid to do it. Calcium’s mineral partnerships are also vital. Even if you eat plenty of calcium and have the hydrochloric acid to utilize it, if you don’t have enough vitamin D or magnesium, your bones will lose calcium.13, 14,15,16, 17, 18, 19 On the other hand, if you eat too much phosphorus, your bones will also suffer.20 And if your intake of protein is insufficient, you can’t use the calcium you eat to build bones properly; the collagen matrix will be unable to maintain itself. In addition, you won’t have the protein necessary to build hardworking calcium carriers in your bloodstream. As a result, large amounts of calcium will be lost from your bones.21
• Nervous system. Calcium is so important to your nervous system that no matter how low the calcium levels are in other parts of your body, they remain at a stable level in your spinal fluid.22 Calcium keeps you calm by helping your nerves relax.23, 24 Another important part of your nervous system—your brain—must have just the right proportions of calcium with magnesium and phosphorus to function correctly.25, 26 Those hormones in the adrenal cortex that cannot be released without calcium—adrenaline and noradrenaline—are also vital to the health of your nervous system.
• Muscles. Without calcium your muscles would have no energy storage bank of glycogen. Calcium also plays a very direct role in the contraction of all your muscles, including your heart. After the muscles receive the word from the nerves to contract, calcium catalyzes the biochemical reaction that results in their carrying out the nerves’ orders. After the contraction, cellular vessels recall the calcium stimulus, and your muscles relax.27, 28
• Digestive system. Calcium is one of the ingredients in your body’s recipe for healthy digestive juices. It is a major ingredient in the recipe for bile, without which you could not break down your meals into nutrients, particularly the fats.29 If you don’t have enough calcium in your diet, the digestive system can suffer, developing muscle spasms that manifest as spastic constipation.30
• Circulatory system. Your circulatory system is particularly dependent on calcium in two ways. First, it helps your blood clot properly.31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39 Second, the proper amount of calcium in your system protects you from high blood pressure in an indirect way: a calcium deficiency causes so much biochemical chaos that your body overproduces cortisone and aldosterone, both of which direct your kidneys to retain salt and water. High blood pressure is the result.40
• Immune system. Calcium helps keep your system clear of toxic heavy metals like lead and cadmium. When there is enough calcium in your diet, the spaces of the bone matrix—which we could visualize as chicken wire—contain calcium. But when inadequate calcium is provided, your body can be tricked into absorbing radium, uranium, lead, cadmium, or strontium to fill those empty spaces. Cancer may result.
Everyone needs calcium. But if you are a woman, if you suffer from osteoporosis (fragile, porous bones), if you are in pain or under stress, if you have arthritis, muscle cramps, or menstrual cramps, if you are pregnant, have high blood pressure, or suffer from depression, you can certainly benefit by paying special attention to getting plenty of calcium-rich foods in your daily meals.
Women have a special need for calcium. Through menstrual fluid losses and in pregnancy, they are much more likely to lose unhealthy quantities of this mineral than are men. When a woman’s need for calcium is not met, the common consequence is the development of osteoporosis in middle or old age. To illustrate: a woman who, at age twenty, is getting half the minimum amount of calcium—400 milligrams—in her foods and supplements, will have lost a third of her calcium supply by the time she reaches fifty-five.41 At that point, she will be a prime candidate to join the 30 percent of American women who have suffered at least one bone fracture by that age.42
Osteoporosis is a subtle condition, difficult to track down in routine lab tests. The loss of calcium from bones becomes visible to the X ray only after it is acute: 60 percent of the bones’ mineral content may be gone before it shows up.43, 44, 45 The surgeon may discover that his patient has bones like eggshells—osteoporosis—only when he is repairing a fracture. Fortunately, your body may give you these warnings before your bones become so brittle that you suffer a fracture: backache, back muscle spasms, aching of the bones in the thighs, difficulty in performing simple acts that require twisting and bending. Even more fortunately, if you become aware that you are developing osteoporosis, you can take steps to recalcify your bones before it gets more serious. Improving your diet and taking therapeutic supplements containing calcium and phosphorus are the first steps in rebuilding your bones.
In any case, you must take in over 400 milligrams of calcium in your foods and supplements every day, or osteoporosis is almost certainly looming in your future. If you get up to 1,250 milligrams a day, your bones are likely to be dense and healthy, as compared even to the relatively sufficient amount of 750 milligrams daily.46
Women need more calcium for another reason. If you suffer from menstrual cramps, the reason may be that you are losing large amounts of your calcium store through the menstrual fluid. Try this, if menstrual cramps are an unpleasant feature of every month for you: ten days before your period is due, take calcium and its nutritional partners in supplements. Continue the treatment through the third day of your period. If your cramps are particularly painful, take calcium/magnesium tablets—one or two per hour—until they decrease. But remember, if you are nutritionally aware in the first place and eat plenty of whole, natural foods, there should be enough estrogen in your system to keep you from losing all that valuable calcium in the first place. Then you won’t have cramps at all.47
Pregnancy is another time in a woman’s life when she is likely to lose large amounts of calcium. If you are short on calcium when you are pregnant, both you and your baby may suffer. Tetany, a condition which may be deadly, may result from calcium deficiency in pregnancy. The symptoms are nervousness, irritability, numbness, tingling, cramps, spasms, and convulsions.48 Particularly in the last two months of pregnancy, the serum blood levels of calcium in the mother may fall so low that the relationship between the muscles and the nerves is disturbed, and tetany can result.49 Even while nursing, the mother loses so much calcium that if she doesn’t watch her diet and take supplements, tetany can become a very real threat.50
And, of course, the pregnant woman must take in extra calcium so that her unborn baby can build its own reserves. Especially after birth, the baby needs plenty of calcium—its blood levels of the mineral fall in any case within the short time it takes for its parathyroid glands and kidneys to start functioning.51, 52 And then if the baby is not breast-fed, receiving cow’s milk (rich in phosphorus) or formulas instead, its parathyroid glands may not function properly; neonatal tetany can ensue.53, 54 In breast milk, nature has provided just the right ratio of calcium and phosphorus, in a form that your baby can digest easily, so it is far preferable to anything you could buy in a store. Also, the baby can absorb two-thirds of the calcium in breast milk, while it absorbs only a quarter of the calcium in a commercial formula, due to the imbalance with other minerals.
Calcium can be your chief helper in treating bone diseases, just as it can actually help rebuild the bones stricken by osteoporosis. Another common bone disease—osteomalacia (softening of the bones)—can be caused by damaged kidneys, because when the kidneys aren’t working properly, they can’t retain calcium.55 The condition can also result from not getting enough vitamin D in sunshine and foods. The symptoms? Aching or easily broken bones, twitching muscles, cramps, spasms.56 When the bones are infected or inflamed, other dangerous conditions result—osteitis, osteomyelitis, and osteitis deformans. Calcium can help here, too. In her books, Adelle Davis tells several dramatic stories of people with these diseases who were remarkably improved with calcium therapy.57
And if you break a bone, remember to eat plenty of protein and calcium-rich foods while it is healing. Paying attention to your diet will help rebuild the bone tissue where the bone broke, and more quickly. Another reason for getting lots of calcium when you suffer a fracture is that when a bone is immobilized in a cast, it loses even more of its calcium supply.58 So a balanced calcium supplement can be a good idea if you are mending a fracture.
If you are in pain for any reason—perhaps you have the flu, for example—don’t reach for the aspirin bottle, reach for the calcium. And when you are unhappy, working too hard, or have had an operation or an accident, calcium can make the road less rocky by keeping your stores of the mineral stable. Why? You may remember from our discussion earlier that calcium must be present for the production and the release of the hormones that help you fight stress. When you are in a lot of stress, as in any of the above situations, your calcium supply can be used up in a hurry. Your adrenal cortex is using it fast to keep producing the antistress hormones you need, and mean-while the increased influx of hormones is speeding up your whole metabolism so that you need more of every other nutrient as well as calcium.
If you suffer a calcium deficiency, calcium is continually leaving your bones to supply the needs of other parts of your body. Not only do the bones degenerate under these conditions; the excess calcium that they release creates a real danger for the very tissues they are trying to help. When you have an excess calcium supply floating around in your blood because you’ve eaten a lot of calcium-rich foods, calcitonin does its job in depositing the calcium in your bones’ storage bank. But when calcium is being withdrawn from the bones, this protective mechanism does not apply. Your body copes with the surplus calcium by depositing it in any convenient place, and the tissues of your body can develop dangerous calcium deposits as a result. Any areas in your body that are weak or even slightly damaged will attract the excess calcium like a magnet. In particular, your joints, muscles, heart, liver, pancreas, stomach, kidneys, and lungs may be damaged.59
For example, let’s say that your joints are strained or overtired, or perhaps they have been damaged by bacteria, drugs, viruses, or accumulating toxic metal deposits. Any of these conditions will draw calcium deposits, which then lodge there. Painful arthritis can develop.60, 61 Or if your smaller arteries are broken in places because they have built up fatty plaque deposits, or because you have high blood pressure, the calcium will be attracted to those broken spots. Arteriosclerosis—hardening of the arteries—will be the consequence.62 When arteriosclerosis is a problem, the heart is automatically affected because it becomes harder to pump blood through the arteries. Also, the heart muscle itself will be weakened and may even be a target for the calcium deposits.63
If excess alcohol or other poisons have weakened your liver, it too will attract the floating particles of calcium, which will further hamper its work.64 If you haven’t paid enough attention to your diet, and your pancreas, stomach, kidneys, or lungs are weak because they haven’t gotten the nutrients they need, calcium deposits will make a beeline for them, too.65, 66, 67 Even your eyes and skin may be affected by calcium deposits, which manifest as cataracts and a condition called scleroderma (leathery skin), respectively.68, 69
This paradoxical situation in which a deficiency of calcium in your diet causes an excess supply in your bloodstream, withdrawn from your “savings account” in the bones, can also lead to kidney stones. Your kidneys will be trying very hard to get the excess calcium out of your system. But since you are deficient in calcium, you don’t have enough magnesium either, and the kidneys are helpless. Why? Without enough magnesium, the pH of your urine is too alkaline to keep the calcium particles in solution. Instead of being excreted, the calcium joins with phosphoric or oxalic acid. These compounds are deposited as kidney stones made of either calcium phosphate or calcium oxalate.70 Insufficient vitamin A or B6 can also contribute to this process if you have a calcium deficiency.
Perhaps you already have kidney stones. Getting enough magnesium, as well as potassium, can help you get rid of them, or keep you from getting more. These two minerals keep your urine at the proper pH, so that it can work with the surplus of calcium.71, 72, 73 Avoid eating gelatin, though, if you decide to try this treatment. Gelatin, if not eaten with foods rich in B6, can help create more oxalic acid, which in turn can lead to the formation of more kidney stones.74, 75
If you suffer from arthritis, your doctor may have prescribed cortisone. Taking cortisone puts your body under a lot of stress, and calcium is lost from your bones as a result.76, 77 Thus, in taking cortisone for the arthritis, you may be creating even more serious problems: calcification of soft tissues (including the already arthritic joints) and easily broken bones.
Luckily, making sure there is enough vitamin E in your diet is a good insurance policy against calcification. Why? Vitamin E keeps your cells and tissues strong and healthy enough that they will be able to resist the weakness and damage that invite harmful calcium deposits. So if you get enough vitamin E, you are much less likely to develop even the bruises that can eventually lead to calcification of joints and soft tissues. In addition, if you suffer from any of the conditions we have just described—which all result from excess calcium in the bloodstream withdrawn from the bones—vitamin E will help speed the repair of the injured tissues.78, 79 Once again, we see how very important it is to eat a diet that contains all the essential vitamins and minerals.
Calcium controls your muscles’ responses to the nerves’ stimuli. Thus, it is very important to have the proper level of calcium in your blood: either too much or too little can cause problems. Too much calcium can contribute to blocked breathing or cardiac failure; too little can cause tremors, cramps, spasms, and convulsions.80
In fact, even a slight deficiency of calcium—easily correctable with proper nutrition—can cause muscle cramps or spasms in your legs, feet, and toes, particularly at night.81 It can even cause you to gnash your teeth in your sleep, which can mean unpleasant visits to the dentist and high bills. If you take a calcium supplement with magnesium and vitamin D right before you go to bed, you may find your cramps and/or teeth gnashing gone.82 You will also get a good night’s sleep—calcium is one of nature’s most refreshing tranquilizers. It leaves you feeling awake the following morning, not drugged.
Your heart may beat irregularly if you are deficient in calcium. Luckily, this frightening condition is also easily correctable with an increased calcium intake.83
Some other unpleasant warnings of calcium deficiency are nervousness, depression, headaches, and insomnia. We just cited calcium as one of nature’s best tranquilizers, so it makes a lot of sense that when you don’t get enough of it, you become irritable, flighty, belligerent, or quarrelsome.
Calcium deficiency may also play a major role in chronic depression and certain types of schizophrenia. In fact, victims of schizophrenia have benefited from injections of calcium, enjoying short periods of clarity.84 Calcium is so vital to the antistress mechanisms in our bodies that if there isn’t enough, mental disease or disturbance can manifest.85, 86
What foods are your best calcium bets? While many foods contain minute quantities of calcium, dairy products are the only really rich sources of this bone-building mineral.87 Milk is one of the very best ways to feed your bones—a quart gives you 1,000 milligrams of calcium88 that is properly balanced with phosphorus and magnesium.89 Some people have trouble digesting milk. If you fall into this category, try a more easily absorbed dairy product like buttermilk, yogurt, acidophilus milk, or kefir, in which the protein is predigested and the calcium more dissolved.90
You may think that by eating cheese you are fulfilling your daily calcium quota, yet unless you eat sweet milk cheeses, you are mistaken.91 Surprisingly, most cheeses are not particularly good calcium sources, with the exception of unprocessed Swiss and Parmesan.
Sesame seeds, torula yeast, carob flour, and sea vegetables all contain calcium, yet most of us don’t eat large enough quantities of these foods to count them as really good calcium sources.
How much calcium do you need on a daily basis? According to the National Academy of Sciences, 800 milligrams daily is sufficient for a healthy adult. For women who are pregnant or breast-feeding their babies, however, 1,200 milligrams daily is required.92
Since most of us are under some stress, and calcium is so important in the production and release of our antistress hormones, it is probably a good idea to take in more than the 800 milligrams daily that is recommended. Some nutritional authorities have suggested that we take as much as two grams (2,000 milligrams) a day, especially if we are sick or under a lot of stress.
The RDA of calcium for infants is from 360 to 540 milligrams. There are 300 milligrams in a quart of mother’s milk, but not all of it is absorbed. However, a baby is able to absorb even less of the calcium in a formula. If you must feed your child a formula, at least find out from an orthomolecular physician how to add calcium lactate at feeding time to balance out the surplus phosphorus in the formula.93, 94 Also find out if the formula contains glucose, maltose, or fructose, which may keep your baby from absorbing the calcium the formula does contain.
For children, the RDA for calcium is 800 milligrams for ages one through ten, and 1,200 milligrams for ages eleven to twenty. But children depend on calcium to help them combat stress just as adults do; if your child is ill or in a stressful situation, give him more calcium.
Your need for calcium may vastly increase under particular conditions. For example, if you suffer from osteoporosis, you will want to up your intake of therapeutic calcium in supplements, with the correct ratio to magnesium and vitamin D, of course.95 If you suffer from arthritic spurs, your doctor may prescribe a short-term megadose of calcium, balanced with all the nutrients that may help you.96 Sometimes large doses (from 2-4 grams) of calcium lactate or calcium gluconate can help in emergency situations involving muscle spasms or convulsions.97
If you decide you need to take a calcium supplement, dolomite is a particularly good one, because it is balanced with magnesium in the ratio your body needs.98 Bone meal is too heavy on the phosphorus side to give any big boost to your calcium levels.99 Calcium lactate is an especially concentrated supplementary source of calcium, and calcium gluconate is good too. From three and a half teaspoons of calcium lactate, you can get one gram of calcium; from seven and a half teaspoons of calcium gluconate, the same amount.100, 101
Throughout our discussion of calcium, we have hinted at its special relationships with several other nutrients. In particular, calcium works hand in hand with vitamin D and magnesium. Vitamin D is extremely important in escorting calcium from your intestine into your bloodstream.102 It is also a coenzyme that catalyzes others into bringing calcium into the matrices of your bones and teeth. Your kidneys need vitamin D before they can filter out valuable calcium from your bloodstream and return it to your system.103, 104
Vitamin D and calcium are so important to each other that vitamin D is now added to milk (also to prevent rickets). But the type of vitamin D added is synthetic—not at all the same vitamin D you get from sunshine or fish liver oil—and may not work as effectively with calcium as the natural kind. If you work indoors, you are especially prone to low vitamin D levels, which can completely throw awry your means to absorb calcium.105, 106
Yet you must be careful in taking supplements of vitamin D. Since it is a fat-soluble vitamin, your body can build up a dangerous accumulation.107, 108, 109 The symptoms of vitamin D poisoning are weakness, headaches, diarrhea, vomiting, and dehydration.110 Too much vitamin D in relation to calcium can cause as many problems as too little: your bones can lose calcium and your soft tissues can calcify as a result. Vitamin D poisoning can be deadly. Luckily, it can also be reversed simply by eliminating the overdosage of supplementary D.111, 112, 113
Magnesium is another of calcium’s partners. It helps you absorb vitamin D, and also changes calcium into a soluble state.114 If there isn’t at least 600 to 900 milligrams in your daily diet,115 your whole calcium-vitamin D-magnesium relationship will be thrown out of balance.116 The ratio of magnesium to calcium should be roughly one part magnesium to two parts calcium.117 It is especially wise to get your magnesium through supplements: our chemicalized farming methods have resulted in a scarcity of this valuable mineral in our foods.
Zinc, iron, selenium, and sulfur must also be present in the proper amounts for your body to use its calcium supply properly.118 Fluorine, too, helps your body absorb calcium,119 as do the B-complex vitamin family and vitamins A, C, and E.120, 121
But calcium has more partners than simply vitamins and minerals. To break down the calcium in the foods you eat, your digestive system must have the proper enzymes, the right amount of bile, and an adequate supply of hydrochloric acid. A simple way to help your digestive system absorb not only calcium but also vitamin D is to take two table-spoons of lecithin-rich natural fats like soy, safflower, sunflower, or peanut oil every day.122 To further aid your stomach in breaking down calcium and absorbing it into the bloodstream, complete proteins and lactose are also necessary.123, 124
On the other hand, there is a long list of factors that are antagonists to your body’s absorption and utilization of calcium. A low-protein diet is one. If there aren’t enough complete proteins in your diet, there won’t be protein transporters like albumin in your bloodstream to transport calcium to your skeletal system. Instead, the valuable calcium in your foods will be treated as a waste product, or deposited in your soft tissues.125 Furthermore, the enzymes in your stomach that help break calcium down for the bloodstream are dependent upon protein for their production.126 Protein also must be present to make the collagen that holds the calcium in your bones. If you eat a lot of high-protein foods like eggs, sprouts, soy products, nutritional yeast, and milk powder, you will be able to absorb 15 to 20 percent of the calcium you eat, as opposed to the 5 percent you will be able to utilize if your diet is low in protein.127
However, a high-protein diet can also be detrimental to your body’s use of its calcium supply. Too much protein in your system will cause you to lose calcium through the urine just as will too little, and a deficiency will be the result.128, 129, 130 If you are on a high-protein diet for a medical reason (perhaps you have hypoglycemia, for example), take extra calcium in supplements to compensate for the loss.
Sugars other than milk sugar are also enemies to your ability to utilize calcium. While lactose actually helps you absorb the calcium in your foods,131 any other form of sugar will obstruct calcium’s movement into your bones. Why? It keeps your body from producing the hydrochloric acid necessary to break down calcium.132 As a sugar, alcohol is especially dangerous. Not only does it affect your production of hydrochloric acid, it also adversely affects your magnesium supply. When magnesium is lost in the urine, so is calcium.133
The phytic acid in certain foods can also antagonize your absorption of calcium: phytic acid and calcium bind to form a compound that your body treats as a waste product because it is indigestible. Whole grain cereals, peanuts, and soybeans can all have this effect, to some degree. Oxalic acid has the same quality: spinach and chocolate are among the offenders here. Yet another situation in which you cannot properly use the calcium in your diet is if your liver is not making emulsifiers to work with the fatty acids in the foods you eat. When not emulsified properly, these fats can combine with calcium to make insoluble “soaps” that are also indigestible.134
As we noted above, deficiencies in either magnesium or vitamin D will cause you to lose calcium.135, 136, 137, 138 Most of us routinely lose calcium because our foods are so short on magnesium. In turn, one of magnesium’s nutritional partners is B6, so a B6 deficiency can indirectly cause a calcium deficiency.139, 140 A copper deficiency—fortunately quite rare—can do the same thing.141
Most of us get far more phosphorus than calcium in our diets, which is dangerous because too much phosphorus brings the calcium levels in the blood down, and your body starts withdrawing it from the “savings account” in your bones. Even foods that we consider healthful—yeast, liver, wheat germ, lecithin—contain far more phosphorus than calcium. It is worth mentioning again that this imbalance makes bone meal an unsatisfactory calcium supplement.142
We have also seen that pregnancy and lactation make huge demands on the mother’s calcium reserves. During pregnancy, the fetus receives four times the amount of calcium from the mother as she would have lost in nine months’ worth of menstrual fluids. The mother’s losses increase dramatically while she is nursing her baby. Even after menopause, women need more calcium than men. The estrogen shortage impedes the body’s ability to absorb calcium, and urinary losses are the consequence.143, 144
More calcium antagonists: antacids that destroy hydrochloric acid;145 aspirin, which causes you to excrete calcium through the urine, as well as causing digestive problems and impeding the ability of your blood to clot;146 mineral oil, which stands in the way of calcium absorption and causes vitamin D losses at the same time.147, 148, 149, 150, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155 Even the mineral oil that many cosmetics list as an ingredient can be taken through your skin to the bloodstream, where it presents a problem for the calcium that is trying to reach your bones.
Still more conditions under which calcium may be lost: consuming large quantities of fluids (common advise for patients with kidney stones) washes it out through the kidneys, along with its friends magnesium and vitamin B6;156 undergoing renal dialysis can cause an extreme calcium deficiency;157 a large amount of exercise combined with copious fluid intake results in a mass exodus of calcium through the sweat and urine.158
There are so many conditions under which calcium’s absorption may be blocked, or calcium lost, that one wonders how it is that any of us get enough calcium! Here are some more: if you are an epileptic, the drugs that have been prescribed for you (anticonvulsive elements) can break down vitamin D and damage your calcium supply.159 Thyroid medication also poses a threat,160 as do cortisone or ACTH treatment, two common therapies for inflammatory diseases. Stress is one of the most pervasive of calcium’s enemies, placing demands on your supply of the mineral that your body may not be able to meet.161
Being immobilized is also dangerous to your calcium levels. Astronauts in peak condition lost 200 milligrams of calcium in their urine every day they were confined to the tight space of an orbiting capsule. Even when you are debilitated in a major way—a heart attack, for example—you should get up and walk around as soon as your physician sees fit. Thus you can avoid the complications of a severe calcium deficiency.162, 163 The same advise applies to you if you have suffered a bone fracture and are immobilized in a cast. Not being able to move the injured limb combined with the fracture’s needs for extra calcium to heal makes excessive demands on your calcium supply, and even two and a half grams of supplementary calcium every day would not be too much in such a situation. If you are in a wheelchair or bedridden, you should be very attentive to your calcium needs, because you are losing a lot through being immobilized.164, 165
If you suffer from kidney damage, you also have a special need for calcium. Normally your kidneys can return to your system up to 99 percent of the calcium that they filter out of the bloodstream.166 Yet if they are damaged, they may not be able to filter out the calcium that you need.
If your diet is low in protein or fat, if you have a severe infection (especially one accompanied by a fever), or if you suffer from heavy metal poisoning, be advised to up your calcium intake.167, 168, 169, 170
Can you take too much calcium? The answer is yes, and these are the consequences: your blood levels of magnesium will go down, your levels of zinc will suffer, your blood may even lose its ability to coagulate properly. If your child is getting too much calcium, it may retard his or her growth.171
Albumin transports both calcium and magnesium through your bloodstream, and they compete for its time. If there is too much calcium, the albumin will be so busy that it won’t have time to carry magnesium, and you will lose it.172 This imbalance poses a real threat since most of us don’t get enough magnesium in our foods anyway.173 Be especially aware of the dangerous imbalance of calcium and magnesium in baby formulas and in prescribed ulcer diets.174, 175
Diarrhea will be your first visible result of acute magnesium deficiency.176 Luckily, you can stop this deficiency in time with a magnesium supplement, or with a balanced supplement of all three of the interrelated nutrients calcium, magnesium, and vitamin D.177 The more serious symptoms of an imbalance between these nutritional partners—tremors and muscle spasms—can be successfully corrected with a megadose—500 milligrams—of magnesium.178 As with any other megadose treatment, however, first get your physician’s advice. In this case it is particularly important to consult your doctor because the very same symptoms signify an excess of calcium.179
Too much calcium can also have an adverse affect on your supply of zinc. Some elements in foods—like the calcium phytate in grains and cereals—form an indissoluble bond with zinc that prevents its proper absorption. It is noteworthy that calcium and zinc supplements should be taken separately, if you take both.180
Too much calcium can also impede the ability of your blood to clot.181 If surplus calcium floods the bloodstream, hemorrhage may result. If you are scheduled to have an operation, be sure to make certain that the calcium you take is balanced with all the other nutrients to avoid the possibility of hemorrhage.
In extreme cases of calcium overdose, there are emergency treatments involving chelation therapy. Chelation therapy is an injection of a substance like fluoride or oxalate that binds the excess calcium so that it can be carried out of your bloodstream through the kidneys.182
At a meeting of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology it was concluded that many American women are deficient in calcium and iron and men consume way too much salt.183
Calcium is your chief mineral, making up 2 percent of your body’s weight. Ninety-nine percent of the calcium in your body lies in your bones and teeth, where it is involved in continual movement as the collagen-containing bone matrix repairs and maintains itself.
The other 1 percent of your calcium supply is very important to your body’s cells, particularly active in your hormone and enzyme systems, as well as your nervous, muscle, and digestive systems. Your circulatory and immune systems also need adequate calcium to operate efficiently.
Women have a special need for calcium, as they are more prone to lose quantities of the mineral (through pregnancy, lactation, and menstruation) than are men. One unfortunate common result of calcium deficiency in women is osteoporosis—porous, brittle bones.
Calcium is a valuable therapy in bone disease or fracture; pain and stress; cramps, sprains, and spasms; and some mental disorders—even simple irritability. Adequate calcium is absolutely necessary to avoid the many complications that can come from calcium deposits in the soft tissues of the body. This “misdirected” calcium—removed from the reserves in the bones because there is not enough supplied in the diet—can lodge in any soft tissue that is even slightly damaged.
Calcium-rich foods are mainly in the dairy group: milk, buttermilk, yogurt, acidophilus milk, and kefir. Cheeses like Swiss and Parmesan are also good. Sesame seeds, torula yeast, carob flour, and sea vegetables also supply some calcium.
The RDA for calcium for adults is 800 milligrams. For pregnant or lactating women, the RDA is 1,200 milligrams. For infants and children, the range is from 360 for babies to 1,200 for those in puberty and adolescence.
Greater amounts of calcium may be required for particular conditions like osteoporosis, muscle spasms, or bone fractures. In supplements, make sure that the calcium is balanced with magnesium, as in dolomite.
Calcium enjoys nutritional partnerships with magnesium and vitamin D. Its antagonists are many. To name a few: a low-protein diet, a very-high-protein diet, a diet rich in sugar, foods that contain phytic or oxalic acid, deficiencies in vitamin D or magnesium, pregnancy and lactation, antacids, aspirin, mineral oil, kidney problems, anticonvulsive drugs, cortisone therapy, thyroid medication, stress, immobility, and infection.
Too much calcium can cause problems such as magnesium or zinc deficiency and inability of your blood to coagulate. Luckily, there are treatments that enable your body to excrete an acute excess of calcium, your chief mineral.
Until Drs. Klaus Schwartz and Walter Mertz pioneered research on the nutrient qualities of chromium, most of us thought of the mineral as something to be used only in plating the trims of our cars. Little did we know that chromium is not only in the earth all around us, but is also contained in minute but vital quantities throughout our bodies.
If you were to dig around for chromium in the earth’s crust, you would find it in the rocks that also contain molybdenum (another nutrient your body needs in trace amounts). If you were to look for chromium in the air, you would find far too much of it hanging over cities where coal is burned in industry.
Schwartz and Mertz also found out that in every billion parts of blood in our bodies, there are twenty parts of chromium. They called it a “vitaminlike” mineral because it takes part in so many of the biochemical reactions of our metabolism, making sure the food we eat is transformed into energy for our cells. They called it “essential,” because it is absolutely necessary for the proper functioning of our bodies, which cannot manufacture it themselves.1
Now that we have a rough idea of what chromium is, let’s look at how it works. We know that it works in our metabolic system, but how?
After you eat food, your body changes the carbohydrates, fats, and proteins the food contains into a simple fuel for energy called glucose. For your energy systems to work properly, each cell must receive glucose from the bloodstream. All the elements for proper glucose metabolism—of which insulin is one—must be present for the fuel to get from the blood to your cells, to give you energy.
Insulin, a key element for proper glucose metabolism, works hand in hand with a vitaminlike substance called the Glucose Tolerance Factor (GTF), so named because it was discovered in connection with the Glucose Tolerance Test. This is the test for insulin deficiency, determining how quickly insulin takes glucose from the blood to the cells. It is called the Glucose Tolerance Test because it tells you how much sugar your metabolic system can handle without going haywire.
Chromium is vital to GTF; in fact, it resides in the center of GTF. GTF, in turn, is vital to insulin, because without its coworker, insulin cannot transport glucose from your bloodstream to your cells. Therefore, chromium is an essential ingredient in the magical process we call metabolism. Your body cannot manufacture GTF, but enough chromium in your system stimulates its synthesization by helpful bacteria in your intestines. But as usual, a complete nutritional program is essential: niacin and three amino acids—glutamic acid, glycine, and cysteine—are other nutrients that must be present if GTF is to be synthesized.2 One great source of GTF is brewer’s yeast; it may be easier to take a tablespoon a day of that powerful stuff than to try to help your bacteria set up a chemistry lab in your intestine.
If there is not enough GTF to partner with insulin in getting the glucose from your bloodstream to your cells, your body has to use chromium from your chromium reserves (which we’ll discuss later) to help metabolize foods properly. As the blood is filtered through the kidneys, about 20 percent of this mobilized chromium is lost through urination.3 Thus, the more sugar you eat, the more your body needs the GTF to work with your insulin, and the more stored chromium you lose if your diet does not contain enough. This can be a true problem, for your chromium stores are quite limited and can actually be depleted very early in life on the average American diet.
Anything you eat that is quickly converted into excess glucose—such as sugar and other refined foods—can just as quickly exhaust your supplies of chromium, as they are continually being mobilized to help your insulin cope with the sudden surges of blood sugar levels that come from eating simple and refined carbohydrates. This discovery is a recent breakthrough that has important implications concerning the role sugar and refined foods seem to play in the development of heart disease. We’ll discuss it at length later.
Although it is present only in tiny quantities, chromium is found throughout your body. Relatively large amounts are stored in your stomach, kidneys, muscles, fatty tissues, skin, and hair. It is especially important to the well-being of your heart, white blood cells, liver, protein production system, brain, immune system, and adrenal glands. But before we look at the reasons, let’s discuss the place where chromium is most largely concentrated: the placenta. As a fetus, you needed all the trace minerals in a high concentration; perhaps you even exhausted your mother’s supply of chromium. But as a result, when you were born, you had a large supply of chromium (unless your mother was chromium-deficient or you were very premature). The quantity you were born with diminished steadily for the first ten years or so.4 From that point on, if you had been eating natural foods grown in chromium-sufficient soil, the amount of chromium in your body remained about the same (except for pregnant women, who are drained of their chromium supplies by their developing babies): about 6 milligrams. How much is 6 milligrams, you ask? A quarter of a teaspoon of chromium is roughly 1,000 milligrams. So 6 milligrams is a very small—yet very vital—quantity indeed.
Where in your body does this 6 milligrams of chromium work hardest? Obviously, it is important to every cell since it is the center of the GTF molecule, which helps glucose move from blood to cell. But chromium is especially important in the following places.
• Heart. If there is not enough chromium for efficient glucose metabolism, your heart will suffer because the liver will be unable to use glucose in its manufacture of glycogen. Glycogen, a storage form of glucose, is important because your muscles need it to contract properly. The muscle that needs the most glycogen is your heart. In fact, it is no coincidence that no matter how depleted the rest of your chromium stores are, your heart is the last of your organs that will give up its supply.5
Chromium also plays a key role in mobilizing excess fat in the blood—fat that can cause atherosclerosis. If chromium is lacking, the liver cannot properly remove the fat and use it to synthesize such elements as fatty acids, phospholipids, cholesterol, and lipoproteins, because chromium is needed for the liver to make these conversions.6 Thus, the excess fat stays in the blood, where it will eventually clog the heart’s arteries.
• Immune system. Your immune system also has a special need for chromium. One of the immune system’s vital mechanisms for resisting invading viruses and bacteria—the white blood cells—contains a fair amount of chromium if you are in good health. Stress can use up the white blood cells’ chromium supply quickly; thus, you are more likely to get sick when you are worn down by stress and fatigue.
• Liver. As we have already noted, chromium is an essential ingredient in the liver’s production of glycogen, necessary for the proper contraction of your muscles. Chromium is also needed for the liver to do its job metabolizing the excess food fats it takes from the bloodstream. If chromium is deficient, your liver can’t make lecithin to break down the cholesterol and fatty proteins in the blood, nor will it be able to lower your cholesterol. This can have serious implications: fatigue, overweight, premature aging, and atherosclerosis can be the unfortunate results.
• Protein production system. You need chromium in order to produce the new proteins that keep your body from degenerating into a state of rapid premature aging. In children, adequate chromium insures proper growth, protein synthesis, and efficient glucose metabolism.7 A sufficient supply of chromium can improve your energy level no matter what your age.8
• Brain. If your chromium stores are inadequate, the insulin supply cannot be used properly. One result: a glucose deficiency in the brain. The symptoms? Trauma to both the nervous and endocrine systems, fatigue, dizziness, anxiety, insomnia, a craving for alcohol. Other more dramatic symptoms are blurred vision, jitters, depression, panic, phobias, and a tendency to suicide.
Much of your body’s chromium supply is concentrated in your brain: a hint of how important it is to your mental health. Some studies indicate that a chromium deficiency, along with a deficiency in its GTF-partner, vitamin B3, may be directly related to several types of schizophrenia.
• Adrenal glands. Chromium is also found in a relatively large amount in your adrenal glands, which with the brain’s pituitary gland help you cope with stress.9 Chromium is also an activator of vitamin C, another important element in the proper functioning of these glands.
Those with hypoglycemia or diabetes, heart disease, high cholesterol levels, poor eyesight, mental illness, and susceptibility to infections may all have a special need for chromium. So might those of us who are exposed to heavy pollutants, who are recovering from surgery, who are pregnant, or who suffer from arthritis.
Chromium is so important in helping glucose travel from the bloodstream to the cells that adequate amounts may really help your condition if you suffer from hypoglycemia or diabetes. In fact, there is evidence that one contributing factor in the development of a blood sugar disorder is an imbalance or malfunction of your chromium-insulin mechanism. If you suffer from hypoglycemia, your problem is that you produce too much insulin, with a corresponding quick drop in blood sugar. Perhaps your body is responding to a diet of refined carbohydrates (sugar and white flour), which do not supply enough chromium for proper metabolism. If you have eaten such nonfoods for a long time, your pancreas may simply be worn out from overproducing insulin to cope with them, and at the same time your stores of chromium may be depleted. The end result may be that your pancreas has exhausted itself trying to keep up with your diet, and can no longer produce insulin at all. You may then find yourself at the next stage of blood sugar disorder: diabetes.
In both hypoglycemia and diabetes, the problem is that your cells are not receiving the fuel (glucose) necessary to make energy for your body to work. Eventually, every organ in your body will have a hard time functioning under such conditions. Both these blood sugar disorders—endemic to the age of refined foods—are usually accompanied by a chromium deficiency.10
Both GTF and chromium supplements have helped people who suffer from blood sugar disorders.11, 12 They have actually helped lower the doses of insulin that diabetic children were taking. Chromium-GTF therapy has helped some older patients end their dependence on insulin altogether.13 In fact, in some experiments with chromium therapy, it has taken only a few months to get the metabolism in formerly diabetic adults to function properly again.14 It is more complicated to reverse diabetes in children.
While we are on the subject of diabetes and hypoglycemia, we should note that in our industrialized society of processed and refined foods these previously uncommon diseases have become rampant. These figures may help tell us why: at the turn of the century, whole wheat bread and only a marginal amount of sugar (five to ten pounds per year) were items in the average American diet. Today, most Americans eat very high amounts of white flour products, while sugar consumption per person has reached the unhealthy amount of two pounds a week!15 It is no surprise that blood sugar disorders are increasingly and tragically common.
We have already touched briefly on the importance of chromium to the liver in removing excess fats and cholesterol from the blood. This function has a direct bearing on the healthiness of the heart. If the excess fats are not removed from the body by the liver, they remain in the bloodstream, where they can eventually lead to atherosclerosis.
Chromium is also necessary for the liver to make the phospholipid lecithin. Lecithin is an emulsifier that keeps fats and cholesterol broken into tiny particles that your blood can handle. Without it, they would form life-threatening globules that could stick to your arteries. The fatty acids are necessary to the energy requirements of your cells, and for the construction of your cellular membranes and nerve sheaths. But if they form globules because your liver isn’t making enough lecithin, they can become a contributing factor in atherosclerosis, sticking to the arterial walls and narrowing the space in which your blood flows.
As we already know, atherosclerosis is a killer disease, bringing with it high blood pressure and heart damage, developing into hardening of the arteries, and eventually increasing your susceptibility to blood clots, thrombosis, or infarction. The connection between heart disease and diabetes has puzzled researchers until recently, when the research on chromium provided a key.
Eating refined carbohydrates (which are eventually converted into fat), creates an excess glucose supply which eventually depletes the chromium supply of your body. Thus the liver cannot take excess fats out of the bloodstream, nor can it make the emulsifier lecithin. As a consequence, a good supply of chromium is not only necessary for normal blood sugar metabolism, it is also necessary for normal fat and cholesterol metabolism. The two functions are vitally connected: when the blood sugar metabolism goes haywire, so can the fat and cholesterol metabolism. That is why so many diabetics also end up with heart disease.
But there is hope. Several medical experiments have used chromium to effectively treat the high cholesterol levels connected with atherosclerosis.16, 17 Using chromium therapy alone, cases of heart disease have been reversed within a few months. Cholesterol levels throughout the experiments fell from between 16 and 28 percent. On younger patients, the treatment worked most quickly.18
In one experiment, every one of the patients on chromium therapy, all of whom were considered heart attack risks, benefited. All of them experienced a drop in serum cholesterol levels, with fewer cholesterol-transporting proteins in the blood. One patient’s cholesterol levels fell by 26 percent in a mere seven weeks.19
Eating chromium-rich whole foods like nuts and brewer’s yeast can reduce your risk of heart attack or degenerative heart disease by enhancing your liver’s ability to deal with fats in the bloodstream. And it’s a delicious way to keep yourself in good health!
One side effect of atherosclerosis is cataracts. Why? If you have fatty deposits on your arteries, your eyes don’t get enough blood. When circulation in the eyes is bad, the lenses become opaque and cataracts develop.20 Those chromium-rich foods that keep your cholesterol levels low can also help you maintain your eyesight through a healthy old age.21
Nearsightedness (myopia) can also be a result of depleted chromium stores. Both vitamin C and chromium are necessary for your eyes to focus clearly. Since chromium is an activator of C, it can also help you metabolize any vitamin C you take. Together, chromium and vitamin C have been used to improve the eyesight of myopic patients.
We have already seen that much of your chromium supply is stored in your brain—symbolic, perhaps, of its importance as an antistress agent and its importance to your mental health. When you suffer from a blood sugar disorder like diabetes or hypoglycemia, your brain may not get enough glucose, which can result in the subtle and/or dramatic symptoms listed above. Several types of schizophrenia may be attributable in part to chromium and vitamin B3 deficiencies.22 Perhaps in the future our mental hospitals will be treating patients with brewer’s yeast instead of chemicals and electroshock therapy!
Chromium can also help protect your body from the toxicity of pollution or heavy metal poisoning, because it activates that pollution-protector, vitamin C. It also helps keep your immune system strong when you are exposed to pollution, maintaining your resistance to infections and bacteria.
In fact, insuring yourself of an adequate chromium intake can be beneficial in treating any disease—such as rheumatoid arthritis or even cancer—that involves viral infections. Rheumatoid arthritis often involves such infections and/or metal deposits in the joint fluid, while some forms of cancer are virus- or toxin-related. More good reasons for taking chromium daily: laboratory tests with animals showed that those who received enough chromium had a stronger resistance to infection, while at the same time demonstrating a remarkably longer life span.23
Two short-term situations in which your chromium needs are increased are after you have had an operation and when you are pregnant. After surgery, you are always more vulnerable to infections; chromium can help you resist them. Be aware that if you do suffer a postoperative virus, your blood’s supply of chromium can decrease by a third, and you will need to replenish it with lots of good food, or chromium supplements.24
A pregnant or lactating woman may lose up to two-thirds of her chromium supply to her developing fetus, with the amount of chromium in her white blood cells cut in half. During lactation, the loss goes on. If you are pregnant or nursing your baby, then, note that you need an extra supply of chromium, either in a good supplement or, better yet, brewer’s yeast.
Why are most Americans deficient in chromium? The answer can be simply and neatly put: refined foods.
A worldwide analysis of chromium deficiency showed up some interesting statistics. Absolutely not a trace of chromium could be found in 23 percent of the Americans over fifty who were tested. In dramatic contrast, 98.5 percent of people from other countries were found to have chromium in their bodies. Americans had only half as much chromium in their bodies as Africans; only a quarter as much as those tested in the Middle East; only a fifth as much as Orientals. Even teenagers in our overfed but malnourished society show signs of chromium depletion.25
Why are we Americans so deficient of this trace mineral? True, our soils may be as depleted as our bodies. Yet, what we put into our bodies may have more to do with it. White flour contains only 13 percent of the chromium of whole wheat flour; polished white rice, only 25 percent of the chromium of brown rice.26 Our refined oils contain no chromium. And even raw sugar contains 83 percent more chromium than the refined white product! Not only do these foods not supply chromium, they contribute to the loss of the chromium supply you were born with, because they use up some of your chromium stores in their metabolism. And our refined diet not only robs us of our chromium, it literally robs us of our health: witness the tragic rise in heart disease and blood sugar abnormalities (diabetes and hypoglycemia) in our country since World War II.
So what do these unfortunate facts have to do with “A Practical Guide to Using Chromium”? This: the first and best way to increase your intake of chromium is to eat whole, natural foods, avoiding refined products whenever possible. Natural foods provide over six times the chromium found in a refined-foods diet, and you need the chromium they supply to replace the average 1 microgram of chromium each of us loses in our urine every day. Adequate chromium must be supplied on a daily basis or you can completely deplete yourself of this vital trace mineral in just a number of years.
What are the best food sources of chromium? Try whole wheat flour, brewer’s yeast, nuts, black pepper (although too much can irritate your stomach lining), all whole grain cereals except rye and corn, fresh fruit juices, dairy products, seafoods, chicken, root vegetables, legumes, leafy vegetables, and mushrooms. If you cook your food in stainless steel pots, you may be adding a chromium bonus to your delicious meal of fresh, whole foods.
Two tablespoons a day of brewer’s yeast—straight if you can enjoy the flavor, mixed in juice or milk or yogurt if you can’t—is an excellent insurance policy for getting enough chromium, as well as other trace minerals like selenium.
Or you may get your chromium through supplements, particularly if you are pregnant or nursing, or suffer from a specific condition that may be helped by chromium. However, be aware that pure chromium supplements—as chromic acetate or chromic oxalate—are difficult to digest; you absorb less than 1 percent of the supplement in most cases. A more usable form of chromium is found in brewer’s yeast.
How much chromium do you need? Although the FDA has not made any definite policy concerning the amount of chromium necessary on a daily basis, from 50 to 200 micrograms are suggested by other government studies.27 Trace mineral experts back the higher figure of 200 micrograms, and that for someone whose basic chromium supply is still somewhat intact. The average American’s diet of refined foods contains only 50 to 80 micrograms of chromium, and only half of that is absorbed.28
It is important to remember that your body has no way of holding on to chromium, as it does with some of the other minerals like sodium and magnesium.2 If you don’t eat properly, your chromium supplies will almost definitely be depleted.
It is possible to get too much chromium. An adult may be able to tolerate over 50 times the average amount suggested (up to 10 milligrams), but any metal can be toxic if you take too much of it. However, in the case of chromium, it is much more likely that you would be poisoned by the chromium that accumulates in your lungs if you live near a coal-burning industry, or from cigarette smoke, than by the chromium in your food or supplements. Just to be safe, though, if you are treating heart disease, rheumatoid arthritis, diabetes, or cancer with chromium, or have increased your intake because you are pregnant or must undergo surgery, do so only under your physician’s guidance.
How do you know if your chromium levels are low? If you are under stress or have been living on a diet of refined foods (or both), you can be almost certain that they are. If you are pregnant or suffer from hypoglycemia or diabetes, you are almost surely deficient in chromium. If you fall into one of these categories, a hair analysis would be useful in diagnosing the severity of your deficiency. Or try upping your intake and see if you feel more energetic. Your energy levels are a key in detecting a deficiency, because of chromium’s role in the metabolism of food.29
Vitaminlike chromium is absolutely necessary to your growth, energy level, and overall health. Because of its vital role in glucose metabolism and its importance to your immune system, it is one of your basic protectors against disease. You are born with a life supply of only 6 milligrams, which if not replenished by a healthy diet of wholesome natural foods, you could lose completely by the time you are thirty.
Chromium is found in minute amounts throughout the body, but is most important to your heart, liver, and brain. Your entire glucose metabolism system is in part based on insulin’s partnership with a substance called GTF, which contains chromium. Chromium deficiencies can lead to abnormal glucose tolerance and lack of energy, hypoglycemia, and diabetes.
Since your liver uses chromium in its conversion of fats to energy, chromium is vital for keeping cholesterol levels low and your heart healthy. Chromium is also vital to your body’s production of new proteins, lack of which can lead to premature aging. Your white blood cells must have chromium to fight bacteria, viruses, toxins, arthritis, aging, and cancer. To counteract stress, your adrenal glands must have their supply of chromium. Your brain needs chromium to keep sugar levels up and to avoid mental symptoms that can culminate in schizophrenia.
Trace mineral experts suggest that you take at least 200 micrograms of chromium daily to keep your system working properly. If you are pregnant or lactating or suffer from any of the disease conditions we discussed in this chapter, you may need more. Remember, you absorb only half of the chromium your food supplies, even less of the chromium supplied by supplements.
Brewer’s yeast is an excellent source of chromium, more assimilable than chromium supplements. Something we forgot to mention above is that molasses, honey, maple syrup, and dark brown sugar also supply some chromium. However, if you eat too much of these sweets you will be doing more harm than good, as your insulin will use even more chromium than these sugary foods supply in handling so much glucose. Complex carbohydrates like whole grains are better chromium sources because they won’t flood your bloodstream with more sugar than it can handle. Fresh fruits, dairy products, and meat are also good sources of chromium, a tiny mineral that can help keep you younger longer.
Iodine, an active ingredient of seaweed and fish, is present only in compounds in your body, and in infinitesimal quantities, making up only 0.0004 percent of your total body weight.1 Unlike some of the other trace minerals, it is not a metal. But this fact makes its activity no less vital to your total well-being, as we shall see.
The speed of all your body’s activities is controlled by iodine. How could such a tiny element, and in such small quantities, accomplish such a large task? Iodine, most of which is stored in your thyroid gland, is used in making hormones vital to your overall metabolism. These hormones control the speed at which your blood absorbs carbohydrates, which are your body’s energy fuel, from the food in your intestine. They also regulate the rate at which those carbohydrates are converted into glucose. Finally, they control how fast your body burns its fuel (oxidizes it) in the cells via cellular respiration. This synopsis makes it perfectly clear that without iodine our bodies could neither grow nor function.
The main hormone involved in regulating the metabolism is thyroxine, of which iodine is an integral part. Your cells are stimulated by this hormone to oxidize glucose properly, so that there will be sufficient energy for all the cellular functions.2 Thyroxine is vital in maintaining your cells’ energy mechanisms (cellular respiration) at a proper, steady rate.
Let’s follow the iodine in your food through the bloodstream into the thyroid gland and see what happens from there. Although other glands—your salivary glands and those in the stomach lining—also take iodine from the bloodstream, they don’t keep it, and they don’t make hormones with it. On the other hand, your thyroid gland is your body’s major storehouse of iodine, where it is being used to continuously make a supply of hormones.
The thyroid gland takes iodine out of your bloodstream at a voracious rate. In fact, iodine is literally “pumped” into the cells of the thyroid at a speed twenty-five times greater than it could seep in through the cell membranes. But if the pump mechanism is to work properly, you must have the right amount of potassium inside the walls of the cells, and the right amount of sodium outside. This sodium/potassium relationship, if it is in balance, creates an electrochemical pressure that pushes the iodine through the thyroid gland’s cellular walls.
The amount of iodine that your thyroid receives through this pumping action is controlled by the anterior pituitary, or hypophysis gland, in your brain.3 As thyroxine in your blood flows through the pituitary gland, a feedback mechanism measures the quantity. Your thyroid gland then gets messages from the pituitary gland about how much more thyroxine the metabolism needs to operate at peak efficiency. The thyroid absorbs the iodine it needs, at which point it combines it with the amino acid tyrosine to make the hormone thyroxine.
But wait—it’s not really that simple. Before it can be combined with tyrosine, the iodine must first be converted into an active form. Enter the enzyme iodine peroxidase, which is protein-based (as all enzymes are). Thus, if there aren’t enough proteins available to make iodine peroxidase, the iodine will remain in its inactive form—iodide—and will be completely useless to your thyroid in making thyroxine. The amino acid tyrosine, too, is dependent on adequate protein, and so are the other enzymes that help iodine and tyrosine combine to make thyroxine. So high-quality protein is necessary to the thyroxine-manufacturing process, or inactive iodide will simply back up in your thyroid and your bloodstream.4, 5
Other vitamins and minerals are also needed to make thyroxine: vitamins B6 and C help your thyroid gland use the tyrosine properly;6 manganese and choline must be present for the thyroxine hormone to form.7
Assuming that the enzyme iodine peroxidase, the amino acid tyrosine, the proteins needed to produce them, the iodine itself, and vitamins B6, choline, and C are all there, what happens when the thyroxine is produced?
Your thyroid gland releases the hormone into the bloodstream, and the bloodstream takes it to every cell in your body to quicken respiration. This function is controlled by another hormone—called the thyrotropic hormone—produced in your anterior pituitary gland.
Once the thyroxine is in the bloodstream, it is protected from oxidation (destruction by free radicals) by vitamin C.8, 9 At the same time, enzymes in your liver inactivate the old thyroxine hormones, breaking them down so that they can be excreted through the urine. Without this safety mechanism—which can malfunction if the necessary enzymes are not produced in your liver—excess thyroxine could cause your cellular respiration process to race completely out of control.10 Thus, a healthy balanced metabolism depends not only on adequate iodine, but also on adequate vitamin C and enzyme-building proteins.
Although your body has mechanisms to conserve many of its other vital nutrients, such as iron, no such hemeostatic mechanism exists for the conservation of iodine.11 The system is designed so that your thyroid is extremely efficient in absorbing the iodine it needs from your bloodstream, but it uses it quickly and sends it out again as a component of thyroxine. Some iodine is released when you have used and broken down the thyroxine, but the blood carries it to the kidneys, from which the urine carries it right out of your body. Therefore, you must constantly replenish your supply of iodine through food, even if you were born with a normal amount.
You need thyroxine (and therefore iodine) for more than just the metabolism of carbohydrates; it is also essential to the metabolism of fats. Thyroxine gives your cells the energy to break down and convert into usable form the fatty acids in your blood. As we shall soon see, this process has invaluable implications for those who suffer from high cholesterol levels.
As we have just seen, iodine works mainly in the thyroid gland in the production of the vital hormone thyroxine. But thyroxine—and therefore iodine—works in every cell of your body. It has special functions in these particular places:
• Protein production system. Ribosomes are manufactured by the body cells; they are in the protein family.12 The ribosomes need thyroxine to make proteins properly.13 Without thyroxine, childhood growth cannot occur and maintenance of healthy adult tissues cannot take place. Thus, an iodine deficiency can keep a child from growing properly, or cause the degeneration of tissues in an adult.
• Immune system. Vitamin A needs adequate thyroxine to be properly synthesized from the carotene you eat in food.14 Since A is vital to the immune system, with an iodine deficiency you may find your resistance to infections lowered.
• Heart. Thyroxine helps your cells metabolize the fats in the bloodstream, keeping large fatty globules from building up in the circulatory system. By making sure there is enough iodine in your diet to metabolize fats properly, you are in effect taking out an insurance policy against atherosclerosis and arteriosclerosis, two killer heart diseases.
Thyroxine also has a role in lowering your serum cholesterol levels and therefore protecting your heart and arteries; it activates the liver’s production of cholesterol, for which fats from your blood are required ingredients.15
Everyone needs iodine, but under certain conditions extra iodine can be extraordinarily beneficial. Some of these conditions, like goiter (thyroid malfunction), are a direct result of iodine deficiency. Others, like heart disease, arthritis, impotence, and cancer, are conditions in which a variety of nutrients can be helpful, including iodine. And, of course, in pregnancy, all the nutritional elements are needed in larger-than-normal quantities.
Goiter is a direct result of iodine deficiency. The thyroid is unable to produce sufficient thyroxine, and as a result the metabolism is slowed. If the problem is not corrected at that stage, it can be too late, for degeneration of the thyroid tissues occurs, and the result is hemorrhaging of such proportions that the dead tissue cells lie stagnant in a pocket of blood.16 Healing does take place, but with fibrous, brittle scar tissue rather than healthy, thyroxine-producing cells. To compensate, the thyroid gland enlarges itself, and the unsightly condition known as goiter becomes visible on the neck. Of the different varieties of goiter, the one directly related to iodine deficiency is called endemic goiter, so named because it usually prevails in regions of iodine-deficient soils.
Iodine therapy by itself can do nothing for the condition, once it has developed. It cannot make the scar tissue around your thyroid gland disappear, and it certainly can’t help you make new thyroxine-producing tissue. However, vitamin E in therapeutic doses may be able to help the scar tissue dissolve. It may also be able to help your body make the new blood vessels necessary for the production of new cells. You should eat a lot of complete proteins if you try this route—they are necessary as raw materials in the replenishment of cells.
To repair your thyroid, try eating egg yolks, dairy products, nutritional yeast, wheat germ, sprouts, and tofu, along with daily supplements of iodine and vitamin E. A suggested therapeutic amount of vitamin E for this purpose is 600 to 1,000 units daily. Complement it with 1 to 3 milligrams of iodine, and you may experience a perceptible increase in the amount of thyroxine in your bloodstream, and relief from goiter.17
Alas, many victims of goiter and their physicians don’t know about this nutritional therapy. As a result, endemic goiter often develops into an even more serious type of goiter called toxic, or exopthalmic goiter. (Exopthalmic means “bulging eyes,” one of the unfortunate symptoms.) Besides bulging eyes, the symptoms include a greatly enlarged thyroid, trembling fingers and hands, rapid heartbeat and pulse, a metabolism that is wildly out of control, heavy perspiration, irritability, emaciation, anemia, and high blood sugar (a prediabetic state).18 Women are far more susceptible to exopthalmic goiter than men.
The nutritional therapy described above cannot help victims of exopthalmic goiter; it is too late. Conventional treatment for the condition involves destruction of the thyroid tissues through X-ray irradiation, which suppresses the thyroid’s activity and can increase the risk of cancer. Luckily, a nutritional therapy that is less toxic than irradiation does exist: it requires administration (by a physician) of quantities of iodide. Paradoxically, this treatment slows, rather than speeds up, the absorption of iodine by the thyroid gland.19, 20 This strange therapy is an excellent example of how the body can react to megadoses of an isolated nutrient.
If you have heart disease, or wish to prevent heart disease, keep in mind that iodine has a very beneficial role in your body’s metabolism of fats. Not only does it help your cells utilize the fats you eat, it also helps the liver convert the fatty substances in your blood into cholesterol for the production of bile and of your sex and adrenal cortex hormones.21
If your cells cannot properly utilize the fatty substances in the blood, or if the liver cannot properly convert the fats into substances that your body needs, the blood and arteries can become clogged with large particles of unmetabolized fat. If there are enough of these particles, they will eventually glob together to form fatty deposits of plaque on the walls of your arteries. Atherosclerosis—which has its own side effects: high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, and heart disease—can be the result. Adequate iodine—along with adequate amounts of all the other nutrients we have discussed—can help your cells burn up the fats you eat, thus lowering your risk of developing heart disease, or possibly influencing your condition in a positive way if you already have it.
For example, in one experiment potassium iodide was administered to heart disease patients in the form of twelve drops of a 10 percent solution in milk, three times daily. Within a month, their serum cholesterol levels showed a significant drop, their lecithin levels (lecithin is produced by your liver to emulsify fats) rose, and they reported less heart pain (angina).22 The experiment is a positive testimony to the beneficial effect of iodine in heart disease.
If your thyroid cannot function properly because of an iodine deficiency, stress is the result. Thus, an inadequate amount of iodine can indirectly cause the stress disease arthritis, and before the discovery of a vaccine for polio, also seemed to increase the susceptibility to that disease as well.23 And because thyroxine is necessary for your liver to produce the cholesterol needed to manufacture your sex glands hormones, impotence can also be the result of an iodine deficiency.24
An unhealthy thyroid gland also bears a relationship to cancer. For one thing, the thyroid extract used in conventional therapy for hypothyroidism has been known to increase the likelihood of cancer of the thyroid, and of other cancers as well.25, 26 In a hyperactive thyroid, the administration of radioactive iodine to destroy thyroid tissue can also increase the incidence of cancer.27 These are good arguments for making sure you eat an iodine-rich diet in the first place, so that neither of those conditions have a chance to develop! Something else to be aware of is that even if you don’t have a hypo- or hyperactive thyroid gland, an iodine deficiency can cause your thyroid gland to absorb the radioactive iodine present in fallout. With a normal iodine supply, the thyroid will not absorb that pollutant.28, 29
In fact, additional iodine can protect you from the radioactive iodine that could be a by-product of nuclear bomb testing. Supplementary iodine—as little as 5 milligrams daily—can help your thyroid excrete the radioactive iodine it does absorb. Thus, in more ways than one, it can be an effective weapon against cancer.
During pregnancy, the mother needs abundant amounts of all the nutritive elements so that she is able to nourish both herself and her fetus properly. If you get enough iodine during pregnancy, you will probably be able to avoid the tragedy of a myxedemic baby—a child with low thyroid function. Be sure to use iodized salt, and eat sea vegetables and fish, whole grain breads, muffins, and crackers.
If your child should have a low thyroid function, you can help by making sure that there is plenty of iodine in his or her food in the early years. The deficiency of thyroxine in a child can cause cretinism,30, 31 a condition in which a child is not only mentally retarded but also dwarfed, all because his system does not have enough thyroxine, i.e., iodine. Fortunately, cretinism can be reversed if iodine therapy is begun shortly after birth. Otherwise, the sad mental and physical defects of infantile iodine deficiency could be permanent.32
How much iodine do you need every day? How can you enjoy getting it in delicious, wholesome foods? What other nutrients help in your absorption and utilization of iodine? Which ones hinder it? How can you tell if you are deficient? On the other hand, can you get too much?
Many Americans suffer from prolonged iodine deficiencies, partly because of iodine deficiencies in the soils in which our food is grown, partly because of our heavy consumption of foods from which iodine has been refined. In addition, the Food and Drug Administration has set a very low legal limit—twenty times under the amount needed daily for healthy maintenance of the thyroid gland—for over-the-counter iodine. By contrast, in Japan, where almost all of the food either comes from or is grown near the sea (where the soils are enriched by iodine-bearing rains), there are no thyroid problems except for those caused by genetic disorders or physical damage.
Iodine is added to salt to compensate for the lack of it in foods grown on deficient soils. And yet, if one tried to meet one’s daily iodine requirements with salt, far more serious problems than iodine deficiency would be the result!
The RDA for iodine is 150 micrograms, but some nutritionists believe that 3 milligrams a day of this trace mineral is necessary to prevent serious thyroid disorders. A healthy intake for both children and adults is probably 150 to 500 micrograms daily. Except in coastal areas where the food is naturally rich in iodine, most of us would do well to make sure that we get that amount by eating iodine-rich foods or by taking supplements.
What if you prefer to receive your nutrients in foods? You may wish to join the wave of the future by learning to cook with sea vegetables. Even though you may not be at the stage at which you enjoy a heaping serving of hiziki or wakame on your plate, you can enhance the iodine content of your diet by cooking homemade soups with kelp, or including dulse in your salads. You can also try some of the flavor-enhancing kelp salt mixes on the market, or take kelp tablets for a more concentrated effect.
Fresh (not frozen) seafood is also a good source of iodine, as is garlic. Dried mushrooms are good, too, if they were grown in soil rich in iodine. Other decent iodine sources include leafy greens, celery, tomatoes, radishes, carrots, onions, and mushrooms (try them in a salad with a garlic dressing!), bananas, strawberries, oranges, and grapefruit. Milk, eggs, meat, and whole grains also supply some iodine.33, 34
Other nutrients are necessary for your thyroid gland to make thyroxine from the iodine in your diet. Let’s review them: as you may remember, high-quality protein helps the thyroid produce enough iodine peroxidase to convert the iodine into an active form, which will combine with the amino acid tyrosine (also dependent on protein) to make thyroxine. Vitamins B6 and C help your thyroid gland use the tyrosine efficiently. Manganese and choline are also necessary for the formation of thyroxine. Vitamin C also helps keep thyroxine from being destroyed by free radical oxidation in the bloodstream. So to insure that your body can use the iodine in your diet, be sure to get plenty of these other nutrients as well.
On the other hand, there are certain foods, like peanuts, untoasted soy flour, and vegetables of the cabbage family, that are antagonists to your absorption of iodine.35, 36, 37, 38 In fact, they contain elements that keep you from absorbing it at all. So if you are trying to beef up your intake of iodine, you might avoid combining iodine-rich foods with these.
How can you tell if you are deficient in iodine? A sluggish feeling—due to the fact that your thyroid is not producing enough thyroxine for your metabolism to work at normal speed—is one clue. Other symptoms are a bad complexion39 and unhealthy looking hair, teeth, and nails. If your thyroid function degenerates into official hypothyroidism, in which perhaps only one-quarter of the thyroxine your body needs is present,40 you may suffer from chronic fatigue, forgetfulness, lack of interest in sex, impotence, overweight, and irritability. Should you notice any of these symptoms, consult your physician. He or she may suggest a prescribed iodine supplement which, in the early stages of thyroid malfunction, could solve your problem.
Can you get too much iodine? Probably not. Of all the nutrients, iodine is most easily excreted through the urine, with small amounts also excreted in the feces, sweat, and hair.41 Less iodine is lost from organically bound sources (as in foods such as kelp) because your body absorbs it better than it does iodine in potassium iodide supplements. There have been no documented cases of iodine poisoning.42, 43 However, be aware that if you suddenly deluge your perfectly normal thyroid gland with large amounts of supplementary iodine, you can inhibit its ability to produce thyroxine.
Iodine, a natural element from the sea that is also present in soils in which our food is grown, is essential in the manufacture of the important hormone thyroxine. Thyroxine controls the speed at which your blood takes the food from your intestines to the cells, where it is used for energy. It is vital not only in glucose metabolism, but also in the metabolism of fats.
Iodine is particularly important to your heart, your immune system, and your system of protein synthesis. In adequate amounts, it can keep you from developing goiter—malfunction of the thyroid gland. Iodine deficiency can increase your risk of developing heart disease, arthritis, impotence, or cancer. In children, it can cause myxedema, resulting in retardation of mental and physical development.
A normal, healthy adult or child needs from 150 to 500 micrograms of iodine daily. Foods from the sea or grown near it are an excellent source, as is garlic, while some vegetables, fruits, and dairy products also contain small amounts.
The FDA prohibits the marketing of iodine is large supplements; but kelp tablets—many per day—may be useful in supplementing your diet if necessary. For supplements as treatment for a specific condition, see your physician.
The dictionary defines iron as “a ductile, malleable, silver-white metallic element, used in making tools,” etc. How does this simple definition apply to the iron that is so often touted as vital to preventing fatigue and “poor blood” in our bodies?
Iron is a vital bodily element that is used in making a very important tool—hemoglobin—that carries oxygen to the cells via the bloodstream. Readily available in nearly every variety of food, it is also widely accessible in over-the-counter supplements. We all know that we need iron to think, to act, even to stay alive. But how many of us know that too much iron can be extremely dangerous to our health?
When we think of iron, we think of energy and strength, and rightly so. Iron energizes our cells by transporting to them oxygen from the air we breathe through our lungs via hemoglobin, the substance that makes blood red.1
Hemoglobin is made of protein (globin) and a pigment that is actually an iron-rich compound (heme). Chemically, there are four iron atoms in each molecule of hemoglobin. Each atom is capable of carrying one oxygen molecule through the bloodstream.2
It sounds simple, yes? In fact, it is a vast and skillfully engineered operation. One red blood cell contains 270 million hemoglobin molecules. Multiply 270 million by four and you will see that each red blood cell is capable of transporting—through its iron atoms—over a billion molecules of oxygen. Then imagine that a healthy adult has about 35 trillion red blood cells. Without the iron in the hemoglobin in these countless red blood cells, the body could not receive enough oxygen to stay alive.3
Iron also plays a reverse role in the nourishment of every cell in your body. After the hemoglobin has delivered the oxygen to the cells in your tissues, it picks up the waste product—carbon dioxide—and carries it back to your lungs, which breathe it out into the air. Thus, iron is necessary for the transport of oxygen to your cells, enabling them to burn glucose for energy, and for the transport of poisonous carbon dioxide away from the cells when the glucose has been burned.
An easy way to observe this process in your own body is to notice the veins in your arms and hands. They are blue: why? Because it is through the veins that blood carrying carbon dioxide returns to the lungs. On the other hand, the blood that is carrying oxygen to the cells—arterial blood—is bright red. If you cut a vein, however, the blood immediately appears to be red because it mixes with the oxygen present in air.
This phenomenon explains why “blue” babies and persons who have been poisoned by cyanide have a blue appearance: they lack oxygen molecules carried by the iron atoms in their hemoglobin. Those who have been asphyxiated by carbon monoxide also look blue. The iron in their hemoglobin has bonded with carbon monoxide, a tighter bond than is formed with oxygen; so tight, in fact, that the iron atoms are unable to deposit their deadly load. Thus, they are unable to carry oxygen, and suffocation is the result.4
Iron is also at work in a substance called myoglobin, which contains one iron atom per molecule. Myoglobin carries oxygen from the blood to the enzymes in the muscle cells, which produce energy. Without the oxygen-binding iron atom in myoglobin, the muscles would be unable to work.5
Iron works in yet another way, helping to synthesize an enzyme called ATP, one of your body’s most important enzymes. ATP (adenosine triphosphate) works in the process that breaks down glucose—the energy substance that results from the breakdown of carbohydrates and excess fats and proteins.
ATP is like electricity in that it “stores” energy that can then be switched on when you need it. Without it, your energy supply of glucose would be utilized all at once, and you would have to eat constantly for a steady supply. Your muscles’ store of ATP guarantees that you will have enough energy to move and breathe. How does iron figure into this picture? It is the part of your cells’ enzymes that carries the electrons that break down glucose to produce ATP.6, 7, 8, 9
In our discussion of how iron works it is interesting to note that your body actually recycles this valuable mineral. When red blood cells break down, the iron is released from the heme and attaches itself to other proteins. As a result, it is too large for the kidneys’ membranes to filter it out through to the urine.10
This “old” iron in its new protein-compound forms (called ferritin and hemosiderin11, 12) is stored in the spleen, liver, and bone marrow—conserved for use in future times.13 In fact, your body so efficiently conserves and recycles iron that if it is overloaded with the substance, it cannot rid itself of the excess. Luckily there is a built-in “safety catch” in the intestinal wall that, under normal conditions, keeps us from absorbing more iron than we need.14
Our discussion above has already answered the question of where iron works:
• Bloodstream. The four iron atoms in hemoglobin carry oxygen to the body’s cells and carry waste products from them.
• Muscles. Myoglobin’s single atom of iron carries oxygen to the enzymes of the muscle cells, which then produce energy.
• Metabolic system. Within the enzymes of the cells, iron carries the electrons that break down glucose to produce ATP.
If we are to believe Madison Avenue, we are all desperately in need of iron in the form of One-A-Day Vitamins Plus Iron.15 And yet, we have just seen that iron is recycled and conserved in our bodies in a most efficient way. The fact is, there are only a few specific situations that call for any more iron than most of us receive in our daily fare.
If you are anemic, you may need additional iron, but not always, as we shall see. If you are pregnant, an iron supplement may also be in order.16 Other times when an iron supplement may be necessary are when you have lost blood through an accident, donation, or unusually heavy menstruation, and during periods of major muscular growth.
We all associate anemia with iron deficiency, and in fact there is a type of anemia that is caused by a lack of sufficient iron for hemoglobin synthesis (or if there is enough for the hemoglobin, by insufficient iron for the myoglobin and the enzyme processes detailed above).17 The result? Chronic fatigue, shortness of breath, perhaps constant headaches, pale skin, and opaque and brittle nails.
The common reactions of a doctor who observed these symptoms in his patient would be 1) to give a test that would determine if the hemoglobin were low, and 2) to prescribe massive doses of supplemental iron. In some cases, this would be the proper treatment. The number of erythrocytes (red blood cells) would be restored to normal levels, and the problem would be corrected.
But—and this is a big but—nutritional research by biochemists within the past fifty years has determined that there are several types of anemia, not all necessarily precipitated by a deficiency in iron. In fact, there are a number of delicately balanced biochemical factors that can precipitate an anemic condition which will not be helped by supplemental iron.
For example, if there are genetic defects or damage to the bone marrow, where production of red blood cells takes place, iron cannot correct the problem.18 If there is a deficiency of B12, also needed to produce red blood cells, pernicious anemia may result;19 an inadequate amount of vitamin E could result in the rapid destruction of red blood cells by oxidation and a form of anemia would develop;20 there could be insufficient protein for the synthesis of the globin (protein) portion of the hemoglobin compound. Mineral deficiencies in cobalt, copper, zinc, or magnesium could be the cause of some types of anemia, as all those minerals are necessary for the synthesis of hemoglobin, as are folic acid, pantothenic acid, and B6.21, 22, 23, 24
To help you visualize the total picture of how red blood cells are manufactured (now that you know how many diverse nutrients are necessary to the process), you should know that in order to prevent anemia, your body must make nearly two and a half million erythrocytes per second. It must then keep each of these red blood cells alive for 120 days.25
In essence, anemia is a condition in which the red blood cells are prevented—by any one or a combination of the factors we have mentioned—from transporting sufficient oxygen to the cells. Obviously, an iron deficiency is only one of these factors.
How do you know if a deficiency of iron is the cause of your anemic condition? If the condition was precipitated by a major loss of blood, you can almost be certain that iron will help cure it. In other cases, a hemoglobin test is not sufficient for determining that iron is the element you need. In addition to that test, your doctor should also measure the serum iron levels. If they are adequate in spite of the low levels of hemoglobin, the anemia is being caused by something else. Another test can measure the iron-binding capacity of the iron carrier transferrin; yet another—the Atomic Absorption Spectograph—can reveal the iron content of your tissues.26 An analysis of your hair can also be useful.
If these laboratory tests seem complicated and expensive, here is a simple at-home test, advised by the British Medical Journal. Eat a quantity of beets. If your urine turns red, you are deficient in iron.27
Why is it so important to be certain that your anemia really is due to iron deficiency before embarking on a regimen of supplements? Two reasons: 1) there is a real danger of taking too much iron, and 2) if you treat an anemia with iron when the root cause lies elsewhere, disaster could be the result.
Why is too much iron so dangerous? As you will remember, your body does have a safety mechanism built in to the intestinal wall that prevents you from absorbing excess iron. Yet, even this ingenious defense mechanism can be overpowered by a high intake of the mineral. Your body binds the excess iron in protein compounds called ferritin and hemosiderin and stores it in the liver, spleen, and bone marrow. When there is too much iron, first the ferritin storage protein is saturated. Then debilitating and sometimes fatal diseases called hemosiderosis and hemochromatosis can ensue. Hemosiderosis is the condition in which there are excess deposits of hemosiderin in the liver and spleen; in hemochromatosis, the iron/protein compound has been deposited in all the body’s tissues. Sometimes a genetic incapacity may cause these diseases, but most often the cause is excessive iron intake.
The symptoms of excessive iron are, oddly enough, quite similar to the symptoms of anemia: headaches, shortness of breath, increasing fatigue, dizziness, weight loss, and a gray-bronze skin tone after the iron has been deposited throughout the tissues.28
Be aware that these conditions have a real possibility of manifesting as a direct result of long-term use of iron supplements, in oral or injected form. As small a dose as 900 milligrams of iron tablets taken at once can be fatal.29 Children who have eaten iron tablets thinking they were candy have actually died.30
There are other conditions that can lead to hemosiderosis and hemochromatosis. Blood transfusions over a long period of time (often given to patients suffering from aplastic anemia, in which there is an insufficiency of red blood cells because of bone marrow damage; or those suffering from hemolytic anemia, the abnormal destruction of red blood cells) can cause toxic accumulations of hemosiderin in the liver, with the resulting destruction of that organ.31
Cirrhosis of the liver caused by excessive drinking or blood transfusions can in turn cause excessive deposits of iron in the liver and spleen. Disorders of the pancreas and diabetes can also result in excessive iron deposits.32 Conversely, excessive iron can damage the pancreas, resulting in diabetes.33
In fact, the accumulation of excess iron can severely damage all your organs. Enough iron can be deposited in the heart muscle to cause cardiac arrest; the deposits are large enough to be seen during an autopsy.34
In hemosiderosis or hemochromatosis, the iron deposits oxidize valuable vitamin C, destroying your primary defense against scurvy.38 If iron is deposited in your joints, painful arthritis can occur. If excess iron lodges in your brain, you may develop schizophrenia.39 If your child has too much iron in his or her system, he or she may be hyperactive, or autistic.40 Breathing polluted air can bring an accumulation of iron to your lungs, resulting in siderosis. Surplus iron in the stomach and intestines has been implicated in cancers of those organs. Interestingly enough, in test animals who were subjected to carcinogens, the presence of iron compounds visibly quickened the development of cancer.41
Thus, one should avoid taking iron supplements for an anemia that is not caused by iron deficiency, because excessive iron in the system can be very dangerous.
The other reason to avoid treating an anemic condition with iron unless it is definitely a result of iron deficiency is that iron therapy treatment could complicate an anemia that was actually caused by another factor.
For example, an anemia characterized by gross abnormalities in the bone marrow—interfering with the proper synthesis of red blood cells—can arise from a vitamin E deficiency.35 The worst possible treatment for this condition would be to take iron. Not only would the bone marrow go unrepaired, but iron actually destroys vitamin E!36
Your stores of iron are significantly depleted by pregnancy, for in effect some of them are being transferred to the growing fetus.37 So pregnancy is one situation in which taking an iron supplement would be advisable.
Be aware that not only do you run the risk of developing iron-deficiency anemia when you are pregnant; there is also the possibility of developing folic-acid deficiency anemia. Because refining foods destroys so much folic acid, as does stress, and because it is water soluble in the first place, easily excreted through the urine and pores, you are likely to be deficient, particularly under the stress of pregnancy.42, 43, 44, 45 A lack of folic acid impairs the full development of the red blood cells, in both you and your growing baby.
You should remember, if you are pregnant, that excess iron lowers your levels of vitamin E. If you don’t have enough vitamin E for yourself and your baby, neither of you will have enough oxygen, either. If your baby isn’t getting enough oxygen, it could be premature, late, malformed, or mentally retarded—or you may even miscarry.46, 47, 48, 49 One sad possibility is that your baby could be born anemic, which was just what you were trying to prevent by taking iron supplements.50
Another situation in which your need for iron might truly be increased is if you have suffered a blood loss through accident, excessive donation of blood, or heavy menstrual flow. In these circumstances a substantial number of blood cells have been lost and iron is absolutely necessary to rebuild the supplies.
Around the ages of fifteen and sixteen, during periods of major muscular growth, the need for iron is also increased. Iron-rich foods help in the increasing production of myoglobin at this time. Since only about 10 percent of the body’s iron is in myoglobin, however, large supplements are not necessary.
So you see, there are in reality only a few times when supplemental iron would be in order. If it seems that we have spent an inordinate amount of time on the circumstances in which supplemental iron is not necessary, it is because it seems necessary to counteract so much of the myth and advertising propaganda surrounding this element, which in excess can be quite dangerous to your health.
What foods should you eat to guarantee a steady supply of iron? Should you ever take iron supplements, and if so, in what dosages? How can you insure that the iron you eat is properly absorbed for full utilization? What are the symptoms of deficiency? If, on the other hand, you are suffering from an excess of iron, what can you do to detoxify yourself?
If you are healthy, there are about 7 grams of iron in your system.51 Your hemoglobin contains two-thirds of that 7 grams, and a tenth of that amount is found in your myoglobin. The energy enzymes of your cells hold roughly a hundredth of the amount in the hemoglobin. The rest of the iron in your body may be flowing through your bloodstream, as molecules of transferrin; or it could be stored for future needs in the spleen, liver, and bone marrow in compounds of ferritin or hemosiderin.
What about stored amounts? In the liver alone, there may be up to 700 milligrams of iron.52 Lesser amounts deposit in the spleen and bone marrow. Remember, before you start taking any kind of iron supplement, ask your physician to help you determine that these deposits are truly depleted!
Nearly every food you eat contains iron. Even refined foods are “enriched” with iron. The most concentrated sources of iron are animal livers. Unfortunately, however, the liver is also the waste-filtering organ and any hormone or chemical to which the animal was exposed will also concentrate there. Egg yolks are another good source, containing more iron than even the muscle meats. They are an especially good source of iron for vegetarians, since meat contains more of this element than fruits or vegetables. (The iron in meat is also more easily absorbed into your body.53)
Good vegetable sources of iron include green leafy plants, dried beans, peaches, apricots, dates, prunes, cherries, figs, raisins, and blackstrap molasses. Supplementary foods that are good sources of iron are yeast and wheat germ, also rich in B vitamins and vitamin E. Yeast is one of the most accessible sources of iron for babies and ulcer patients.54
Of all the major food groups, only the dairy group contains a negligible amount of iron. Also, the iron in grains and spinach is not as available to you as that from other sources. Their phytic and oxalic acids render their iron insoluble; much is lost in the feces.
If you must take iron in supplements for any of the conditions we discussed above, here are some tips for getting the most out of the supplement with the least danger of developing toxicity: take small doses; with the iron take larger doses of the vitamins and other minerals that help you absorb and utilize iron and prevent toxicity (more on that to come); try to find a source of organically grown meats and eat the livers in order to benefit from the heavily concentrated iron. The shorter time it takes to correct your iron deficiency, the less risk you run of creating a toxic condition.
The type of supplement called ferrous fumarate tends to be less harsh than ferrous gluconate. Read the labels when purchasing your supplement. Avoid the types of supplements that contain iron in the form of either ferrous sulfate and ferrous chloride, which are not beneficial to your health. If you are taking iron in a multivitamin/mineral tablet, check the dosage. Do not take more than 18 milligrams of iron a day (and give none to your children) unless you are under the direct supervision of a (preferably orthomolecular) physician.
What are the official daily requirements for iron (all of which are available through food)? For children, 8 to 12 milligrams; for teenagers, 10 to 15 milligrams; for adult males, 10 milligrams; for females in their reproductive years, 18 milligrams. Pregnant women need 30 to 60 milligrams per day.55
If you are taking iron supplements for an anemic condition and your hemoglobin levels are not raised by 2 grams per 100 milligrams of blood every three weeks, you may need other nutrients along with the iron, or you may not need the iron at all.56
How can you guarantee the proper absorption of iron from your food? Other minerals and vitamins play a part in the amount of iron you are able to use. Certain natural elements synthesized by your body also play a role.
For example, while copper is necessary for the absorption of iron, too much copper actually lowers iron levels and causes anemia.57 There is an intricate play here between copper and the trace minerals molybdenum, manganese, and zinc—a deficiency in any of them can raise copper levels, resulting in iron deficiency. Keep in mind that these days copper is very easy to come by: it is in our water pipes, thus in our drinking and cooking water. It is also usually present in multivitamin/mineral supplements. Too much copper can be dangerous for a variety of reasons. On the other hand, if you are deficient in copper, a lack of zinc or manganese can cause excess storage of iron. But an excess of zinc or manganese can limit iron’s absorption.58 Balancing trace minerals is a complicated matter even for biochemists; the best approach for the individual is to eat a wide variety of fresh, whole foods, preferably organically grown.
Refined foods contain abundant phosphorus in the form of phosphates, which can hinder the absorption of iron—another good reason for sticking to whole unprocessed foods. Fortunately, when there is an oversupply of phosphorus, it combines with calcium. This process helps keep your iron free for absorption.59
And speaking of calcium, for it to be broken down for use, hydrochloric stomach acid is necessary. This vital substance depends on the B vitamins B1, B2, B3, pantothenic acid, and choline.60 Anything you eat or drink that has an alkaline quality—sugar, white bread, pasta, crackers, cakes and cookies, white rice, alcoholic beverages—can lessen the hydrochloric acid and reduce its effectiveness. B12—the lack of which may produce pernicious anemia—also depends on hydrochloric acid for proper absorption.
Diuretics such as coffee, tea, and alcohol can interfere with your absorption of iron simply because they cause so many other nutrients to pass quickly through the kidneys. Interestingly enough, too much plant fiber (cellulose) can also interfere with iron absorption, while protein is vital for iron’s utilization in the body.
Vitamin C increases your ability to absorb iron, as well as the rate of hemoglobin production. It also protects you against toxic elements like lead, cadmium, and aluminum, all of which interfere with iron absorption.61, 62
Iron absorption is hindered by vitamin E, and vice versa. It is best to take iron eight to twelve hours after taking vitamin E, if you must take iron supplements. And remember, excess iron has the ability to diminish your tissues’ vitamin E stores.63
How can you tell if you are deficient in iron? The symptoms of iron deficiency are the symptoms of anemia: chronic tiredness, lack of endurance, shortness of breath, etc. If you suspect an iron deficiency, it is advisable that your physician conduct an entire battery of tests (detailed above) before you start taking supplements.
But what if your problem is an excess of iron? We already know how dangerous too much iron can be—what can be done? Fortunately there are ways to rid your body of toxic excesses of iron, and to repair the tissues the deposits have damaged or destroyed. There are certain elements that can actually reduce the excess iron to a form that the kidneys can eliminate.
Chelation therapy, for example, is a process in which a patient is intravenously infused with a solution containing elements that will bind (chelate) toxic heavy metals and remove them from the body. L-histadine, an amino acid, is the substance used in chelating iron. Deferoxamine mesylate and 2,3 dihydroxybenzoic acid are also useful in chelating iron and helping the body rid itself of excess amounts.64 Penicillamine, used in chelation of copper, may also be effective in removing iron.65
If you suffer from iron toxicosis, there are several other vitamins and minerals that can help you get rid of the excess iron. Zinc helps lower iron levels, for example, and there is some evidence that it can free arthritic joints of excess iron.66 Vitamin B6 and magnesium are also helpful in the endeavor to reduce high iron levels.67 If you want to guard against the dangers of iron deposits, make sure your diet includes plenty of the B vitamins, vitamins C and E, and protein.68 Taking adequate amounts of E is also a good preventative against the deposits’ causing cancer.69
Studies conducted on 37 volunteers resulted in the conclusion that the consumption of tea and coffee, especially in conjunction with a meal, tends to inhibit iron absorption. It was interesting to note that coffee consumed one hour before a meal was not as effective in preventing iron absorption as when taken with the meal.70