Should you be taking vitamins? Or should you get ALL your nutrition from food and food based supplements? I prefer the latter for almost all my dietary needs. That’s why I’m always encouraging you to take supplements like pharmaceutical grade fish oil, berries, apples and other proven health enhancers.
In line with what I’ve previously written, today I have a piece for you from Dave Copeland of AppleBoost.com. I think what he has written will REALLY open your eyes. Read on and you’ll quickly discover why.
Matthew Furey
by Dave Copeland
It’s one of the biggest mistakes in nutraceutical manufacturing today. Researchers identify a single vitamin or dietary phytochemical (DPC) that seems to protect against a particular disease, and then nutraceutical manufacturers crank out supplements whose only active ingredient is that isolated substance.
That’s like plucking Cal Ripken, Jr. away from the rest of the Baltimore Orioles, putting him up against an opposing all-star team … and expecting him to win the game single-handedly.
But baseball, real life, and real health don’t work that way. Biochemical processes are complex and synergistic. Take quercetin, the new darling of nutrition researchers. It’s found in high concentrations in apples, onions, and tea, but it’s also found in red grapes, broccoli, citrus, cherries and some kinds of berries. It acts as an anti-viral agent, an anti-inflammatory, and even an anti-cancer agent. But to bring out its superstar performance, it needs the help of other dietary phytochemicals.
In one telling experiment Dr. Rui Hai Liu, a leading nutrition researcher at Cornell University, demonstrated that as great as isolated quercetin is, it’s even more effective in combination with other naturally-occurring dietary phytochemicals.
Dr. Liu tested both isolated quercetin and whole-apple extract against human cancer cells. Both inhibited cancer cell growth, but the whole-apple extract was significantly more effective. In a second experiment with human liver cancer cells, Dr. Liu tested extracts from either peeled or unpeeled apples. The extract that included apple peel, where the dietary phytochemicals are much more concentrated, outperformed the unpeeled apple extract by 50%.
That’s why whole food supplements make so much more sense than isolated vitamins, minerals, or phytochemcials. A single whole food contains anywhere from dozens to hundreds of dietary phytochemicals … most of which we haven’t even identified yet! It’s pretty certain, though, that all these DPCs have a synergistic effect on one another.
NEWS YOU CAN USE:
Quercetin boosts effectiveness of anti-herpes drug.
In a Hungarian study done in the 90’s, researchers showed that quercetin boosts the effect of anti-viral drug acyclovir (used to treat herpes). This study tested isolated quercetin. You can learn more about the study
Given the information in today’s feature article above, it would be interesting to see what would happen if acyclovir were used alongside concentrated apple extract (like Dr. Liu used in his experiment) or apple peel powder.
Takeaway point >>> If you’re taking acyclovir, be sure to include quercetin-rich foods (such as apples or onions) in your diet, or take AppleBoost pure apple peel powder.
Order AppleBoost today at AppleBoost.com.
Power Quote of The Day“He that takes medicine and neglects diet, wastes the skills of the physician.” — Chinese Proverb |