Protection through nutrition

For many years, nutrition scientists have explained that optimal nutrition requires a balanced intake of carbohydrates, fats, protein, vitamins, and minerals. It is well accepted that nutrient deficiencies within the major food groups can contribute to malnourishment, lowered immunity, disease, and degenerative conditions such as arteriosclerosis, cancer, and arthritis. Our modern lifestyle now appears to be an underlying factor in many cases of nutrient deficiency and related health problems. Fortunately, there are positive steps that can be taken.

Overemphasis on convenience comes at a cost

The emphasis on a convenience-based lifestyle has increased our overall consumption of processed food items. Many of these are loaded with unhealthy preservatives, stabilizers, and other chemical additives. Typical examples of processed foods include instant soups, breakfast bars, energy drinks, and noodle meals packaged in styrofoam containers. Instead of supplying essential nutrients, an overload of these poor quality foods actually depletes the body of valuable resources. This is a consequence of the chemical additives that must be neutralized then eliminated from the body.

Fresh produce is not enough

Unfortunately, the risk of absorbing damaging substances is not limited to convenience foods. Unless grown under strict organic certification standards, most varieties of fresh produce now carry a significant risk of pesticide and other agricultural chemical contamination.

The potential consequence of pesticide exposure was suggested in a recent study by Cynthia Curl and associates (2002). These researchers employed urine sampling and biological monitoring to assess the organophosphate pesticide exposure in preschool children consuming organic foods and a comparison group consuming a conventional diet. Metabolites of pesticide chemicals were significantly higher in the comparison group, confirming a widely held belief that consumption of organic fruits, vegetables, and juice is an effective and reliable means to reduce children’s exposure to organophosphate chemicals.

In addition to residual and other toxins found in some foods, environmental and industrial sources of pollution contribute to the chemical load impacting on the body. Hydrocarbon emissions from internal combustion engines constitute a significant health risk in many areas, particularly the expanding cities of developing nations.

Other sources of concern include industrial and domestic spillage of chemicals and untreated waste into water channels, plastics manufacturing and many synthetic products which break down slowly to release a complex and dangerous mixture of chemical compounds.

Optimal nutrition provides protection against pollutants

While there are inevitable exposures to many sources of pollution, it remains possible to provide our bodies with some natural protection in the form of optimum nutrition. This requires a balanced combination of high quality foods with a particular emphasis on freshness, wholeness, and the ability to provide biologically effective concentrations of the antioxidant vitamins, minerals, and associated nutrients.

There are multiple sources of antioxidant research which confirm their capacity to protect cells from the oxygen related damage that is accelerated by a wide range of chemical pollutants. Most importantly, there is clinical evidence to confirm that careful replenishment of antioxidant vitamins and minerals can reduce the symptoms of several chronic and debilitating health problems. Examples include alcoholism, allergies, chronic fatigue, rheumatoid arthritis, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, obesity, hyperactivity, and migraine.

Representative clinical trials compared two groups, each containing randomly assigned individuals with the same condition and approximate severity of symptoms. Under clinical supervision, the experimental groups were treated with antioxidant based nutritional supplements chosen to reduce symptoms and restore health. Individuals assigned to control groups were treated with non-nutrient placebo. To preserve research integrity, participants were not informed of their experimental or control status. In each study, symptom severity was evaluated before and after the intervention period. Objective physiological data were obtained in the obesity, hypertension, diabetes, and allergy studies, while symptom evaluation surveys were employed in the chronic fatigue, arthritis, hyperactivity, and migraine research. In the study relating to alcoholism, a combination of physiological measures and survey were used to evaluate symptom severity. All of these studies reported a statistically significant reduction of symptoms after treatment with clinically prescribed nutritional supplements. With the exception of the migraine study, individuals treated with the non-nutrient placebo, showed no significant improvement in their symptoms.

Consider an organic lifestyle

In addition to providing symptom relief, the clinical management of nutrition can also play a role in the prevention of serious conditions such as coronary heart disease, stroke, cancer, and diabetes. For most healthy individuals, the important health and preventative benefits described in the antioxidant studies can be readily obtained from consuming a balanced variety of organic foods in sufficient quantities. So, if you want to maximise your body’s natural defence mechanisms, consider switching to a lifestyle that emphasises fresh and nutritionally optimal organic produce.