World's Greatest Con Job -- It Gets Scarier
Does it really matter how old or how young we are? Shouldn't each of us be concerned about our health? Don't we all want to live fuller, healthier lives?
This is week five of my series on how we are being conned by numerous vitamin and pharmaceutical companies that their products are the best; the safest. There are a few simple questions you can ask about your brand to determine if you are being conned. That is the purpose of these posts.
Week Two: Does your brand produce vitamins with the life factor intact? Or are they over-processed and of little value? Click here
I cannot emphasize strongly enough how important the following questions are to ask. Writing a letter or making a phone call to the company that manufactures your brand and asking them specific questions plus these crucial ones, could save your life. You may think "It's too much work." Please, for the sake of your health, your family's health and possibly even your life - think again.
1. Are their products backed by PUBLISHED clinical research studies? Don't just ask the question; ask to SEE the published research. Is it PEER-REVIEWED published research? Where was it published? Peer-review published research is a difficult and rigorous process and few companies meet the criteria.
Why is this important? Many companies piggyback on other companies published research claiming it as their own. A reputable company can do the research and post their results. A company without integrity can use that research to make it appear that it applies to THEIR product.
2. Do the nutrients in the product get absorbed into the bloodstream AND.....is there (here we go again) PUBLISHED, clinical evidence to PROVE it? Here is a simple test that was done on Vitamin E by five different brands. All claimed to have 200 I.U. of Vitamin E but could the body absorb them?
Five brands of 200 I.U. Vitamin E was tested for delivery to the bloodstream. The results were:
Brand 1 - 0.15 units absorbed
Brand 2 - 15.0 units absorbed
Brand 3 - 1.0 unit absorbed
Brand 4 - 67.0 units absorbed
Brand 5 - 200 units absorbed.
Check your resources.
3. What does Consumer Lab say about your product? Reports of LEAD contamination and frequent mislabeling of supplements continue to emanate from the independent, third-party product analysis website - Consumer Lab. Their Head of Research conducted product safety testing for the FDA for nine years, before joining Consumer Lab.
Tod Cooperman, M.D., the President of the company, recently stated: "One of every four supplements we have tested had some problem. Over the years we have tested more than 1,900 dietary supplements for quality and purity."
I will not mention company names but here is an example: One brand claimed that their joint-health supplement had the highest potency and most concentrated chondroitin supplement ever developed. The lab results showed that the product did NOT CONTAIN EVEN TRACE AMOUNTS of chondroitin. In fact, eight of eleven chondroitin supplements failed to deliver on label claims.
Sadly, this is a common problem with both health food store and pharmacy-grade products. Fifty-two percent of multivitamins did NOT make the grade in Consumer Lab testing. And even sadder many of these multis contained excessive amounts of LEAD -- yes, you read that correctly. I get sick to my stomach when I see pregnant women taking these pre-natal brands and I beg them to throw them away -- they would be better off taking nothing than ingesting poison and heavy metal.
How is this even possible?
Are you wondering how companies can get away with that? If a product contains the amount it claims, even if that is a synthetic source, they can get a stamp of approval to distribute their product.
I hope that by this fifth post, you are starting to check your brand; and if you have any questions, please email me. As a health coach for four decades I have seen the good, the bad and the ugly.
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