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Vitamin C is an interesting case in point. [...]
One of the most well-established functions of vitamin C is to assist in the production of a non-essential amino acid - hydroxyproline. This amino acid is a building block of the protein collagen. In light of this information, why would some people claim to use vitamin C to treat bleeding gums? Arthritis? Sprains and strains? Easy bruising? Slow healing of wounds? Could such claims lead to controversy?
Another function of vitamin C is
to facilitate the absorption of iron from the digestive tract. How could this function lead to claims that vitamin C is a good "tonic" for people suffering from fatigue?
Vitamin C is found in large concentrations in the adrenal glands, and is apparently essential for the production of some of the adrenal hormooes, particularly the glucocorticoids.
Hunting cultures often were able to stave off scurvy during the winter months by eating the adrenal glands of the animals they hunted. Can you treat stress with vitamin C?
Vitamin C plays an important but poorly-understood role in normalizing the immune system.
In fact, frequent infection is a sign of scurvy. Is vitamin C a cure for colds? Cancer? Allergies?
Under certain circumstances, oxygen, usually present in the body as 02, forms the caustic molecule 03. This is sometimes known as peroxide or superoxide, and is one of a category of caustic chemicals known as free radicals. Free radicals can cause cellular damage, and can even disrupt the structure of DNA.
Vitamin C is known to speed up the catabolism of 03 to 02. Is vitamin C a treatment for aging?
A number of animals are able to synthesize their own vitamin C Based on studies of how much vitamin C these animals produce for each kilogram of body weight, the American biochemist
Linus Pauling calculated that adult humans require up to 9,000 mg of vitamin C per day for optimum health. The RDA for vitamin C is much lower - 60-70 mg per day for the average adult. Is one of these answers wrong? Is there some way they can both be right?
A megadose of a vitamin is considered to be anything exceeding lOx the RDA;
Pauling's recommendations are well into the megadose range. Yet, vitamin C has few known deleterious effects, even at megadosages.
Signs of vitamin C "overdose" are primarily digestive upset (especially diarrhea) and burning on urination. The only documented situation in which vitamin C supplementation is clearly dangerous is when it is combined with the use of aspirin. This combination is a risk factor for peptic ulcer.
http://blogs.nvcc.edu/wp-content/blogs.dir/91/files/2012/06/Lecture14.pdf
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If vitamin C harmed DNA, why do most animals make (not eat, but make) between 2,000 and 10,000 milligrams of vitamin C per human equivalent body weight per day? Evolution would never so favor anything that harms vital genetic material. White blood cells and male reproductive fluids contain unusually high quantities of ascorbate. Living, reproducing systems love vitamin C.
http://www.foodsmatter.com/nutrition_micronutrition/vitamins/articles/vit_c_therapy.html