The truth about Synthetic Nutrients

The supplement industry has a dirty secret, and has done an incredible job of concealing the secret about synthetic nutrients with hip marketing phrases like "megadoses", "purity", and "natural."

I understand how persuasive those words are; heck I swallowed hundreds of thousands of grams of synthetic nutrients over an 18 year period.

I believed that synthetic was better and or equal to what was found in Nature. If molecule per molecule a synthetic nutrient was the same as that nutrient found in food, why not take the synthetic and get a much higher dose of it to boot!

Everytime I asked a formulator what the synthetics were made from, I got the standard response, "well they are crystalline."

"Okay, but where did the molecules come from?"

"Oh, that's proprietary information."

The only thing I learned in all those years working for synthetic vitamin companies was that the biggest supplier of the synthetic B vitamins was pharma giant Hoffman Larouche.

The history of synthetic supplements started in the 1940's. The formulations available at that time were small dose synthetics, similar in milligram amount to what was found in whole foods like yeast.
It wasn't until chemist Linus Pauling championed Megadose Therapy in 1970 that synthetic nutrients in high doses really became a part of our supplement culture.

The synthetic supplement boom began in the 1980's and companies fought for health food store shelf space based on having the highest miligram and gram amounts for B complex, vitamin C, and amino acids. As the doses got larger, the pills got bigger, so swallowing these synthetic monstrosities took a Herculean-sized throat.
The supplement companies responded by creating powders and liquids to keep the megadoses flowing.

Today Megadose Therapy is still very much alive. The Pharmaceutical companies have adopted the principle when formulating medicines; particularly the ones synthesized from plants. While a traditional healer would use amounts best described as a "handful" of the leaves or roots, the pharmaceutical approach is to synthesize one chemical ingredient found in a plant and then produce it in 100's of miligrams. These amounts do not occur in the plants themselves.

It was in August of this year that an email alert came across my computer. Since my company TheracellEQ is a manufacturer, I now have access to the proprietary information that I never had access to before.
This email alert was a notification that there would be a price increase for synthetic supplements because of the petro chemicals and petroleum extracts used to make them.

What?

I read the email alert again. Petrochemicals used to produce some vitamins.

Holy Cow. All these years I've spent bombarding my cells with the "purified"
benefits of petrochemicals. And I've done the same thing to my dogs and horses.

Armed with this information I headed down the rabbit hole and finally found what I had been searching for: exactly what individual nutrients are made from.


Here in a nutshell is the raw material used to produce synthetic nutrients:

Vitamin A/Betacarotene: Methanol, benzene, petroleum esters; acetylene, refined
oils

Vitamin B-1: Coal tar derivatives, hydrocholric acid; acetonitrole with ammonia

Vitamin B-2: produced with 2N acetic acid

Vitamin B-3: Coal tar derviatives, 3-cyanopyridine; ammonia and acid

Vitamin B-5: condensing isobutyraldehyde with formaldehyde

Vitamin B-6: petroleum ester and hydrochloric acid with formaldehyde

Vitamin B-12: Cobalamins reacted with cyanide

Vitamin C: Hydrogenated sugar (generally a corn source) processed with acetone

Vitamin D: Irridiated animal fat/cattle brains or solvently extracted

Vitamin E: Trimethylhydroquinone with isophytol; refined oils

Vitamin K: Coal tar derivative; produced with p-allelic nickle


Obviously, supplement companies have a vested interest in keeping their secret. They want us to keep injesting synthetics, and buying into megadose therapy; the more is better marketing scheme.
Megadoses don't occur in Nature. Nutrients from whole foods and plants are always found in concert with other biological factors like enzymes, proteins, minerals, and other as yet unidentified co factors.

I wonder if the urine and feces waste from synthetic supplementation taken by cattle, horses, dogs, and humans affects the ground water, the soil, the other animal life depended on a balanced eco system. Maybe the only problem to the environment is the chemical and hazardous waste produced by processing synthetic nutrients. Where does that stuff go?


What I do know is that the answer to health, well-being and longevity does not reside in synthetic supplementation. Even the Father of modern medicine, Hippocrates, knew that when he wrote: "let food be your medicine, let medicine be your food."


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References to synthetic supplements:

1] Budvari S, et al editors. The Merck Index: An encyclopedia of Chemicals, Drugs, and Biologicals, 12 th ed. Merck Research Laboratories, Whitehouse Station (NJ), 1996

[2] Vitamin-Mineral Manufacturing Guide: Nutrient Empowerment, volume 1. Nutrition Resource, Lakeport (CA), 1986

[3] DeCava JA. The Real Truth About Vitamins and Antioxidants. A Printery, Centerfield (MA), 1997

[4] Hui JH. Encyclopedia of Food Science and Technology. John Wiley, New York, 1992

[5] Gehman JM. From the Office of the President: Pseudo-Group Once Again Misleading the Naturopathic Field. Official Bulletin ANA, January 25, 1948:7-8

[6] Ensminger AH, et al. Food & Nutrition Encyclopedia, 2 nd ed. CRC Press, New York, 1993

[7] Mervyn L. The B Vitamins. Thorsons, Wellingborough ( UK), 1981

[8] Thiel R. Natural vitamins may be superior to synthetic ones. Med Hypo 2000 55(6):461-469

[9] Haynes W. Chemical Trade Names and Commercial Synonyms, 2nd ed. Van Nostrand Co., New York, 1955

[10] Shils M, et al, editors. Modern Nutrition in Health & Disease, 9 th ed. Williams & Wilkins, Balt.,1999

[11] Gruenwald et al editors. PDR for Herbal Medicines, 2nd ed. Medical Economics Company. Montvale (NJ) 2000