More is Better

In an environment where “more” is often perceived as being “better,” consumers tend to think that if a supplement provides 100% of their needs, then something that provides 1000% must be 10 times better. The truth, those in the mainstream say, is it doesn’t work that way with supplements. They insist that there is no data that supports mega-dosing of supplements for health outcomes. (Mega-dosing is generally considered to be the practice of consuming 10 times or more the recommended amount of a vitamin or mineral supplement.)

However, when we think of certain basics like magnesium, iodine, selenium and bicarbonates, we can easily trash the above assertion. Take the case of iodine supplementation. Governments around the world conceded a century ago that the worlds populations needed more iodine, just enough though to avoid goiter but not enough to avoid cancer and other diseases due to iodine deficiency. When we look at the fact that iodine is an antiviral, anti-fungal and even effective against bacteria one would have to say high dosages, which were routinely given a hundred years ago, are called for in many medical situations.

Magnesium is an effective medicine at high dosages yet it is a common supplement as well. The recommend dose for magnesium is 320mg for adult women and 420mg for men. That might be a reasonable maintenance dose for healthy individuals but it is not near enough if one is suffering from a deficiency of the mineral and certainly not enough if one is suffering from cancer or diabetes or one of a many variety of diseases. Then five to ten times the recommended amount would certainly be in order.

Bicarbonates are not generally recommended at all yet it too is a supplement and a medicine doctors use all the time in ICU and emergency situations. Just to see how ridiculous Google can be, search for ‘iodine and goiter’ and you will see under the question, ‘How is Goiter Treated,’ they do not even mention iodine, though they concede that iodine deficiency causes the disorder.

Although supplements are often confused with drugs, supplements are not drugs. According to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) supplements are, “Not intended to treat, diagnose, mitigate, prevent or cure diseases.” Well certainly supplements cannot diagnose anything but the point I make in Natural Allopathic Medicine is that nutritional substances like magnesium, iodine, bicarbonates, potassium and even selenium, when injected or administered intravenously are certainly medicines.

The medical industrial complex will stop at nothing to put down supplements. They say that in the supplement world, there is no legally defensible definition for the term “natural.” In fact, when it comes to the natural products industry, the word “natural” more often than not means nothing. The perception of a natural supplement product is that it is not artificially fabricated. There is some truth because many supplements are synthetically created in a laboratory environment and do not contain any natural, plant-based or non-synthetic ingredients. That is what the mainstream likes to point out.

“Vitamins and dietary supplements may kill you, and they often provide little or no health benefit,” concludes one writer for Time. Doctors killing you with their pharmaceuticals are not mentioned even if the number of dead in the United States alone goes over the hundred-thousand mark from properly prescribed medicines. It would be more accurate to say that doctors and pharmaceutical medicine may kill you and most often provide little of no health benefit.