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Introduction
A NUTRITION GAP IN OUR DIET HAS BEEN CREATED BY CHANGES
IN FARMING TECHNIQUES (RESULTING IN LESS NUTRITIONAL PRODUCE), INCREASES IN
PROCESSED FOODS IN OUR DIET, AND OUR BUSY SNACKING LIFESTYLES.
All of the above can contribute to
a much reduced, and unhealthy, nutrition intake for many people.
- Good Nutrition is
fundamental to good health
- There is now a recognised
nutrition gap for many, caused by a number of different factors
- This nutrition gap, in many
individual forms, is linked in research to many of the prevailing degenerative
diseases of our generation
- The provision of effective
nutrients to bridge this nutrition gap is the nucleus of the Nature's Own
philosophy
- Food State nutrition we
believe is the most appropriate and effective short term solution for this
problem
- We have developed "The
Lifestyles Programme" by age group and sex to fill this gap
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Background and
Overview
We were
designed to live until 120 years of age. Most of us live for just over half
that time, or less, and die from effects of our civilised world rather than the
natural causes of aging. The reason for this is multifactorial, but the most
significant predisposing factor is the dramatic changes which have occurred
over the past 70 years to the nutritional status of most people. We used to die
in the main from infection or trauma. Twentieth century medicine has scored
significant victories against these causes. Today the majority of cases of
illness in the West are caused by lifestyle factors such as lack of exercise,
smoking and poor nutrition. We need a recipe for addressing these 21st Century
problems, as conventional medicine alone cannot address the cause - only some
of the symptoms. To effectively address the cause of the problem, we need to
understand how balance was achieved in bygone years and identify the changes
that have taken place to cause the problems we now face.
The nutritional status of our body is dependent on 4
things:
- Our food choices
- The nutrient content of the
food we eat
- The ability of our
individual bodies to assimilate nutrients
- Environmental influences
which give rise to extra nutrient needs, or interfere
- with absorption and/or
uptake of certain groups of nutrients
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The good old days, 1930 and
before
Man was put on
this Earth along with all the components he needed for good health:
- Water - natural source,
alive and pure. A source of minerals and an energetic transport
medium
- Air - fresh, unpolluted and
clean
- Light - sunshine filtered by
ozone, bright, clear light
- Food - nutrient-rich whole
food.
1930 and before was a time
of eco balance. The Earth provided what we needed and Man returned the same to
the Earth.
We need to understand how
this was achieved.
a) Food
Choices
Diets in the 1930's were
mainly of fresh, free-range meat, locally-grown seasonal fruit and vegetables.
Mothers were at home and took the time to prepare and cook fresh meals, and
these habits were passed on to their children. Processed food and fast-food
options were not available.
b)
The Nutritional State of the Food
- Mineral-rich fruit and
vegetables grown in mineral-rich soil
- Rotational farming - crops
rotated with grazing animals. Crops remove minerals from the soil. Animal waste
returns them. (No chemical fertilisers and pesticides to upset the bacterial
balance of the soil)
- Most produce used locally
and waste returned to local soil
- Meat high in omega 3
essential fatty acids. Grazing (free-range) animals produce meat high in omega
3
All the above provided a
solid foundation for eco balance of healthy, mineral rich soil, maintained by
manure and natural colonies of bacteria. Healthy plants grew rich in minerals
and provided humans and animals with the mineral nutrition they needed for
health |
"Minerals in the soil control the metabolism
of plants, animals and man. All of life will be either healthy or unhealthy
according to the fertility of the soil."
Dr Alexus Carrel, 1912
Nobel Prize Winner |
c) Ability of our bodies to assimilate
nutrients
In the 1930's our bodies
were relatively unpolluted. There were limited drugs and minimal use of
chemicals, insecticides, pesticides and preservatives. Few environmental
influences directly affected our ability to assimilate
nutrients.
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The bad new days, 1930 and
beyond
1992 Earth
Summit Report found that mineral depletion of the soil is over 76% in Europe
and 80% in the USA. |
"You can trace every sickness, every disease and
every ailment to a mineral deficiency"
Two times Nobel Prize Winner Dr.Linus Pauling |
During this period the eco balance became disturbed and this has had
significant repercussions on the nutritional status of humans and
animals.
1) Our water is no
longer "alive". It is treated with fluoride and other chemicals, many of which
affect the way our bodies absorb vitamins and minerals. For instance, fluoride
in water destroys vitamin E in the body.
2) Air- no longer clean, fresh and pure. It is full of
industrial waste, fuel fumes, pollution. There are more free radicals, which in
turn pollute our bodies and increase our antioxidant
requirements.
3) Light -
marred by smoke and smog. Pure light is so important for cell growth and
development in plants, animals and humans.
4) Nutrients and Food:
Food Choices
- Over the last 50 years
children are eating less calories (they are getting fatter). 19% reduction in
calorie intake for boys, and 29% for girls, but increased sugar
consumption!
- 1989 - school diets for
children show major deficiencies - all minerals and key vitamins show shortages
- e.g. 86% of girls are getting below the recommended daily intake of iron,
which is critical to good health
As women began to go out to
work and generally our lifestyles became more time-pressurised and hectic, so
our food choices changed to accommodate this. The carefully freshly-prepared
daily meals were replaced by fast, convenience and processed foods. Today's
children are so tuned into fast foods that 7 out of 10, when asked in school
one day, thought potatoes grew on trees!
Most people do not eat food with the thought of it giving them the
nutrition they need for health. They see it more as a source of energy and
something to satisfy hunger pangs. Most processed foods are purchased for
colour, taste, texture and calorie content, not for nutritional
value.
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The State of The
Food
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In 1936 the USA Senate saw the growing problem of farming and
nutrition. Here is a quote from the 74th Congress, 2nd
Session.
"The alarming fact is that
foods (fruits, vegetables and grains) now being raised on millions of acres of
land that no longer contain enough of certain minerals are starving us - no
matter how much of them we eat. No man of today can eat enough fruits and
vegetables to supply his system with the minerals he requires for perfect
health because his stomach isn't big enough to hold them".
All the factors listed below have significantly and
detrimentally affected the nutritional status of the food we eat:
- Birth of intensive farming -
fewer minerals returned to the soil than taken out. Growing plants use many
minerals and trace minerals but man returns only 3 to the soil in the form of
Nitrogen(N), Phosphorus(P) and Potassium(K). The reason for the NPK mixture is
that scientists found that these were the three minerals which encouraged
plants to grow quickly, as rapid growth was a more important consideration than
nutritional status of the plant. But with many minerals taken out and only 3
returned, this inevitably gave rise to deficiencies of the rest. There is
documented evidence to show that on average the same food was between 45% and
125% more nutritionally rich 60 years ago
- Pesticides and insecticides
further upset the natural pro-biotic eco balance in soil. The natural
pro-biotic (pro= for bios = life) bacteria are so necessary for transforming
inorganic minerals into a form easily usable by plants.
- Less bacteria = less
inorganic mineral transformation = less minerals in the correct form to be
taken up and used by plants = lower mineral content of the plant = lower
mineral intake by the animals or humans who eat the plants.
- Falsely-ripened produce does
not have fully developed mineral potential
- Much produce is cut early
and stored. Storage depletes vitamin content
- The birth of fast and
processed food. Foods which have lost most of their fresh value in terms of
vitamins, minerals and enzymes. Food processing dramatically reduces the
mineral content of the food. Anything from 20% - 80%, depending on the
processing method and food involved.
An example of this is the
nutrient losses in the flour refining process which sees the
following:
Calcium - 60% loss.
Magnesium 85% loss. Chromium 98% loss. Manganese 86% loss. Zinc 77%
loss!
- Additives such as chemical
colourants and flavourings in food compound the problem. At worst these are
mild poisons, and at best are chemicals that the body does not see as food. The
body needs to use nutrient energy to deal with these.
- Factory farming of animals -
animals whose movement is restricted. This changed the essential fatty acid
content of the meat so produced from high omega 3 (in free range stock) to low
omega 3 and high omega 6. Humans began to lose the benefits of omega 3 EFA
nutrition
- Organic food should be the
answer. But although organic food has the great benefit of being grown
according to nature's laws and being free from pesticide and herbicide
residues, there is no guarantee that it contains any more minerals than
ordinary food. Organic farming uses chemical-free methods of fertilisation, but
has not yet been able to replace the minerals which have for many years been
removed and not replaced.
The Eco balance has changed
and is no longer symbiotic. Imbalances began to reflect in degenerative changes
in both animals and humans.
- 1988 The Surgeon General in
the USA concluded that 15 out of 21 deaths involved nutritional
deficiencies
- There is a proliferation of
nutrition-based research highlighting diseases linked to nutritional
status
- Research shows that 267mg
Vitamin E reduces the risk of heart disease by 50% - on average we intake 9.3mg
in the West
- Research shows that 500mg
Vitamin C can cut death rates by 50%. The average Western intake is
58mg!
- Research shows that
sufficient intake of omega 3 fatty acids helps prevent circulatory problems and
reduces the incidence of strokes and heart disease. The average intake is
150mg, although as yet no RDA has been set but it is likely to be around
350mg
Environmental Influences
Detrimental to Health ·
- Chemicals, environmental
toxins, smoke, smog and fumes all increase our antioxidant needs
- Birth of antibiotics -
widespread probiotic imbalances in intestines and impaired synthesis of B
vitamins and Vitamin K, along with decreased uptake of other minerals and trace
minerals
Pasteur, father of the germ
theory, was heard to say late in his life. "It is not the germ, it is the soil"
- meaning that pathogenic bacteria and viruses are only a cause of disease if
one is susceptible to them. A healthy balance of probiotic bacteria in our
soils and in our bodies offers superb natural defence against
invaders.
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What can we do to redress
the balance
Summary
to date: The human body needs a certain level of nutrients for optimum health.
Anything less and ill-health will set in. Food was given to us on this Earth to
supply all the nutrients we need for optimum health. However over the past 50
or so years the nutritional status of our diets has changed dramatically. This
covers:
- a) our food choices which
are now predominately for mineral deficient processed fast foods
- b) the prevalent mineral
depletion of the soil and plants which grow there and animals which graze the
plants
- c) humans who eat both the
mineral-depleted plants and mineral-depleted animals
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The nutrition gap
There is a big gap in the nutritional status of most
people today, and even a wholesome diet of organic food will not always be able
to supply the nutrient requirement in total.
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Solutions
1) Long term - The long term and best solution is for farmers and
government bodies to team together to replenish the soil of the land with
micronutrients.
2) Medium term -
Food fortification. To add vitamins and minerals to all foods to ensure that
most people will get their nutrients requirements, whatever they eat!
3) Short term - To supplement the
diets of people with nutrients which are as close as possible to those found in
food.
We know that
chemically-isolated vitamins and minerals present in standard supplements are
not as effective as those nutrients when presented to the body in food.
Why?
The human body has evolved over the
millennia with receptor sites designed to recognise the nutrients it needs for
survival. For many, many thousands of years these nutrients have been supplied
in food where they occur as a complex molecular structure incorporating many
other phytonutrients. The human body has evolved to survive by using nutrients
in this form. The past 70 or so years has seen the birth of cheap,
chemically-produced, isolated vitamins and minerals which have flooded the shop
shelves. Massive marketing campaigns have convinced the health-conscious public
that these nutrients are as good as those in food. But alas, this is far from
the truth.
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Nature knows
best
The most recent
scientific research has clearly identified that it is the total phytonutritive
nature of food which is beneficial to man, and not just single isolated
chemical vitamins or minerals. The discovery is most significant for mineral
nutrition. It has been found that the amino acid complex which naturally
surrounds minerals in nature is responsible for actively transporting that
mineral to sites of need within the body.
This discovery forms part of the Nobel prize winning submission by
Gunter Blobel on protein carriers as essential factors in protein transport
across cell membranes. Each nutrient is surrounded by many amino acids, each
having a different target location and carrying a different password which
directs them to the sites of need within the body, and which allows them to
cross the cell wall when cells are in need of the mineral being
carried.
Gone is the premise that
minerals floated around in the body waiting for a needy cell to pick them up!
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