How to know what vitamins are best for you

Most supplements on the shelves of health food stores, pharmacies and supermarkets contain "vitamins" which are chemicals produced by humans and "minerals" that are crushed rocks or minerals.

For example, most of the "vitamin C" sold in the United 
States is ascorbic acid. This is a chemical produced by humans found nowhere in nature. There is no ascorbic acid in orange, tomato or broccoli, or any fresh fruit or vegetable.

Ascorbic acid is produced in chemical plants by application of heat and pressure and additional chemicals for the glucose (sugar), which converts glucose to ascorbic acid. Not exactly like drinking orange juice, is it?

Ascorbic acid, which is a chemical, is not absorbed or utilized in the same way as food, and can often upset the stomach and gastrointestinal tract, as it is an acid.
Vitamin C as found in nature is not acid - it is neutral! Acidic taste in oranges and other citrus fruits is caused by their citric acid content.

Some companies will combine ascorbic acid with other chemicals to "buffer" it (make it less acidic). This results in a "sodium ascorbate" or forms of ascorbic acid "calcium ascorbate."
The key is that these forms of "Vitamin C" as well as most other "vitamins" that you find on store shelves, are chemicals made by humans. They are not like the real vitamins from fresh fruit, vegetables and meat.

Now, let's take a look at the "minerals" that are available on store shelves. For example, 70% of calcium supplements "" sold in the United States is calcium carbonate. This is factually finely ground limestone, shells or coral.

Only 4-7% calcium carbonate taken as a supplement is actually absorbed by the body. Calcium carbonate is sometimes combined with other chemicals to try to improve this very poor absorption.

Whatever the number of different chemical forms of calcium carbonate can change, none of them are the same as the calcium found in cabbage. Not at all!
These artificial chemical vitamins and crushed rocks and minerals are called "USP" vitamins and minerals. (USP means United States Pharmacopeia, which is a set of standards of these vitamins and minerals are measured.)

You can also find vitamins and minerals that are labeled "based foods." These are the vitamins and minerals that have been physically mixed with alfalfa or soybeans or other USP foods.

This mixing is performed with food in an attempt to increase the absorption of these chemicals and crushed rock in the body. This is why you often see "take with food" on their labels.

Sometimes those based on "food" products will be labeled "organic". This simply means that alfalfa or soybean USP chemicals were mixed with experienced organic growth.
Today you can find vitamins and minerals dissolved in liquid form. If the product is made with vitamins and minerals USP, you're just pumping chemicals manufactured by the man in your body.

When you place a cabbage plant in the ground, roots grow in soil and rocks, and they pull up ground calcium and other minerals in a form that you and I can not eat.

Then, through the process of the normal life of the plant, it converts these mineral in a body part of the plant itself. Now, calcium has in fact become a food we eat, our body knows how to absorb and use.

To be efficiently absorbed and utilized, vitamins and minerals should be as they are in foods.

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