TOO MUCH SUGAR? TOO MUCH VITAMIN C?

I have been listening on the radio to a speaker discussing research on Vitamin C and other things. Firstly, the statement was made that if you ate  a,b,c,and d you were probably having a good diet. I wonder what that was based on?  Yet in reality it is said that your dietary input needs to be about 8700KJ with a balanced diet to guarantee an adequate intake. So your energy intake component is important. One mouthful of a,b,c,and d may not be adequate. (page 45, Let’s Talk Sugar). Weight control is important.

This speaker also quoted research with very high intakes of Vitamin C. In actual fact we know very little as to the consequences of this. Firstly we know that the concentration of Vitamin C is not the same in all body tissues, but is concentrated in parts of the adrenal gland, above the kidney, in some white cells and other tissues involved in aspects of the immune response. Once these are saturated, the remaining Vitamin C  is excreted. Can we train these tissues to hold more over time? We don’t know.

Vitamin C is an interesting substance. The best food sources are associated with high sugar foods, namely the fruits.

Vitamin C has the chemical structure of a 6 carbon sugar, as do glucose and fructose (page 68, Let’s Talk Sugar). There is some evidence that, at least in some circumstances, vitamin C competes with the other sugars for absorption into your body. That is, if you absorb more Vic C you might absorb less of the other sugars. And vice versa. That is, if you are on a very high sugar diet (a sugar junkie) you might absorb less Vitamin C. The consequences may be as described above and your immune competence may reflect this. On the other hand what is the consequence for a diabetic who absorbs more Vitamin C and less of the other sugars. Fascinating questions?

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