I tend to believe that we get all the nutrients we need along with a great excess of calories, etc. from the typical diet. Are there nutrients that Americans, et al. lack in their diets? What are the symptoms? I ask because someone I know is trying to claim that I don’t get enough vitamins. I don’t think it’s the best in the world, but I am not dying of scurvy either.
Thanks,
Rob
In general, you should be getting enough nutrients in a typical diet. As you age, though, you may not metabolism them as well (doctors are talking about Vitamin D supplements these days, even though it’s readily available).
A multivitamin can help; megadoses are probably either useless or even dangerous.
It’s very debatable, but by some standards mild Vitamin D deficiency is fairly common in the US. I’ve seen estimates that ~40% of Americans have deficiency, as defined by blood concentrations below 20 ng/L. But it’s not at all clear that such mild deficiencies directly cause any significant health problems. More severe deficiencies definitely cause ricketts and contribute to osteoporosis; less severe deficiencies have been identified as risk factors for all sorts of diseases. At the same time, the research hasn’t shown that vitamin D supplementation has any benefit outside of a few specific situations.
Yes, Vit D deficiency is moderately common in Americans, some think due to overuse of sunscreen, but more staying in too much and not eating right.
Vegans sometimes have problems with not enough B12.
There’s considerable expert opinion on the subject, mostly suggesting that people eating a balanced diet do not need vitamin supplements.
Even if you eat a lot of junk food, it’s extremely unlikely you’d be at risk of classic vitamin deficiency diseases. Many food are vitamin-fortified, making the odds of such problems even tinier.
What continues to be debated are daily requirements (RDA) for some nutrients/vitamins for which there could possibly be subclinical problems associated with low intake (but which is still above the RDA). Magnesium and vitamin D are examples where better health and/or cancer prevention might be associated with greater intake than now recommended.
On the other hand, taking daily multivitamins and getting lots more of certain things than you need can either cause disease or possibly even result in a higher cancer risk (some early evidence suggests this for vitamins E and D in certain cases).
The thing is that nutrient deficiency can be chronic, and it can be acute. Acute deficiency, such as scurvy, is easy to diagnose because it presents with pronounced symptoms, such as your teeth falling out. You do regularly get Americans suffering from acute micronutrient deficiencies, but it’s not staggeringly common.
What is staggeringly common is chronic deficiency. These don’t present with pronounced symptoms. Instead, chronic calcium deficiency leads to early-onset osteoporosis, and chronic B-12 deficiency leads to mild mental retardation in children, and chronic Vitamin C defiency leads to increased susceptibility to various infetcions and cancers and so forth.
A 25 year old can be chronically micronutrient deficient right now, but without blood tests there is simply no way for anybody to tell. They will find out when they break their hip at 50 and wonder how the hell that happened. Or they might develop colon cancer at 45, and they will never know that it was caused by micronutrient deficiency.
The exact rate of micronutrient deficiency is a bit hard to pin down, but I’ve seen figures that suggest that 70% of Americans are suffering health effects from micronutrient deficiency at least once a year. The problem is that you can suffer potentially irreparable damage because your diet slips for a few months, and although the deficiency will correct itself when your diet improves, the damage is already done. That is even more true when talking about people under the age of 18.
That sort of short-term deficiency is hard to detect, but it does show up when you look at rates of certain diseases, especially cancer, between groups that go out of their way to ensure they eat fruit a continuously balanced diet, and people who eat a more erratic diet.
So to answer your questions:
Are there nutrients that Americans, et al. lack in their diets? Yes, without a doubt.
What are the symptoms? Cancer, osteoporosis, sub-optimal physical and mental performance and a whole host of other symptoms that you either can’t detect until it is to late, or can never detect at all unless you administer yourself a a battery of performance tests today and another one after eating a balanced diet for 12 months. It’s not like you can tell whether your are suffering from mental problems or lack o stamina compared to your optimum unless you actually measure both now and at your optimum.
+1
In dog forums, I often suggest a dog eating a dog food is getting a better diet than its owner. I am sure my dogs do. I have to wonder about those living largely on Coke and potato chips.
Yes, dogs should not be living on Coke and potato chips.
At my check-up last year, my doctor included a vitamin D test, and I was indeed low. I would say I’m outside significantly more than the average Canadian due to my walking and gardening habits, but we’re just too far north to get all the sun a human needs.
I’m taking my doctor’s recommended amount of vitamin D now.
Cite?
Cite?
I ask for the cites not to be argumentative or dismissive; I’m genuinely interested to know what’s been demonstrated.
I just had the exact same recommendation from my doctor. I was flabbergasted considering the quantity of D-enriched dairy products I consume. I’m going to ask her to check again in the summer.
My doctor tested me about two years ago, and I had low Vitamin D too. He said something like 80% of his patients did. Most of us are on 2000 IU/day now. Started at 1000 IU, but that didn’t get my levels up enough to make him happy.
-D/a
I live in the first world. 5 years ago I got scurvey (vitamin c deficiency). This was caused by a digestive disorder rather than not eating properly.
I remember a post on the dope a few years back where it was mentioned that some gentleman got scurvy in the US after his wife died and he stopped eating right.
Cite?
Cite?
I am genuinely interested in how you can dispel my profound skepticism as to these claims.
Puhleeze:rolleyes:
*Three-quarters of U.S. teens and adults are deficient in vitamin D, the so-called “sunshine vitamin” whose deficits are increasingly blamed for everything from cancer and heart disease to diabetes, according to new research.
*
That’s just Vit D.
I’m low on vitamin D as well. I assume it’s because I spend all day inside and don’t generally go outside except on Saturdays.
The thing that gets me though, is that my potassium is not low. It’s nonexistent. That’s what the lab results said, in my doctor’s handwriting. Every subsequent test on my blood confirms that my potassium just isn’t there and they try forever to get it up to a normal level to the point of IVs in the hospital before they release me, even though I was in there for a different reason entirely. Potassium burns like hell if administered without diluting it, so it takes forever.
What does “no potassium” do to a body over time? And how am I doing that? I don’t get it. I know I should be taking vitamins but I have a high gag reflex and I already take enough pills per day to the point where I just don’t want to take any more.
There are medical conditions that make the biological uptake of certain nutrients very difficult or impossible. For instance, my girlfriend has a chronically low iodine level. Her doctor has advised her to try to increase the protein in her diet to remedy this.
That might have been me. I remember reading that in my lower division nutrition text. The guy lived off of nothing but hamburgers, steak, and martinis. Went from doctor to doctor until one of them finally figured out that the poor bastard had scurvy.