Let Food Be Your Medicine

By : | Comments Off on Let Food Be Your Medicine | On : September 26, 2012 | Category : General Information

Ingredients for Stewed Bell Peppers

“Let food be your medicine. Your medicine shall be your food.”

Hippocrates

Dietary supplements; vitamins, minerals and herbs is a $30 billion per year virtually unregulated industry in the United States. It is a great example of deregulation at its worst.

Vitamins, minerals and herbs are natural, in some cases essential and should be good for you. But what most people have forgotten is that vitamin suppliants have been around less than 100 years. Up until the 1900’s, people obtained vitamins and minerals from food and lived healthy lives. In some cases into their 80s or 90s without taking a single supplement.

One reason for the exponential growth of dietary supplements is the poor diet many Americans eat that is truly vitamin and mineral deficient. Fresh fruits and vegetables have been replaced with highly processed and refined foods. To make for the vitamins and minerals stripped from whole foods manufacturers “enrich” products like flour, milk, and breakfast cereals. But adding nutrients back into foods isn’t the same as eating natural whole foods. You do obtain essential vitamins and minerals but from a refined product like enriched wheat flour which is another name for white flour.

If your diet is high in fruits and vegetables and low in meat and processed foods you are probably geting all the vitamins and minerals you need.