Vitamin C

Optimal dose 500-1,000 mg/day

Thanks to low carb diets, scurvy is starting to make a comeback. In a study done at the University of Arizona and published in the American Journal of Public Health, it was found that men and women aged 25 to 44 often fail to take in adequate amounts of vitamin C and are at high risk of getting scurvy. Because the disease is seldom considered by 21st century healthcare practitioners, people presenting with scurvy symptoms such as fatigue, limping, bleeding gums, or swollen extremities are often misdiagnosed and medicated for other disorders.

Vitamin C is well known as a critical nutrient, being important for proper immune, adrenal and antioxidant function. You should get at least 500 mg/day. To help encourage you to take it, too little vitamin C in the blood stream has been found to correlate with increased body fat and waist measurements. Nutrition researchers from Arizona State University report that the amount of vitamin C in the blood stream is directly related to fat oxidation — the body’s ability to use fat as a fuel source — during both exercise and at rest.

Vitamins C and E also help to prevent osteoporosis and vitamin C may protect against developing angina or strokes.

As an aside, vitamin C actually does make you less likely to catch a cold. In one study, people taking 500 mg of vitamin C a day had 18% fewer colds than those in the 50 mg/day group. Vitamin C also helps improve sperm count and motility, and can be helpful in treating male infertility.

More Information Online

Nutritional primer

We have a 20,000 word primer on nutrition at our website that provides more detail with study references on each nutrient. Click here to visit the "Vitamin C" section of our primer.