What is osteoporosis?
There are three issues of importance concerning osteoporosis. 1. What is it? 2. What causes it? 3. What can be done to prevent it?
1st. What is osteoporosis?
Your bones are made up of a number of elements. The two most prevalent minerals in bones and teeth are calcium and phosphorus. Which are deposited into a protein rich material to form the structure of bone. Calcium is lost from the structure of the bones for various reasons. It literally leaves the bones overtime If a sufficient amount is lost, the bones become porous and brittle and can break with the least provocation. A sneeze can break a RIB. Going over a bumpy road can cause hip fractures. Even a friendly hug can cause the bone to break. So fragile do they become if sufficient calcium is lost. Think of a plank of wood. Strong when, solid but if worn or eaten, you can break it by barely tapping it. So it is with bones deficient in calcium. It is as if they were worm eaten.
Osteoporosis. Is an extremely serious problem for a great number of people. Between 15 and 20 million people are affected by it in the United States. Some 15,000 people die from hip fractures alone each year. Osteoporosis has become a $4 billion industry in the United States. The calcium supplement pushers are in heaven. Practically out of the clear blue sky comes the windfall of millions of women who have been whipped into a frenzy of fear, clamouring for calcium. All of a sudden, calcium supplementation is the latest selling tool for products. It used to be the “new and improved”. Now it’s with “calcium added” Magic words to make the cash registers ring. You can get antacid with calcium. Laxatives with calcium. And soft drinks with calcium. And bread with calcium. Cereals with calcium. Flour with calcium. Vitamins pills with calcium. I’m waiting for one of those car salesman who come on television screaming hurry on down to take advantage of these prices. To coincide with. And the first 500 people to buy a car this weekend will get a sack of powdered calcium thrown in. As you will see shortly, these calcium supplements do more harm than good.
What causes osteoporosis? As is true with many other afflictions, there is no one cause. There are many variables that together Contribute To the end result Of. Impairment, and so it is. With osteoporosis. It would be just grand. If osteoporosis. Could be avoided by one simple measure. Such as adding calcium to the diet. Although on the surface that would seem to be just the solution. It’s not. In fact, studies have shown quite clearly. That so long as the factors that cause calcium loss from the bones continued. Even very high doses of calcium. Calcium Supplements have no benefit. Think about it. A multimillion dollar industry pushing calcium supplements, .When, the evidence Is already in.. In fact they hurt. Most of these supplements are cooked. Bone meal. Or dolomite. And many contain harmful. Amounts of lead. arsenic. and other toxic metals.
The body’s need for calcium. Is filled quite easily. Believe it or not. A lot more easily than people realise. Once that need is met, that’s it .adding more doesn’t help. If you have an 8 oz glass and the full jug of juice. Once you filled the glass to the brim it won’t take anymore. That’s it. No exceptions if you continue to pour the juice into the full glass, it will only spill onto the floor and be wasted. That old Saying. If a little is good, a lot must be better. Is a bunch of rubbish. Yes, it would seem to be so and that seemingly apparent formula is precisely what the supplement pushers used to get you to load up your body with more calcium than it can possibly use. But unlike the spilled juice. Which is just lost or cleaned up. The excess calcium in the body has some very serious consequences. It’s been shown that when calcium is lost from the bones, it is not just eliminated from the body. This calcium in The body is picked up by the blood and deposited in the soft tissues, The blood vessels. Skin. Eyes. Joints. And internal organs. Calcium combined with fat and cholesterol in the Blood vessels to cause hardening of the arteries. The calcium that ends up in the skin causes wrinkling. In the joints it crystallises and forms very painful arthritic deposits. In the eyes, it takes the form of cataracts. And in the kidneys, it forms hard deposits known as kidney stones. So don’t think that taking extra calcium is an Innocent precaution. It’s not. It’s disease producing.
So what does create the problem of osteoporosis? Several influences are to blame.
Tobacco. This does not surprise me at the least, considering that tobacco so negatively affect so many other aspects of health. Why should it be different in this case? You see, one of the crucial roles calcium fulfils is to maintain a proper acid alkaline balance. In the body. Minerals including calcium are needed to neutralise excess acid. Smoking is an exceedingly Acid producing habit. It is so important for the integrity of the body that this acid be neutralised. That calcium is actually drained from the bones and teeth to meet this need.
Alcohol. Alcohol impairs calcium absorption by affecting the liver’s ability to activate vitamin D. Vitamin D is important in the metabolism of calcium. The more alcohol you drink, the more you hinder your body’s ability to build up and maintain healthy bones.
Caffeine. This drug found in coffee, tea, soft drinks, chocolate and many other over the counter drugs. Causes twice as much calcium to be excreted.( So eliminated. From the body). As normal. This has been demonstrated in several studies.
Soft drinks. The culprit here is phosphoric acid added to many soft drinks to keep bubbles from going flat. It is made by treating phosphorus with sulfuric acid. Does that sound like something you’d like to have come in contact with the sensitive lining of your stomach? Sulfuric acid. Yum. Just another little caustic something brought to you by your friendly, concerned, caring soft drink manufacturer. It is important to understand that calcium does not act on its own in the body. The body uses calcium in concert with other minerals. Phosphorus. Plays a vital role. There should be a 2 to one ratio of calcium over phosphorus taken into the body. High phosphorus diets cause a substantial rise in the level of phosphorus in the blood. In an effort to maintain the proper ratio of calcium to phosphorus in the blood. The body responds by removing Calcium from the bones and releasing it into the bloodstream. If calcium did not buffer the excess phosphorus the subsequent acid level in the blood would place one’s life in danger. In addition to soft drinks guess what two other food groups have the most phosphorus. Right. Meat and dairy products. In fact, Made has 20 times more phosphorus than calcium. Good old animal products. Cheeseburger anyone?
Salt. This acid substance is often a principle constitute of animal products. To say nothing of the tonnes of it we add to our own food. and /or. Have added for us, by the food processors. In one journal I found the perfect statement. The equation is a simple one. The most sodium. (salt) You take in the more calcium you excrete.
Antacids. Some antacids contain aluminium. Which causes an increase in calcium excretion. Those who are popping these relief agents throughout the day should be aware that they are causing a further calcium deficit. Also. Hydrochloric acid helps absorb calcium in the stomach and antacids neutralise Hydrochloric acid. There’s another good reason to start combining your foods properly.
Insufficient exercise. It has clearly been shown that exercise increases bone mass. Well, lack of exercise causes bone loss. On this there is no question. And many studies prove this to be the case. Exercise will even rebuild bones already affected by a loss of calcium. Bones are alive and react to exercise just as muscles do they become stronger. Exercise and activity exert pressure. upon the skeleton and that in turn stimulates the formation of new bone.
Lack of sunshine.. Vitamin D plays an extremely important role in Bone Metabolism. Since the best source of vitamin D is sunshine. It doesn’t take a lot to figure out. That getting a little sun each day or so , surely couldn’t hurt your chances. Of preventing osteoporosis.
The number one cause of osteoporosis.
Now we come to the last cause of osteoporosis. The major cause? Far and away more hurtful than any of those mentioned. So far this is truly the knockout punch. The crowning insult. The Coupe de Grace, the death blow. Have you figured it out yet? Yes, it’s the Hubinger of disease, animal products. Had the people of this country not being so. Harassed. Scared. Bullied. Threatened. Bulldozed. Coerced. Into gorge in their bodies with hugely excessive amounts of protein from animal sources over the last century the last part of this chapter would not be necessary because you would never even have heard of osteoporosis. Flesh foods and dairy products are the main reasons you do know what it is.
Because Of propaganda fuelled by commercial interests. We humans, Simply consuming. far more protein than our bodies require and anyone who has taken the time to look at the research on the subject knows this to be true. Right now. The World Health Organisations suggested minimum daily protein requirement is approximately 40 grammes a day. The RDA is about 55 grammes today. On an average a person is now taking over 100 grammes a day. The shocker is that it’s been shown that we can fare very, very well indeed on less than 30 grammes a day. The World Health Organisation and, RDA. Recognise this too. But they nearly doubled the figure to add a margin of safety. The margin of safety adds about 30 to 50%. To our real needs to compensate for any possible needs that some May have for more protein. This is then doubled and the result is that everyone is told to consume more than twice the protein actually needed by the body. It has been proven that’s far less protein is necessary to sustain life. And it is quite simple to verify.
Unfortunately. The idea that we need so much more protein is based on tests. Conducted 3/4 of a century ago on rats. These same tests long since disproved are still the basis for today’s ridiculously high recommendations. When weight is taken into consideration, an adult rat requires 3 1/2 times more protein than an adult human. The protein concentration in the breast milk which is only 2% protein. We are not rats. That notwithstanding we are admonished to stuff ourselves with much more protein than we need every day. And of course, we are led to believe that animal products are the best source of protein. When it Has been demonstrated over and over again that a diet totally devoid of animal products can supply us with all we need. Here is the killer. I do mean killer. What do you think happens to all the excess protein? First, it is broken down into amino acids. Some of which are metabolised. In the liver and excrete it through the kidneys as the urea. With the urea and amino acids excreted into urine go large amounts of minerals. One of the minerals lost is calcium.
Studies show that the more protein you consume, the more calcium you lose.
2 great books to read. I by Doctor McDougall. And the names are.
McDougall’s plan and McDougall’s medicine.