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http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/1241
Folic Acid Supplements are a Health Hazard, John McDougall, MD:
Murray 2005.11.01

http://www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2005nl/oct/051000folic.htm

The McDougall Newsletter, October 2005, Vol. 4, No. 10

Folic Acid Supplements are a Health Hazard

Stop Folic Acid Pills Now
Limit Your Intake of Fortified Flour Products (in the USA)
Don't Lower Your Homocysteine Levels with Supplements

Taking supplements with as little as 0.8 mg/day of folic acid
has been shown to increase your risk of dying of heart disease and cancer,
according to the results of the first large randomized treatment trial
to carefully examine this issue. 1  [ 0.8 mg = 800 micrograms ]

The Norwegian Vitamin Trial (NORVIT) of 3,749 patients,
who were followed for 3.5 years was designed to show the benefits of
taking supplements - but the results were contrary to expectations.

Folic acid supplementation was found to lower homocysteine levels
by 28%., but to increase relative risks of heart attack, stroke, and death
by 20%, along with a more than a 30% increase in cancer.
Those with the highest baseline homocysteine levels (13 umol/L or greater)
suffered the most harm from taking supplements of folic acid.

Homocysteine Is Only a Risk Factor

Elevated levels of the amino acid homocysteine, found with a blood test,
have been associated with many common diseases, including heart disease,
strokes, venous thrombosis, dementia, and Alzheimer's disease.
The commonly made, but incorrect, assumption is that these diseases are
caused by elevated homocysteine in the body and
the solution is to give medications (vitamin pills) to fix the problem.

However, homocysteine is not the problem.
Elevated homocysteine is only a sign that the body is becoming diseased
and at risk of a tragedy.  We call this type of sign a "risk factor" -
it predicts future risk, but it is not a disease in itself  -
no one dies of an elevated homocysteine level -
most commonly, clogged heart arteries are the actual cause of death
for those people showing this sign.

So what is the real meaning of this risk factor?

Homocysteine levels increase when people eat more meat and
fewer vegetables. These same dietary habits cause other signs
(risk factors) - indicating a higher chance of death and disability - to
rise;
like cholesterol, triglycerides, uric acid, blood sugar, lipoprotein a,
C-reactive protein, blood pressure, and body weight.
Fortunately, correcting the poor diet heals the underlying disease,
and at the same time the risk factors show improvement.

Folic Acid Supplements Overload the Body

Consuming more than 0.2 mg of folic acid daily floods the bloodstream
with this vitamin, overloading the metabolic capacities of the body,
causing imbalances that increase the risk of heart disease and cancer. 2

Folic acid is a synthetic version of the natural vitamin, folate,
found in plant foods.  Folate from food is essential for good health.

Folic acid sold in capsules is a medication at best and a toxin at worst.
When given in doses of 0.8 mg it will lower homocysteine by about 30%
(3 to 4 umol/L). 3  Higher doses then 0.08 mg have no greater benefit
for lowering blood levels of homocysteine.

Folic Acid Mandated for U.S. Cereal Products

January 1998 was the mandatory deadline for the fortification of
grain products with folic acid in the United States.
Folic acid was added to flours used to make bread, rolls, and crackers.
Another hefty source of this supplement comes from enriched
(vitamin-added) "ready-to-eat cereals."

Since 1998, folic acid intake has increased significantly in every segment
of the U.S. population with the average additional intake of 0.22 mg/day.
3,4
Remember, as little is 0.2 mg causes overloads and imbalances
with an increased risk of illness.
A significant segment of the USA population is now consuming
over 1 mg/day of folic acid daily - an amount found by the NORVIT study
to increase the risk of heart disease and cancer.

Doctors Harm Patients with Supplements

Cardiologists are fond of recommending vitamin pills to treat elevated
homocysteine in hopes of preventing further heart disease in their patients.
One of the most commonly prescribed preparations is called Foltx  -
a combination of 2.5 mg of folic Acid, 25 mg of vitamin B6, and
2 mg of vitamin B12.  A recent study showed a similar preparation
reduced the homocysteine levels of patients with a history of stroke
by 2 units (umol/L), but found no difference in risk of future strokes,
heart attacks, or death compared to a control group. 5

Another recent study showing folic acid actually causes the heart arteries
to close should cause doctors to mend their prescribing practices.
After six months of supplementation in 636 heart patients with stents
(stents are wire-mesh supports placed in the coronary arteries during
angioplasty), the Folate After Coronary Intervention Trial found those
patients taking folic acid had significantly more narrowing of the arteries,
more artery closure (restenosis), and more major adverse cardiac events
compared to those taking placebo - the exact opposite of what investigators
had expected to find. 6,7  As expected, the homocysteine blood levels
were reduced by the above treatment.  The authors recommended that the
routine administration of folate treatment not be advocated at the present
time.

Even with all this condemning evidence, you can easily find experts
(many working with vitamin companies) trying to convince the unaware buyer
that high-dose folic acid supplementation - as much as 5 mg/day -
will be good for their heart and blood vessels. 8

Appropriate Response to Homocysteine in Your Blood

The main motivation behind fortification of flours and taking supplemental
vitamins has been to reduce the occurrence of serious birth defects,
especially the occurrence of neural tube defects (NTDs).
The effort seems to be working a little - since the onset of fortification
there has been a 19% decrease in the incidence of NTDs.
Unfortunately, these same widespread recommendations to take folic acid
may be causing more heart disease and cancer.  So, what to do?

All that money and effort now spent on supplementation with the hope
of reducing birth defects, heart disease, and cancer should be directed
towards educational programs to teach people to eat more legumes,
vegetables, and fruits - the plentiful and safe sources of folic acid.
(The name folic comes from the word foliage, which refers to plants.)
When packaged in the plant, folic acid is never harmful and always
beneficial.
Further efforts should be made towards making sure all people have ready
access to plant-foods.

Because of the overwhelming evidence that the vitamin supplements people
are buying are a serious health hazard, I propose these products be labeled
with bold warnings like:
"Taking Vitamin E can raise your risk of dying,"
"Vitamin A (retinol) can damage your bones and cause birth defects,"
"Beta carotene may raise your risk of cancer," and
"Folic acid causes heart disease."

All supplement packages should also tell people that vitamins and other
nutrients are best obtained from healthy vegetable foods.
For more information on the hazards of supplementation,
please read from my newsletter archives the following:

August 2003: Plants, not Pills, for Vitamins and Minerals:
www.nealhendrickson.com/mcdougall/030800puvitaminsandminerals.htm

November 2004: Vitamins Do Not Prevent Cancer and May Increase
Likelihood of Death: How Supplements Can Make You Sicker
www.nealhendrickson.com/mcdougall/2004nl/041100pufavorite5.htm

July 2005: Neither Aspirin Nor Vitamin E Will Save Women
www.drmcdougall.com/misc/2005nl/july/050700fav5.htm

February 2004:  Treating Homocysteine with Vitamins Fails
www.nealhendrickson.com/mcdougall/040200pufavorite5.htm

References:

1)  Bonaa KH. NORVIT: Randomized trial of homocysteine-lowering
with B-vitamins for secondary prevention of cardiovascular disease
after acute myocardial infarction.
Program and Abstracts from the
European Society of Cardiology Congress 2005;
September 3-7, 2005; Stockholm, Sweden. Hot Line II.

2)  Quinlivan EP, Gregory JF 3rd. Effect of food fortification on folic acid
intake in the United States.  Am J Clin Nutr. 2003 Jan; 77(1): 221-5.

3)  Homocysteine Lowering Trailists Collaboration. Dose-dependent
effects of folic acid on blood concentrations of homocysteine:
a meta-analysis of the randomized trials.
Am J Clin Nutr. 2005 Oct; 82(4): 806-812.

4) Choumenkovitch SF, Selhub J, Wilson PW, Rader JI,
Rosenberg IH, Jacques PF.
Folic acid intake from fortification in United States exceeds predictions.
J Nutr. 2002 Sep; 132(9): 2792-8.

5) Toole JF .  Lowering homocysteine in patients with ischemic stroke
to prevent recurrent stroke, myocardial infarction, and death:
the Vitamin Intervention for Stroke Prevention (VISP)
randomized controlled trial.  JAMA. 2004 Feb 4; 291(5): 565-75.

6) Lange H.
Folate After Coronary Intervention Trial" (FACIT).
www.accitalia.it/congress_centre/meeting_int/detail.asp?acr_trial=FACIT
Lange H.
The folate after coronary intervention trial (FACIT).
Scientific presentation at the 52nd Annual Scientific Sessions
of the American College of Cardiology, Chicago, March 30th, 2003.

7)  Schnyder G, Roffi M, Flammer Y, et al.
Effects of homocysteine-lowering therapy on restenosis
after percutaneous coronary intervention for narrowings
in small coronary arteries. Am J Cardiol 2003; 91: 1265-1269.

8) LifeExtension:
www.lef.org/magazine/mag2005/mar2005_report_folic
_01.htm?source=Google&key=folic_acid_supplements&WT.srch=1

You may subscribe to this free McDougall Newsletter at
www.drmcdougall.com

Newsletter archive

2005 John McDougall All Rights Reserved
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Tuesday, November 1, 2005

Any unsuspected source of methanol, which the body always quickly and
largely turns into formaldehyde and then formic acid, must be monitored,
especially for high responsibility occupations, often with night shifts,
such as pilots and nuclear reactor operators.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/1237
ubiquitous potent uncontrolled co-factors in nutrition research are
formaldehyde from wood and tobacco smoke and many sources, including
from methanol in dark wines and liquors, in pectins in fruits and
vegetables, and in aspartame: Murray 2005.10.26

As a medical layman, I suggest that evidence mandates immediate exploration
of the role of these ubiquitious, potent formaldehyde sources as co-factors
in epidemiology, research, diagnosis, and treatment in a wide variety of
disorders.

Folic acid, from fruits and vegetables, plays a role by powerfully
protecting against methanol (formaldehyde) toxicity.
Supplements are proven to be very unsafe sources.

Many common drugs, such as aspirin, interfere with folic acid,
as do some mutations in relevant enzymes.

The majority of aspartame reactors are female.

In mutual service, Rich Murray
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Rich Murray, MA Room For All rmforall@comcast.net
505-501-2298 1943 Otowi Road Santa Fe, New Mexico 87505

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/messages
group with 146 members, 1,241 posts in a public, searchable archive
http://RoomForAll.blogspot.com

Dark wines and liquors, as well as aspartame, provide
similar levels of methanol, above 100 mg daily, for
long-term heavy users, 2 L daily, about 6 cans.

Methanol is inevitably largely turned into formaldehyde,
and thence largely into formic acid.
It is the major cause of the dreaded symptoms of "next
morning" hangover.

Fully 11% of aspartame is methanol -- 1,120 mg aspartame
in 2 L diet soda, almost six 12-oz cans, gives 123 mg
methanol (wood alcohol). If 30% of the methanol is turned
into formaldehyde, the amount of formaldehyde, 37 mg,
is 18.5 times the USA EPA limit for daily formaldehyde in
drinking water, 2.0 mg in 2 L average daily drinking water.
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http://www.vrg.org/  The Vegetarian Resource Group   vrg@vrg.org

http://www.vegsource.com  extensive vegan information

http://www.drmcdougall.com    practical, delicious healthy diet guidance

http://www.vegsource.com/articles/kradjian_milk.htm
Robert Kradjian MD Discusses Milk

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/aspartameNM/message/971
Joel Fuhrman critique of Atkins diet in "Eat To Live":
Murray 2003.03.01 rmforall

http://www.hyp.ac.uk/cash/index.htm
Consensus Action on Salt and Health

What Rich Murray eats:

Avoid all products with aspartame and MSG.
Substitute stevia (at health food stores).

Gradually reduce alcohol, caffeine (coffee, cocoa, and teas), meat, fish,
eggs, milk, butter, and cheese,  hydrogenated oils, trans fats, white bread,
food additives and colors, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, fluoride, city
water, salt and sodium (  < 1,000 mg daily ).

Enjoy organic rice, potatoes, vegetables, fruits, beans, garlic, tumeric,
with modest use of soy products, walnuts, almonds, flax seeds,
almond butter, sprouted grain breads, flax seed and olive oils, chili sauce,
4-8 1,000 mg fish oil capsules,
and fill your jugs with deionized or distilled water.
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