7 Ingredients to Avoid in your Supplements
1) Silicon Dioxide:
Silicon dioxide (SiO2), also known as silica, is a natural compound made of two of the earth’s most abundant materials: silicon (Si) and oxygen (O2). Found naturally in many plants, silicon dioxide is also added to many foods and supplements as an anticaking agent to avoid clumping. As with many food additives, consumers often have concerns about silicon dioxide as an additive. There isn’t yet evidence to suggest it’s dangerous to ingest as a food additive.
However, it’s best to be cautious with food additives as even minor changes in levels of minerals can have a profound effect on healthy functioning. A good approach is to eat whole foods and avoid synthetic additives.
2) Maltodextrin (from genetically modified corn)
If you pick up a natural product and the ingredients list says “maltodextrin,” chances are very high that the maltodextrin in the product is derived from genetically modified corn.
Virtually all the maltodextrin used throughout the natural products industry is genetically modified. Look for tapioca maltodextrin instead (or no maltodextrin at all).
3) Vitamin C:
Vitamin C is typically called “ascorbic acid”. Nearly all the ascorbic acid included in vitamins across America right now is derived from GM corn.
The best way to add vitamin to your diet is to let your body naturally absorb from whole foods.
4) Inorganic minerals in cheap vitamins:
Would you eat iron filings from scrap metal and call it nutrition? Or just ground-up seashells for calcium? The majority of people don’t know that most of the cheap vitamins sold today are made with synthetic inorganic minerals. “Scrap metal,” almost.
The No. 1 best source for all minerals is, not surprisingly, fresh plants. If you really want to boost your minerals, feed ’em to sprouts or garden plants, then eat or juice those plants. Your body wants “organic” minerals from plants, not inorganic minerals from rocks.
5) Synthetic colors:
Synthetic Color is labelled with FD&C followed by a number, such as FD&C Yellow #6. They are added to offset color loss due to exposure to light, air, temperature, moisture and storage conditions. But do we really care if our vitamin pill has a lovely shade of red? Especially considering the FDA itself has “probed” into the connection between artificial food dyes and children’s behavior. After all, artificial colors in your vitamins serve no function other than making food look more “fun”, or even worse, cover up the fact that the active ingredients in the vitamin has been degraded by exposure to light, air, moisture, heat, or poor storage conditions. Additionally, European lawmakers now require a warning label on foods that contain artificial dyes.
6) Hydrogenated oils:
Here you thought you were avoiding hydrogenated fats by passing on the margarine. Did you know that your dietary supplement may also have these little toxic nasties? The CDC posted in 2014 that “Consuming trans fat contributes to the leading cause of death in the U.S. – coronary heart disease (CHD)” So why does the FDA allow these dangerous ingredients in your supplements? They’re cheap fillers. People still have this idea that bigger is better. Until we realize that smaller can be just as good, manufacturers will use cheap nasty fillers to give us bigger horse sized pills.
7) Titanium Dioxide:
Titanium dioxide is yet another one of the nasty and dangerous ingredients in your vitamins or supplements; it is used as a colorant Titanium dioxide has also been implicated in immune system function, with some studies showing DNA damage by Titanium dioxide nanoparticles, albeit marginal damage. Just a wee bit of DNA damage with your vitamins.Taken internally, it has been shown to cause kidney damage in mice[16] and to induce small intestine inflammation. This is scary considering how many people suffering from Chrohn’s and gluten sensitivity are probably taking supplements containing Titanium dioxide.
Yet again, our health is risked so our vitamins can be a pretty color. Very disturbing. Avoid it.
kellyl, you have misunderstood the nature of chemical substances! NaCl (Sodium Chloride) is what we commonly refer to as table salt yet to say that if you break it up into the components (which is Sodium and Chloride) as a way to determine whether something is safe or not is erroneous. The actual compound is what you look at. In this case silicon dioxide. I certainly wouldn’t want to be consuming silicon dioxide! There are numerous substances that are completely unnecessary in our supplements. Whatever the FDA says is also a joke. I won’t even go there considering they like to label many things as “generally recognized as safe” while in Europe the equivalent substances are banned from foods! And the last 3 years have definitely shown the FDA’s motives to be very questionable in all matters where they have deemed things to be ‘safe’!
Thank y’all for the information.I was looking to get some rotisserie chicken and 1 of the ingredients was silicon dioxide (SiO2). With what I’ve read, I’m still not sure if safe to eat.
Nice. Informative, to the point, and helpful.
Jasper’s concerns are funny. Silicon dioxide is silicon and oxygen — neither are dangerous. Cellulose — better stop eating all vegetables, as cellulose is in all of them. And magnesium stearate has repeatedly been found safe in studies.
The sky isn’t falling.
Thank you for this information. We only want organic health. Blessings!