Free Radicals And Disease
The Tin Man in the Wizard of Oz corroded due to oxidation. We’re suffering much worse damage due to oxidative stress, and we need something other than an oil can to keep us in good repair!
We’ve all seen what oxidation does to a piece of metal . . corrosion and rust! Our bodies are under the same sort of stress. Even though oxygen is required for life, it may produce damaging by-products during normal cellular metabolism. These by-products are called free radicals.
The oxidation process is necessary, but it produces free radicals, oxidized molecules that are short of electrons. These molecules are unstable and agitated. They stay unstable and short of electrons until they steal new electrons to replace the missing ones. They roam around our bodies robbing electrons from our cells, even our most vital ones like electron-rich DNA.
When free radicals rob electrons away from our DNA it can no longer function properly. DNA keeps our genetic information and controls the reproduction of all new cells, including the cells that make up our organs, heart, brain and other tissues which are foundational to our health.
Left unchecked, free radicals may cause in excess of 50 health problems including abnormal development of new cells; damage to vision; faster aging of skin, organs, and bones; damage to heart and blood vessels; damage to the nervous system and brain cells; enzyme malfunction; cancer; and a weak immune system.
Several things increase our metabolic activity and consequently increase our body’s generation of free radicals:
- Strenuous physical activity
- Mental stress, depression, and recurring anxiety
- Toxic industrial chemicals in in what we eat, drink,and breath,
Our blood streams contain 300 – 500 toxins, the majority of which didn’t exist prior to the Second World War. This is regardless of what section of the country we live in. One researcher tested people around the U.S. and found that 100% of the people tested had 100% of the toxins tested for.
Our drinking water has been degraded by chemical fertilizer runoff, medicines flushed down our toilets, and pollution from manufacturing facilities.
Perhaps the best way to protect ourselves from free radical damage is eating foods high in antioxidants. Antioxidants easily give up electrons to “hungry” free radicals that are electron deficient. Antioxidants either bind to the free radicals and transform them into non-damaging compounds or by repairing cellular damage.
Antioxidants contained in what we eat include vitamin C, vitamin E, selenium, and the carotenoids. Our bodies can also produce antioxidants. However, the antioxidant content of our modern diet has been seriously decreased due to soil depletion, “green harvesting”, and modern farming techniques. Any antioxidant nutrients in fruits and vegetables that make it through our modern-day growth and harvesting methods then suffer due to the cooking, processing, preserving, and packaging common today.
Thus to ensure antioxidant protection it is necessary that we eat foods high in antioxidants and to include a reliable antioxidant supplement in our daily regimen. This pdf document, A comparative list of antioxidants, shows the free radical protection provided by each of 91 different antioxidant products based on their ORACo value. ORAC is an acronym for Oxygen Radical Absorption Capacity. The original ORAC assay was a measurement for only water-soluble antioxidant activity. ORACo assays both fat and water-soluble antioxidant activity.