Team Super C22
Vitamin C is at the top of its game! So, it’s appropriate that we included our Super C22 in March Madness week. Recent research shows that vitamin C is rapidly finding new applications in protecting against endothelial dysfunction, high blood pressure, and the blood vessel changes that precede heart disease. Additional research is discovering that vitamin C can be helpful in preventing asthma, protecting against cancer, and even supporting healthy blood sugar levels in diabetics.
Smart for the Heart
One of the most intensely studied areas of vitamin C benefits is that of cardiovascular health. Researchers are finding that vitamin C impacts several aspects of cardiac health, ranging from blood pressure to endothelial health. Vitamin C helps to prevent heart disease by preventing free radicals from damaging artery walls, which could lead to plaque formation. Vitamin C also keeps cholesterol in the bloodstream from oxidizing, another early symptom in the progression toward heart disease and stroke. It may help people who have marginal vitamin C status to obtain favorable blood cholesterol levels. High blood pressure may also improve in the presence of Vitamin C. All of these factors combined make vitamin C an inexpensive and easy way to lower your risk of heart disease and strokes.
Kicking Cancer Where it Counts
Exciting new research is showing that vitamin C supplementation may decrease the toxic effects of chemotherapy drugs (such as damage to heart tissue) and increase the anti-tumor activity of chemotherapy. Moreover, recent studies show that vitamin C may work together with other antioxidant and anti-inflammatory nutraceuticals to help fight cancer. It supports the body’s immune system, the first line of defense against cancer, and prevents certain cancer-causing compounds from forming in the body. Chronic supplementation with vitamin C might reduce the risk of actually developing cancer.
When Air Becomes Dense…C Makes Sense
Large, well-designed studies continue to show that vitamin C reduces the frequency and duration of the common cold. More serious respiratory illnesses also benefit from the antioxidant effects of vitamin C, particularly asthma. Research has shown that vitamin C improves asthmatic symptoms and lessens the body’s production of histamine, which contributes to inflammation. In one study, asthmatic children given an antioxidant supplement containing vitamin C had markedly decreased responses to environmental asthma triggers. In another study, vitamin C supplements reduced the amount of long-term inhaled corticosteroids needed by adults with asthma.
Sweet Victory
Human studies have now demonstrated that vitamin C supplements may help lower blood glucose levels in diabetics. Since insulin helps vitamin C, as well as glucose, get into cells, people with diabetes may not have enough vitamin C inside many of their cells. Just like glucose, vitamin C can’t do its work if it’s not inside of a cell. Supplementing vitamin C can force it into body cells, where it can protect against the many complications of diabetes, including lowering LDL “bad” cholesterol and protecting against damaging free radicals.
Join Team Super C22 so you, too, can be at the top of your game!