CHOLESTEROL CONTROVERSY
Posted by admin on Friday, February 27th, 2009
Though wearing your heart on your sleeve isn’t usually
considered beneficial, if we could actually do it we would
be able to take a close look at its condition every day.
Head off heart disease by nurturing the most discussed but
least appreciated organ that symbolizes love and caring.
More of us die from broken heart than any other ailment.
Although we know that heart disease is the leading cause of
death in Canadians over 45, few of us have questioned the
conventional ways that we try to combat it. Sure, we’ve been
told about healthy habits to reduce the risks – by losing
weight, reducing red meat consumption and avoiding stress.
But physicians continue to prescribe cholesterol-lowering
(statin) drugs, calcium beta-blockers and high blood
pressure medications to millions of Canadians, with side
effects that outweigh benefits.
But there are more natural and sensible ways to strengthen
our heart. In fact, one of the greatest scientific minds of
the 20th century, Linus Pauling, Ph.D., said that doctors
have got it all wrong.
Every year half a million people die from coronary heart
disease. In a recentCNN article discussing a new study
based on the data from the Framingham study concludes: The
study “reaffirms the notion that coronary heart disease is
the 800-pound gorilla of disease in this country, now and
for the foreseeable future,” says cardiologist Dr. Stuart
Seides. Heart attacks were virtually unknown before the
turn of the century. Our diets, especially in “developed”
countries have gone through dramatic changes in this period.
There is a very real connection between this new disease
and our new diets.
Dr. Pauling, a two-time Nobel Prize Laureate and recipient
of over 40 honourary degrees, stressed that it isn’t
cholesterol or even fatty foods that cause heart troubles;
he was convinced it is caused by malnutrition. Instead of
medications, Dr. Pauling believed strongly in curing heart
disease with vitamin supplements. But even though millions
of lives could be saved annually by simply taking a few
common, inexpensive vitamins, the medical industry would
have little incentive to prescribe them.
Linus Pauling himself ingested 18,000 mg daily of vitamin C
daily in order to approximate the tissue levels of an
animal of his body weight.
The few species which include humans, that do
not make their own vitamin C suffer a condition called
atherosclerosis, where white plaques narrow the arteries.
This disease has been misnamed
“heart disease” because it often leads to a heart
attack. The disease is not prevalent in species that
make their own Vitamin C
Vitamin C is required for tissue integrity. Tissues that
are under constant stress are particularly vulnerable to
degradation from C deficiency. This is certainly true of
our arteries.
Shortly before his death at 93, Linus Pauling and Matthias
Rath had completed work on the link between atherosclerosis
and Vitamin C (please see the link in the side bar). They
had concluded that chronic Vitamin C deficiency lead to a
serious compromising of our arterial system. Our bodies
respond to this situation with a healing process.
According to Pauling, vitamin C prevents illness due to its
role in manufacturing collagen, the protein that helps make
the walls of blood vessels. He was convinced that vitamin C
can help prevent cardiovascular disease by reversing damage
done to blood vessels. Vitamin C’s link to healthy blood
vessels is supported by scurvy studies. It causes collagen
breakdown, resulting in ruptured blood vessels, so victims
bleed to death.
A great misfortune of human evolution, Dr. Pauling stated,
was when our ancestors’ bodies lost their ability to
manufacture vitamin C , discarded when we had a steady
supply of fresh-picked fruits and vegetables. Ever since
humans migrated away from the tropics, we’ve suffered
deficiencies (vitamin C begins to quickly deteriorate as
soon as fruits and veggies are picked.
When arteries are compromised, our systems produce a
specialized, sticky form of low-density lipoprotein- called
Lp(a) which attaches itself to the arterial wall to prevent
blood seepage. This is consistent with where arterial
plaque is found – where there are lesions and where there is
particular stress (i.e. at branches, in arteries, not veins,
due to the pressure and in coronary arteries due to the
stress of the constant motion).
Heart disease is a misnomer because there is no
malfunction of the heart. The underlying disease process is
characterized
by scab-like build-ups that adhere to the walls of blood
vessels. As thearteries narrow, the blood supply to the
heart and the other organs is reduced, resulting in
angina (“heart cramp”), heart attack and/or stroke.
The more correct terminology is chronic scurvy, a sub
clinical (difficult to detect) form of the classic
vitamin C deficiency disease scurvy.
In this lectures, Pauling discussed vitamin C’s connection
with lipoprotein (a), a substance linked to cardiovascular
disease and a major part of plaque found in blood vessels of
atherosclerosis patients. Certain fats in the blood have the
ability to plug the leaks caused by lack of vitamin C by
forming a kind of plaster (plaque). These are cholesterol,
lipids, and lipoprotein (a). He claimed that lipoprotein (a)
tries to strengthen blood vessels walls by coating them if
there isn’t adequate vitamin C in the diet. He felt
lipoprotein (a) was more of a factor in heart disease than
cholesterol, which is a secondary tool used by the body to
coat the cracks and fissures in the walls. This sticky
cholesterol is a special kind of cholesterol made in our
livers and not the cholesterol we get from fatty foods.
Again, all plaque in the arteries is laid down as temporary
repair material for damaged blood vessels. This happens only
when the body is malnourished. The coating, however, narrows
arteries, eventually causing blockages – and heart attacks
and strokes. None of today’s heart drugs lower lipoprotein
(a) levels.
Dr. Pauling created a formula for halting these effects.
His therapy included megadoses of vitamin C, of course, but
it also included supportive B vitamins including vitamin B3
(niacin) which also lowers lipoprotein (a), and vitamin B6,
B12, and folic acid. Key amino acids l-Lysine and L-proline,
vitamin A and E, magnesium, selenium and omega-3 oils were
also added. He was adamant that this simple formula could
stop and even reverse the majority of cardiovascular disease
cases. He practiced what he preached, gradually increasing
his daily dose of vitamin C to 18 grams.
What does vitamin C do? It increases HDL (high density
lipoprotein), or good cholesterol, and decreases lipoprotein
(a), cholesterol and triglyceride production. It is also
thought to lower blood sugar and insulin requirements. By
relaxing the blood vessel walls, it lowers blood pressure
when hypertension is present, and it stops inappropriate
clot formation, which is often the final cause of heart
attacks and strokes.
When Pauling died in 1994, he knew that cardiovascular
disease would continue to rise in epidemic proportions. In
the US and Canada, every other person will die of heart
disease. Each year, $ 100 billion is spent on surgery and
medications for vascular heart disease in the US. The bottom
line is that lipoprotein (a) levels, which are rarely
checked by doctors, may be the real risk factor in
cardiovascular disease only because this fat is trying hard
to repair damage done by eating too little of what we need.
Your heart works 24 hours a day with no breaks. It can be
difficult to get enough nutrients from your diet for this
hard –working organ. Supplement with vitamin C and other
nutrients- they’re your body’s major line of defence against
heart troubles.
To learn more about cardiovascular health, listen to Dr.Anca’s Cardiovascular Health & Heart disease Prevention Tele-seminar recordings.
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