My doctor unaware of the major genetic disease that all humans have

Went to see a new doctor for a routine check-up recently and he was unaware that humans not being able to make ascorbic acid (vitamin C) in our bodies is a genetic disease. The doctor was maybe forty years old. Don't they teach that in medical schools? I've long thought that something like every human on the planet having an easily curable major and very serious genetic disease is something that the media and medical profession should be trumpeting (or even Trump should be trumpeting), but he didn't even know about it.

For those who don't know, including people in the medical profession who apparently aren't taught this (at least loud enough to stick), every living thing on Earth aside from primates and guinea pigs is making ascorbic acid in their body every moment. Insects, fish, mammals, plants, reptiles, birds, but not your Aunt Millie. In her and us the process broke (our cells keep trying to constantly make it but can't, poor things). That's why there is so much emphasis on ATS to make people aware of how to best supplement, but at least to supplement with what most people think are "megadoses" (thanks to the orange juice industry which want you to think drinking their product is enough).

The easy answer is that the top levels of the medical profession don't want this publicized very heavily because it would lessen the amount of money spent on medications and hospital visits. The real answer may be that the top levels of the medical profession don't even think about it because they don't know about it.

Any insights from people on ATS involved in the medical field? Do people in your field ever discuss this? Thanks.

It's not a "genetic disease" that makes no sense. It's an adaptation. We have many other antioxidants in our system that make up for what used to be vitamin c's main role. As long as we sufficiently intake some c on occasion things remain okay. Exceptions exist, but for the most part a healthy diet is all that's needed.

a reply to: pl3bscheese

No, jeez on a stick. It's a genetic disease. The enzymes which make ascorbic acid broke in primates - the genetics don't work. Every other living thing, your dogs and cats for example, are making it in their bodies all the time.

a reply to: Aleister

There's this thing called species differentiation, or evolution, have you heard of it? I can't begin to imagine how you could be this confused.

You bought into some hooey, with poor reasoning, and keep propagating it.

No seriously, your facts are correct, but conclusion makes no sense.

Please try again.

You do realize that we don't make b-vitamins, either, right? Or have fins, or scales, or walk of 4 feet, or breathe underwater. All the result of genetic mutations.

a reply to: pl3bscheese

There are four or five steps that the body uses to make ascorbic acid. If I recall correctly primates go through the first three or four, and then the last one broke. So we are trying to make it at every moment. This has nothing to do with evolution, but with a break in the functioning of the genes, thus 'genetic disease'.

a reply to: Aleister

It has absolutely everything to do with evolution, how you can divorce genetics from evolution is beyond my comprehension.
Two groups, one has an advantage, which one survives?

We did. The ones who mutated away from producing the L-galactose dehydrogenase and gained a 2% metabolic efficiency, thereby surviving however many famines in our species past.

Glutathione seems to have taken up most of the work of ascorbic acid. We now require it to a much less degree.

a reply to: Aleister

But they actually absorb very little, while our cells suck it up like a Dyson and even recycle it.

www.sciencedaily.com...

A new study appears to explain how humans, along with other higher primates, guinea pigs and fruit bats, get by with what some have called an "inborn metabolic error": an inability to produce vitamin C from glucose.

Unlike the more than 4,000 other species of mammals who manufacture vitamin C, and lots of it, the red blood cells of the handful of vitamin C-defective species are specially equipped to suck up the vitamin's oxidized form, so-called L-dehydroascorbic acid (DHA), the researchers report in the March21st issue of Cell, a publication of Cell Press. Once inside the blood cells, that DHA--which is immediately transformed back into ascorbic acid (a.k.a. vitamin C)--can be efficiently carried through the bloodstream to the rest of the body, the researchers suggest.

"Evolution is amazing. Even though people talk about this as an 'inborn error'--a metabolic defect that all humans have--there is also this incredible manner in which we've responded to the defect, using some of the body's most plentiful cells," said Naomi Taylor of Université Montpellier I and II in France, noting that the body harbors billions of red blood cells. "[Through evolution], we've created this system that takes out the oxidized form of vitamin C and transports the essential, antioxidant form."

Meanwhile, the red cells of other mammals apparently take up very little, if any, DHA, which might explain why they need to produce so much more vitamin C than we need to get from our diets, Taylor said. The recommended daily dose of vitamin C for humans is just one mg/kg, while goats, for example, produce the vitamin at a striking rate of 200 mg/kg each day.

In essence, the red cells of animals that can't make vitamin C recycle what little they've got. Earlier studies had described the recycling process, Taylor said. "Our contribution to the whole story is to show that this process of recycling exists specifically in mammals that don't make vitamin C."

a reply to: Aleister Yes but what pl3bscheese is saying is that it is not a genetic disease, it's a genetic mutation, which are two different things.

a reply to: DAVID64

Thank, good data. Of course, in evolutionary terms, the primates able to compensate for this genetic-break have survived and thrived. But the suggested daily dose isn't enough to run the machine at optimum levels, we have to supplement to get to that point.

a reply to: Aleister

My understanding is the high doses of ascorbic acid act more like a drug to compensate for poor SAD diets in western world. Go vegan and you would be a-okay with small doses.

Hey, I pop a vitamin c tablet from time to time, but unless something like ebola comes my way I'll stay off the very high doses.

originally posted by: WeSbO
a reply to: Aleister Yes but what pl3bscheese is saying is that it is not a genetic disease, it's a genetic mutation, which are two different things.

Thanks. Yet this may be a "cart before the horse" argument. The mutation wasn't beneficial, the primates had to compensate to survive, so calling it a disease seems correct. In any case, "megadoses" aren't really megadoses, but a way to normalize the system. I haven't checked this in years, but in the U.S. the legal regulations for apes in captivity (zoos, testing facilities, etc.) used to mandate that they get the human body-weight equivalent of over three grams of ascorbic acid a day.

a reply to: Aleister

So let me get this straight. Having the ability to survive due to a genetic mutation is not a benefit? Increased metabolic efficiency is not a benefit? You just can't give this one up! Wow.

originally posted by: Aleister
a reply to: pl3bscheese

No, jeez on a stick. It's a genetic disease. The enzymes which make ascorbic acid broke in primates - the genetics don't work. Every other living thing, your dogs and cats for example, are making it in their bodies all the time.

Hmm, cat's can't make Taurine. We can. Weird how cats have to have a supplement.

Damn broken genetics...

Also, I want gills back. Who needs ear drums... stupid evolution.

originally posted by: pl3bscheese
a reply to: Aleister

My understanding is the high doses of ascorbic acid act more like a drug to compensate for poor SAD diets in western world. Go vegan and you would be a-okay with small doses.

Hey, I pop a vitamin c tablet from time to time, but unless something like ebola comes my way I'll stay off the very high doses.

Well it's not just high doses, it's the manner in which you take it, how the body absorbs it.

Hence the use of lecithin to help emulsify it in whatever machine you have to break it all down (sonic cleaning whatnots, pass lol)..

I know that with turmeric for instance, the addition of black pepper to golden milk helps the absorption a great deal, and I can attest to the positives of high level turmeric.

Unless you've worked on the vit-c, the doses you take that may seem high are mostly flushed out untouched by the body, similar to vitamin b1.

a reply to: sn0rch

Hey I've got an ultrasonic cleanser and two kilograms of l-ascorbate packed away in case ebola comes back around Just had to call out the "genetic disease" thing.

Yea, I purchase an organic curry spice mix that has turmeric and black pepper in it. Usually put it in a meal a day, and a few dabs on my palm to tongue besides that.

originally posted by: Aleister
a reply to: pl3bscheese

There are four or five steps that the body uses to make ascorbic acid. If I recall correctly primates go through the first three or four, and then the last one broke. So we are trying to make it at every moment. This has nothing to do with evolution, but with a break in the functioning of the genes, thus 'genetic disease'.

By that logic the ability to speak is a disease. Chimpanzees have their "larynx" gene intact allowing them to grunt ours changed.

originally posted by: pl3bscheese
a reply to: sn0rch

Hey I've got an ultrasonic cleanser and two kilograms of l-ascorbate packed away in case ebola comes back around

Just had to call out the "genetic disease" thing.

Yea, I purchase an organic curry spice mix that has turmeric and black pepper in it. Usually put it in a meal a day, and a few dabs on my palm to tongue besides that.

haha Aww you just know I wish I did have the equipment to do it, too broke. The bamix didnt work either.

If you have not heard of golden milk, give it a try. I would end up having a teaspoon or two in a mug of hot milk. Pepper, turmeric and milk??? It works.. Or I'm seriously ill, who knows, but I liked it

I am finding it harder to find natural things here, I'd love to get turmeric root. I also want to make my own coconut oil, they can be super cheap here at times.

I'd be useless if I was rich in a spice store or an oriental store. lol

originally posted by: Aleister
a reply to: pl3bscheese

There are four or five steps that the body uses to make ascorbic acid. If I recall correctly primates go through the first three or four, and then the last one broke. So we are trying to make it at every moment. This has nothing to do with evolution, but with a break in the functioning of the genes, thus 'genetic disease'.

That's more in the way of a Genetic disorder surely?

a reply to: Aleister

Disease is the wrong word if as you say every human throughout history...does not produce it. "DISEASE"...if every person naturally has it...then it's not one.

MS
EMT/ERT

Some people have the ability to make acetic acid into absorbic acid in their bodies, usually the people living way up north in Europe, Russia, and the Eskimo and northern Indians way up north. It is actually considered a mutation to do this. Many processes in the body form acetic acid so that isn't a problem.

So some people need nothing other than vinegar to form their vitamin c. The strange part is if these people take too much vitamin c/absorbic acid, they will get sick. Supplementing vitamin c or absorbic acid is not for everyone. If your body is adapted to take in too much iron, raising vitamin c levels can increase the iron absorption and cause problems. There are a lot of adaptations our bodies have made to this evolutionary change. Getting vitamin C from food is the best way and sometimes an occasional vitamin will help but there could be some people who actually need more vitamin c/absorbic acid because they excrete it.

I believe that supplementing vitamin C or absorbic acid as a temporary medicine is good but not taking it all the time. The medical profession does not back high doses of this vitamin for a good reason, it can cause some people a lot of harm and there is no way to identify how to tell who will be effected negatively. I read quite a bit about this and there are legitimate reasons why medicine does not back taking high levels of it. People have the right in this country to buy it if they want to give it a try, some people may need it. I don't have a problem taking it out of food, I like veggies and foods that contain it anyway, just moderate consumption of it in your diet.