Fitness

The 15 or more B vitamins are so meagerly supplied in our American diet that almost every person lacks them.

Dr. Norman Jolliffe has pointed out that a few generations ago even the paupers received a diet rich in these vitamins. They were better off than the wealthiest are today.

The reasons for this drastic decrease are numerous. Formerly every bite of bread, cereal, and foods prepared from grain supplied B vitamins. Since there was no refrigeration or canning and there were few fruits and vegetables, the mainstay of the diet was breadstuffs. In 1862 machinery was invented which refined grains in such a way that most of the nutrients were discarded. Molasses, rich in certain B vitamins, was once the only sweetening. No refined foods and few sweets of any kind were available. Now the consumption of sugar has increased tremendously; all the original nutrients are discarded; it quickly destroys the appetite and greatly augments the need for certain B vitamins. Whereas no nutrients were formerly discarded, two-thirds of our calories are now supplied by foods from which the original nutrients are largely or wholly discarded. Furthermore, we lead such sedentary lives that our food intake is small compared with that of our grandparents. Seventy years ago, men consumed approximately 6,000 to 6,500 calories daily; women 4,000 to 4,500. Today the average is 2,400 to 2,800 for men and 1,800 to 2,200 for women.

The advantage of using whole-grain breads and cereals was shown during World War I when shortages caused the Danish government to forbid the milling of grains; nutrition in Denmark was so improved that during the war years the death rate fell 34 per cent. The incidence of cancer, diabetes, high blood pressure, and heart and kidney diseases dropped markedly, and evidences of positive health greatly increased. Much the same improvement occurred in England during and after World War II when grains were only slightly milled. Although the English diet was deficient in many respects, surveys showed that the national health did not suffer during this period.

Now that our breadstuffs are refined, no food rich in the B vitamins is ordinarily eaten daily. In fact, there are only four good sources of these vitamins: liver, brewers’ yeast, wheat germ, and rice polish. A few foods are high in one or two B vitamins, but to obtain our daily requirement of all of them from such foods is impossible.

A source of B vitamins perhaps more important than any other is that synthesized by valuable bacteria in the intestine; the amount from this source cannot be easily measured. Studies of B vitamins found in the blood and urine of persons on diets lacking these vitamins show that intestinal bacteria can produce large amounts of certain B vitamins, which disappear from the blood and urine if the bacteria are destroyed. For reasons not understood, other persons on a B-vitamin-deficient diet have been found to have little or none of these vitamins in their blood and urine.

It appears that these bacteria grow best on milk sugar and cannot grow unless fat is supplied them; milk-free and/or fat-free diets, therefore, may be dangerous. The taking of sulfonamides and antibiotics, such as streptomycin and aureomycin, completely destroys these valuable bacteria; symptoms of multiple B-vitamin deficiencies may quickly appear unless food which promotes the growth of desirable intestinal bacteria, such as yogurt, is eaten. This food, sometimes spoken of in America as a fad, has been eaten for centuries in countries from Turkey to Lapland, Iceland to China. A study made by Dr. Seneca 1 of the College of Physicians and Surgeons of Columbia University points out that when yogurt is eaten over a long period, no other bacteria except those from yogurt are found in the stools.

The B vitamins appear to be needed equally by every cell in the body. For example, if a well-fed animal is killed and its tissues are analyzed separately, these vitamins are found to be evenly distributed throughout the tissues. Conversely when animals are kept on a deficient diet, then killed, and separate tissues are analyzed, each tissue is uniformly deficient. Most of the other vitamins are needed more by certain tissues than by others. Dr. Roger J. Williams (ref. 1, p. 35) has pointed out that because these vitamins are needed equally by all cells, a deficiency can produce severe damage before the condition can be noticed. The damage is nevertheless real. Instead of one organ showing abnormalities, as do the eyes during a vitamin-A deficiency, the entire body degenerates into a one-hoss-shay collapse. This overall abnormality is difficult to recognize in an adult, but severely stunted growth makes it markedly noticeable in the young.

Dr. Williams also points out that only when the deficiency becomes quite severe does one group of cells show greater damage than another. For example, when a person feels below par, he automatically decreases his activity and may spend much time sleeping; thus most of his cells do less work, and their need for B vitamins decreases. The heart, however, works continuously from birth until death; even though the deficiency is already severe and every cell has been equally damaged up to this point, the first deficiency signs may now appear in the heart.

It has become increasingly clear that since the B vitamins occur together in food, no person is deficient in anyone B vitamin without being deficient in all of them. There are, however, as many degrees and variations of B-vitamin deficiencies as there are different individuals. Formerly the disease beriberi was thought to be caused by a deficiency of vitamin B1, and pellagra by lack of the B vitamin, niacin. When human volunteers have stayed on diets lacking vitamin B1 or niacin, however, neither beriberi nor pellagra has been produced. These diseases actually result from multiple deficiencies of all the B vitamins, the lack of vitamin B1 or niacin being only more prominent.