Yay, Vit C!

Since I first started studying nutrition, about - erm - 20 years ago (eek!), I've been a big fan of Vitamin C. In fact, when I did my Certificate of Naturopathy, I wrote a six page article on it, based heavily on the works of Linus Pauling. It just seems very logical that Vitamin C is important. Our bodies cannot make it, and cooking (and to a certain degree, storage) destroys it. Therefore, most modern humans just don't get enough of it. It's one of the supplements I take every day.

You can therefore imagine that it was a super exciting moment in my own lounge when I saw on the news that a kiwi researcher (working just a few minutes from where I live) has finally come up with something scientifically acceptable regarding the link between Vitamin C and cancer. I haven't actually read the study yet, as it's very new and probably embargoed, so I'm not sure sure what form of Vitamin C they used or how it was administered, probably intravenous. From what I understand, this researchers field of specialty is physiological responses to stress. She has discovered that tumours with low vitamin C levels contain higher levels of a certain protein which allows them to grow when the body is stressed. Interesting, I thought to myself. Really bloody cool. For years I've been reading anecdotal evidence that Vitamin C inhibits tumour growth, cures swine flu, lowers cholesterol and many other things, and finally, finally, here is the beginnings of evidence which will be accepted by the scientific community, at least as regards cancer.

Of course, there is always the possibility that Medsafe will prick up their capitalist ears and decide that Vitamin C really is a drug, to be regulated and available only by prescription. I would not be surprised. But, for now, it's just a regular vitamin, and one of the cheapest. As usual, The Programmer was more quick off the mark than me, fixing me with a worried look and asking 'so.. how much do you have in stock?'. I guess I'd better brace myself for Ascorbic Acid chaos! It will have to wait until we return though, so in the meantime, eat greens, lots of greens, berries and peppers ;)

Monday is flight day and the plane leaves at 5am. That means getting to the airport at 3am, which is so ridiculous that it should be funny, but isn't. I've got 24 hours stopover in Seoul which is somewhere I've never been, so I hope to keep myself awake enough to see some of it. Then on to Prague and three days of falling asleep standing up. Such is the glorious jetlaggy wonder of long-haul travel.