Health Benefits Of Vitamin C
Vitamin C is one of the most popular micronutrients due to it’s role as an immune booster and source of energy, activity and happiness. We investigate the 7 main health benefits of vitamin C that have given it such a good reputation.
Vitamin C has been widely regarded as essential to everyones nutrition for years now, especially sailors who were the victims of scurvy and a host of other diseases linked to the lack of fruit and vegetables that were available to them.
Ascorbic acid, or vitamin C, is one of the most important water soluble vitamins. It is essential for collagen, carnitine and neurotransmitters biosynthesis. Most plants and animals synthesize ascorbic acid for their own requirement. However, apes and humans cannot synthesize ascorbic acid due to lack of an enzyme named gulonolactone oxidase.
For this reason, we need to ensure that our diets are packed with vitamin C and, luckily, many fruits and vegetables contain adequate amounts of vitamin C so getting it is easy. The recommended RDA of vitamin C is 75-90mg, however, recent studies suggest that in order to get the best health benefits from vitamin C you would need to consume 500mg daily, which makes a case for vitamin C supplementation.
Why Vitamin C Is Essential To Fast Weight Loss
The key to losing weight fast is to work with your bodys natural mechanisms to motivate it to burn stored fat.
What is vitamin C?
Water soluble vitamin, found in fruit & vegetables, water soluble means we need to take it daily because unlike fat soluble vitamins the body does not store it.
Vitamin C helps in the weight loss process in two very significant ways:
- It helps regulate the hormone insulin that tells your body to store fat
- Its part of an important amino acid that burns the stored fat you already have.
To understand the first mechanismof weight loss using vitamin C, you first need to understand what the hormone cortisol is and how it works.
Cortisol is one of the stress hormones. Each stress hormone has specific tasks in the presence of stress. When the brain perceives stress, which can be anything from a paper cut to a job loss, it stimulates the release of these stress hormones to do their various jobs. All of those jobs are meant to protect the body from both the physical and the mental impact of whatever might be causing the stress in the first place.
So your brain sends out a supply of cortisol and that cortisol takes glucose and converts it to fat,
Still with me?
Rather than allowing it to go through the process of being converted to glycogen, which is what your food becomes so that it can be burned as energy.
Vitamin C and L-Carnitine
So now that you know why you need vitamin C to lose weight, how do you make sure youre getting enough?
It Strengthens Your Immune System
One of the best-known health benefits of Vitamin C is its ability to give our immune system a real boost. In fact, this is the main reason why most people decide to introduce this vital vitamin into their diet, being unaware of all of the additional health benefits that we discussed before.
Vitamin C boosts the production of the white blood cells, which, as you may know, are responsible for fighting those nasty infections. There is also the benefit of it being a strong antioxidant and reducing the levels of oxidative stress and inflammation in the body. In addition, it has been scientifically proven that Vitamin C shortens the amount of time needed for any wounds to heal properly.
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Helps Have A Healthy Immune System
A healthy immune system leads to a good metabolism and this results in losing weight faster. A person with a weak immune system is prone to digestion-related problems or intestine or gut-related problems that could harm the body.
For this, consumption of Vitamin C proves to be very effective since it fights allergic reactions to protects the immune system from any infections. It increases the strength of the immune system and eventually decreases any inflammation in the body and helps with weight loss.
Aids In The Treatment Of Cancer
High vitamin C dosage increases the effect of cancer-eliminating drugs utilised in chemotherapy. Unlike other medications, this vitamin is target-specific. Hence, it doesnt damage the other body cells. Moreover, a study suggests that increased intake of nutrients can also reduce the risk of mouth, lungs, throat, vocal cords, colon, oesophagus, and rectum cancer.
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Follow The Sun To Increase Vitamin D
A 2011 study showed overweight adults who took vitamin D and calcium lost more fat from their abdomens than those who didnt. Vitamin D, which is a hormone, helps your body absorb calcium. To increase your levels, get sun exposure daily. You can also obtain vitamin D from a supplement or foods, such as salmon, tuna, egg yolks, and fortified milk, yogurt, and cereals.
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How Can Vitamin C Cause Weight Loss
The answer to that question is very simple. Without vitamin C, there is no L-carnitine.
In addition to the amino acids lysine and methionine, the presence of L-carnitine in the body is associated with the content of vitamin C.
Its deficiency reduces the synthesis of L-carnitine, resulting in increased blood triglycerides, physical weakness and other symptoms significant for vitamin C deficiency.
The earliest symptom of vitamin C deficiency fatigue, is associated with reduced synthesis of L-carnitine.
In addition, L-carnitine is necessary for the transport of fatty acids into the mitochondria where their oxidation takes place. This is how L-carnitine can contribute to the weight loss process fat loss!
It is also important to point out that it does not encourage increased fat consumption. If there is not enough L-carnitine, fats are not used to create energy, but are increasingly deposited in adipose tissue.
In addition to the above link between vitamin C and L-carnitine, research has shown that vitamin C promotes weight loss in other ways.
Namely, it participates in the secretion of growth hormone, and thanks to it, during our sleep, the process of breaking down fat and converting it into energy takes place. This is why we feel rested in the morning.
Also, vitamin C improves the utilization of iron which is crucial in the process of making red blood cells, transporting oxygen to the cells, and this whole process is necessary for burning fat.
Speeds Up The Healing Of Wounds
Vitamin C leads to collagen production, a protein present in connective tissues of the skin, muscles, and tendons. So regular intake of this vitamin is helpful in wound healing. Vitamin C speeds up the healing process, whether the wound is a minor or deep cut, broken bone or burns.
Vitamin C is the principal water-soluble antioxidant found in plasma. It is a two-fold action it oxidises itself and regenerates and activates iron or copper. Then it removes the damaging oxidising agent. The process helps in speeding up the wound healing process.
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How Much Do You Need
If you eat a balanced diet, it’s pretty easy to get enough. Adult women need 75 milligrams of vitamin C per day men, 90 milligrams. A mere 1/2 cup of raw red bell pepper or 3/4 cup of orange juice will do it, while 1/2 cup cooked broccoli gets you at least halfway there. Your body doesn’t make or store vitamin C, so you have to eat it every day.
Ways Vitamin C Benefits Weight Loss
Vitamin C has been long used for a range of benefits for humans. Many people believe that vitamin C benefits weight loss. Is this true? Surprisingly, yes, vitamin C does help with a lot of things that include weight loss as well.
So, here, we will talk about the ten ways of how vitamin C benefits weight loss and your health. But that is not all. We will also help you figure out where you can get the right vitamin C supplements to include in your daily routine.
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Losing Weight With Vitamin C
Nutritionists at the University of California at Davis decided to see if adding vitamin-rich tomato juice to weight loss diet plans would help dieters lose weight. They didn’t recommend just a little vegetable juice. Dieters were asked to cut calories, avoid salt, and drink 2 to 4 cups of low-sodium V8 juice every day.
The results weren’t spectacular. Dieters who drank V8 juice lost, on average about 2 pounds more after six weeks than dieters who did not. But the additional vitamin c was very high, either. Drinking V8 juice only put dieters at 120% of the recommended daily intake .
What if dieters got higher levels of vitamin C? Here is what scientists have found out.
- More vitamin C is correlated to trimmer waistlines
- More vitamin C is correlated to a lower body mass index .
- More vitamin C is correlated with faster fat burning.
- The benefits of vitamin C are highest in women.
Scientists have not found that it is necessary to take megadoses of vitamin C to help with weight loss. In fact, as little as 100 mg a day may make a difference. What vitamin C cannot do is to compensate for the effects of eating too much. Vitamin C can help you burn fat faster, but you have to eating a diet that isn’t restoring fat to fat cells as fast as you burn it off.
Selected References:
Vitamin C Helps Obese People Exercise
Above all, you should consume fewer calories and start exercising for fast weight loss.
Vitamin C not only helps the body burn more fat, but also prevents fatigue after exercise. Therefore, vitamin C makes it easier for obese people to work out regularly, improving their health and decreasing their body weight.
A daily vitamin C dose of 500 mg helped obese people lose more weight. If you cant get this dose from food, you may benefit from taking vitamin C supplements.
Additionally, a daily vitamin C dose of 250 mg can help you build muscle mass, recover faster from exercise, and sleep at night.
Certainly, you should get at least 100 mg of vitamin C from your diet. Foods contain much more than vitamin C. Foods contain other vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants that act synergistically helping the body burn more fat.
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Helps Prevent Iron Deficiency
Iron is an essential nutrient that serves multiple functions. It builds red blood cells and assists the transportation of oxygen throughout the body. Vitamin C absorbs the iron from your diet. It further converts it into an easily absorbable form. 100 mg of vitamin C can improve iron efficiency in the body by 67%. According to research, it helps lower the chances of contracting anaemia.
/10want To Drop Weight Fast
Vitamin C is one of the most effective nutrients of all. From fighting cold to protecting the heart, vitamin C has numerous proven health benefits. But do you know that it is also a great fat burner? As per a study, people who had ample vitamin C in their diet burned about 30 percent more fat while exercising as compared to people low on this nutrient. In order to lose weight in an effective way, women should consume 75 milligrams of vitamin C every day and for men, it is 90 milligrams.
So munch on these 9 vitamin C rich fruits and veggies if you want to drop weight fast:
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Vitamin D & Solar Therapy
Perhaps one of the easiest vitamins to obtain, vitamin D is responsible for maintaining bone health and managing the bodys levels of other nutrients like calcium and phosphorus however, it also has functions across the entire body . One of these seems to be energy regulation . People struggling with obesity have been shown to have vitamin D deficiency, which can compound many other problems that obesity can bring on, such as insulin resistance and cardiovascular disease .
Its still unclear whether vitamin D deficiency directly causes weight gain or whether it merely contributes to the effects of obesity . Either way, there is undoubtedly vitamin D deficiency among people struggling with obesity, and the lifestyle habits of obese people strongly contribute to a lack of vitamin D and other adverse health effects .
Making changes to your diet and activity to incorporate more vitamin D can make you healthier overall. The easiest way is to go outside, as your body uses sunlight to produce more vitamin D. Getting exercise, from even just moderate activities like walking for a half-hour each day, can increase your vitamin D intake, burn calories, and improve your cardiovascular fitness. Try adding new, vitamin D-rich foods to your diet too. The goal should be to get around 15 mcg per day. Some examples are:
- Fatty fish like salmon and mackerel
- Eggs
- B12
- Folic acid
B vitamins are found primarily in animal products, such as
- Fish
- Eggs
- Dairy
Regulate Blood Sugar Levels
Avoid the highs and lows that come with a poor diet to keep your blood sugar levels steady. Vitamin C can help support this, so you dont find yourself reaching for a biscuit or chocolate bar every day at 3pm. Enjoy a healthy snack from the recipes on the 28 Day Weight Loss Challenge.
Try this: Spinach and Cheese Triangles
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Vitamin C For Weight Loss In Saudi Arabia
There are few countries on earth that have a bigger problem with obesity and type 2 diabetes than the United States of America, and one of them is Saudi Arabia. Across the Kingdom, Saudis of all ages are dealing with issues of weight control and high blood pressure. Researchers at the Shahid Sadoughi University of Medical Sciences and Health Services first tested vitamin C as a treatment for type 2 diabetes.
The results of the study were encouraging:
- Blood sugar levels went down.
- Cholesterol levels went down.
- And insulin levels went down a lot.
The significant of lowering insulin for weight loss is that this sugar-storage hormone also stores fat. In fact, it’s about 300 times more efficient at storing fatty acids than it is at storing sugar. In type 2 diabetes, the body makes more and more insulin as certain tissues become more and more “insulin resistant.” Eventually the body just can’t make enough insulin and blood sugar levels start to rise.
Before that happens, however, insulin levels rise and most people get fatter. You don’t get fatter if you don’t overeat, but having high insulin levels ensures that every extra morsel you eat quickly gets stored away as body fat. The Saudi scientists seemed to have discovered a way to make sure that lower-calorie diets actually worked for weight loss. But does vitamin C for weight loss really work?
Vitamin C Is Good For Physical And Mental Health
All-in-all, vitamin C is an essential micronutrient that doesnt have a good reputation by accident. Alongside how it improves your ability to heal wounds and reduce inflammation inside and outside your body, as well as giving you a great look, it has also been marginally viewed as a vitamin that gives you more energy and boosts your mental health.
Although hard to really nail down, people with higher levels of vitamin C have been observed to be less likely to suffer from depression and fatigue. Whether this is due to all the other aforementioned benefits is hard to say, but more importantly you should just increase the amount of vitamin C-rich foods you eat and see for yourself, you wont be disappointed!
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It Lowers High Blood Pressure
More and more people struggle with high blood pressure nowadays. In fact, 1 in every 3 American adults has been diagnosed with high blood pressure. This is one of the many risk factors for developing heart disease, which is the number one cause of death on a global level.
Luckily for us, Vitamin C is here to save the situation. Studies have shown that regular use of Vitamin C supplementation has proven to be an effective way to reduce high blood pressure, in both animal and human subjects .
Vitamin C And Bodyweight
Vitamin C does not directly lead to fat oxidation or loss of body fat. However, it is related to body weight and waist circumference.
One study found that vitamin C and body mass are inversely related, meaning low plasma ascorbic acid concentrations are linked to high body mass index . BMI is the ratio of a persons height and weight. A BMI of 30 or higher is an indicator of obesity.
The study also showed that people with low vitamin C burn around 30% less fat during moderate exercise than those with adequate vitamin C levels. In other words, low vitamin C can make you resistant to fat mass loss, increasing fat reserves and adding to body weight.
It is worth noting that fat distribution, specifically excess belly fat, is a sign of metabolic syndrome, which is a collection of conditions that increase the risk of cardiovascular disease . Therefore, intake of more vitamin C and its indirect effect on waist circumference has widespread health benefits.
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