Nowadays, it is hard to escape hearing about so called liquid vitamins, as they are advertised everywhere on the internet it seems.
An example of one of the most popular of these liquid multi vitamins is called Seasilver(TM)
, although FTC action has been taken against this company so it may be no longer available.
Liquid vitamin supplements — it is claimed by many of these companies and their Distributors — have an almost total absorption rate, often quoted as high as 98%.
Accompanying this claim is another one: 90% of the nutrients taken in a tablet or pill form are going straight down your toilet.
But are these claims true? Are there any real benefits to liquid vitamins? Are there drawbacks?
At Nutritional-Supplement-Info.com we will present the facts, and let each of you make up your own minds.
The facts on Liquid Vitamins: Liquid Vitamin Supplements
First, let’s begin with the claim that supplements taken in tablet or pill form are 90% excreted and wasted.
This is a very misleading statement.
Here’s why: there is a huge variation in supplement quality.
On one end of the spectrum, you have cheap vitamins mass produced and sold in supermarket chains. These supplements are made using the cheapest ingredients possible, as well as the cheapest excipients (excipients are what bind the ingredients together).
Because of the excipients used, the nutrients are mostly released in the stomach, and, therefore, destroyed by the stomach acids.
In the case of these supplements, 90% of the vitamins can indeed end up wasted in the toilet.
On the other end of the spectrum, though, there are companies that manufacture highly sophisticated supplements, often referred to as nutraceuticals. These companies can use extremely expensive all natural, potent ingredients and excipients.
Some of these supplements, due to these differences, have highly sophisticated delivery systems. For example, the best of them have excipients that ensure the nutrients are absorbed via the lining of the walls of the upper intestine, allowing them to enter the bloodstream where they go to work.
In short, it is dishonest for these purveyors of liquid vitamins to try and claim all tablet or pill form supplements have poor absorption. Comparing supermarket variety vitamins to sophisticated nutraceuticals is like comparing apples to oranges.
Absorption of Liquid Vitamins
Now, let’s discuss the alleged 98% (or greater) absorption claimed by some of these liquid vitamin supplements.
Sadly, this is also misleading.
There are only a few different ways in which nutrients can get into your bloodstream:
1) By injection…must be performed by a clinic or physician. For example, vitamin B12 or Human Growth Hormones can be introduced into the body using this route.
2) Through the mucous membranes of the mouth via a sublingual tablet or liquid. This can be highly effective for certain nutrients, but does not work for many others simply because many nutrients possess molecules that are too large to be absorbed via the mucous membranes.
3) Via the lining of the walls of the upper intestines. (Discussed above, this is how many of the best nutraceuticals work).
4) Via the lining of the colon walls using suppositories (which are prescription items and are not applicable to supplements).
5) No specific delivery system.
It is the last category that cheap vitamins you buy in the supermarket fall into, as well as so called liquid multi vitamins.
In short, these cheap supplemements and liquid vitamin supplements are simply drank as is, or mixed with water or juice before imbibing. They then enter the stomach where the vast majority of the active nutrients are destroyed.
The bottomline is that these companies that market liquid vitamin supplements are taking advantage of the fact that most people are not equipped with an understanding of the principles behind absorption and bio-availability, and can present their liquid vitamins as having greater efficacy than they truly do, while at the same time “knocking down” supplements that come in tablet or pill form.
Other facts that manufacturers of Liquid Vitamins don’t want you to know
If you follow the latest breaking health trends as we do, you may be aware of the many benefits of enzymes, which have been revealed to possibly help disorders ranging from the caridovascular to the circulatory to the health of the lungs, kidneys, liver, and even brain. A good amount of this research is being conducted by Medical Scientists at the prestigious Harvard Medical School.
Many sellers of liquid vitamins will often extol the virtues of enzymes and claim their products harbor all of the beneficial enzymes that you need.
Don’t buy the hype.
The fact of the matter is that the enzyme component in these products are negligible because the enzymes are not added, and therefore only contain trace amounts, which were present in the food matrix.
What’s worse, enzymes cannot be added to liquid vitamins because enzymes are highly sensitive and can only survive in a liquid form for approximately 2 to 3 hours.
Enzymes, however, can be a viable component in complex tablet form nutraceuticals and not suffer destruction like they do in liquid vitamin supplements.
Nutritional-Supplement-Info’s Verdict on Liquid Vitamins
In our opinion, liquid vitamins are on a par with respect to efficacy as cheap supplements you can buy in any supermarket. Unfortunately, most of these liquid vitamin supplements are not cheap (especially for what you are getting) at all.
Indeed, many of them command prices of 40 dollars and upwards — this is primarily due to the way these liquid vitamins are marketed, which is MLM (Multi-level-marketing). Multi-level-marketing schemes have a strong tendency to inflate the retail prices of the products because there are many levels of payment made to those marketing them.
In the final analysis, the only real benefit we can ascertain of taking liquid vitamin supplements is that some people have difficulty swallowing any tablets.
If you are one of these people, then taking a liquid multi vitamin will probably be better than taking nothing at all.
However, liquid vitamin supplements cannot compare to sophisticated nutraceuticals for the reasons cited above — and many more in our opinion.
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