With weather transitioning and the workload getting heavier the past few weeks, many students and faculty across Penn State’s campus have been getting sick. When
I talk to my dad on the phone often, he hints that I should be drinking orange juice everyday in order to avoid getting sick. Within the past month, I have drank over two gallons of orange juice in order to avoid getting sick. With my experiences, I believe orange juice can prevent getting sick, but since this is merely an anecdotal observation and could potentially be a myth, I did more research to find out.
According to Harvard Health Publications, the immune system acts as a body guard against germs and harmful bacteria. Although, vitamins must be consistently consumed in order to maintain the overall quality of the immune system. Therefore, if someone wants to prevent an illness, or the breaking down of their immune system, then one must take vitamins, drink juice, or other aliments that provide these benefits. This includes orange juice, which has a high percentage of Vitamin C in it, which ultimately improves the quality of the cells. Given these points, it is suggested that Vitamin C improves the overall quality of a person’s immune system. Moreover, a source suggests that oranges may be a better substitute to orange juice due to the added sugars in the juice.
The chart below, from The World’s Healthiest Foods Organization, shows the nutrients found in oranges, including the high percentage of Vitamin C in one orange. Each bar represents how well the certain food supplies each source of nourishment. Although the orange juice diagram is not available on the website, it is explained how some of the nutrients in oranges are left out when orange juice is created. The article goes on to explain the additional benefits from oranges including heart benefits.
To conclude, Vitamin C is and has been a vital nutrient that benefits us in many ways. In class, we have talked about the disease Scurvy numerous times and how there was no mechanism needed for why lemons cured it because it worked. We also discussed how later on it was learned that the Vitamin C in the lemon was the cure. With this blog post, I learned that orange juice is a good beverage to drink to maintain the quality of one’s immune system. However, if given the chance, one could substitute that for an orange in order to gain the nutrients that are commonly lost when producing orange juice.
Image citation: https://authoritynutrition.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/orange-juice.jpg
I’m a big believe in orange juice. I even give it credit to my missing the various illnesses that plagued my roommates at the beginning of the semester. It’s especially good for hangovers, nice and hydrating. Even if there aren’t many blazing health benefits, it’s a delicious beverage and maybe it’s a placebo effect, but it makes me feel good.
Lydia, I could really relate to this post as my Dad also tells me to take vitamins constantly to avoid getting sick. I thought that it was interesting that your dad tells you to drink orange juice specifically to avoid getting sick. I found this article that describes exactly how Vitamin C specifically impacts the immune system. I found it interesting that in control trials it was found that taking Vitamin C not only helps people from getting sick, but actually decreases the duration of the common cold and also helps with sicknesses like pneumonia. People definitely should be getting some source of vitamin C as the cold and flu season gets closer and closer!