The “freshman plague” is spreading rapidly around campus and coughs can be heard echoing throughout the Forum building. With sickness comes many texts from mom and dad saying “rest and take your vitamin C.” I know I have been taking close to around 1,000mg a day of vitamin C plus my daily glass of orange juice. But the question I keep asking myself is “does vitamin C actually make you get better, quicker?” So I started looking.
Vitamin C is used constantly to treat colds and make symptoms go away faster. However, there is almost no benefit from vitamin C that helps to treat the common cold. Researchers spent time looking at whether or not taking 200mg of vitamin C daily could help reduce the severity, duration, or frequency of the common cold. The researchers went through 60 years of clinical trial results and discovered that taking vitamin C after a cold has begun has no impact on the duration and severity of the symptoms presented. However, the researchers did find that the cold duration is shortened by 8% in adults when vitamin C is taken daily. In addition, according to the Cochrane Review vitamin C supplements have “no benefit in either the duration or the severity of symptoms.”
However, just because vitamin C does not help once a cold has begun does not mean you should stop taking it. There are many health benefits that come from vitamin C or a vitamin C supplement. According to a study published by the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition vitamin C can help prevent wrinkles. How is this possible? Well, vitamin C helps form collagen which smooths fine lines and wrinkles. Vitamin C can also help to protect your heart. Finnish researchers looked at studies found the risk for cardiovascular disease can be reduced by 25% if 700mg of a C supplement are taken daily. Being in college also calls for help staying focused. One of the most successful problems vitamin C helps with is preventing age-related macular degeneration (AMD) which is a leading cause of blindness in people over the age of 45. The National Eye Institute sponsored a major clinical try which found a daily supplement of 500mg of vitamin C combined with vitamin E, copper, and zinc can help reduce the risk of vision loss by up to 25%.
Taking a daily supplement or drinking orange juice has many health benefits. The recommended dietary intake is 65 to 90mg a day with 2,000mg being the maximum per day. Too much vitamin C isn’t harmful, however some unwanted symptoms can result from excessive amounts of vitamin C. Diarrhea, nausea, heartburn, headaches, insomnia, and abdominal bloating are some symptoms of too much vitamin C. However, this should not scare you from taking a supplement because overall an adequate amount of vitamin C is needed for a healthy lifestyle.
This post is very relevant to my recent life because last week I was diagnosed with a viral infection and it was awful to say the least. I have never been more congested in my life than I was last week. I heard people talking about emergenC which I started taking late into the week but I did find myself feeling a bit better taking it along with vitamin c pills because I heard they helped with being sick and preventing colds and other illnesses. Here WebMD talks about vitamin c for the commons cold http://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/cold-guide/vitamin-c-for-common-cold
Ever since I was little my parents gave me vitamin C every morning and I knew that it gave some good qualities, but I didn’t know necessarily what. I like that your article points out all the things that Vitamin C can help with despite the fact that it might not be the best cure for the common cold. Also, I’ve lived here in State College for practically my whole life and I know from experience that with the long winters a lot of my friends experience minor systems of depression. They also told me that with their seasonal depression they took Vitamin C and it actually helped a lot to improve their overall wellness and feelings. It’s essentially like taking a little vitamin of sunshine and is impressive with the positive health effects.
I’m not sure about the use of VC to daily cold, but because my mom’s a doctor, I know that VC can help people with their skin health ( release the dark and avoid the sun’s hurt). Thanks for your article, now I got something new about VC and its use. And like you said in the article, although the VC cannot be that magic, it is still good at our daily health if we take it properly. But since you bring up with Orange Juice, I want to remind you that even though it can serve you with daily VC, you still need to choose carefully, because some of it can really bring you calorie.