It's easy to buy vitamins and minerals at a discount. Just go to any grocery store or drug store, and you'll find a lot of options, most of which will claim to be the cheapest, the best, etc. How do you know for sure which discount vitamin and mineral product is best? Since vitamin makers are not regulated, this is a good and important question.
And do we really need vitamin and mineral supplements? Many studies have found that the overall nutrient value of foods keeps going down because of soil depletion, which has been going on for decades. Less than one in ten people meet or go above the daily requirements set by the USDA food pyramid for how much important vegetables and fruits they eat. Taking a good discount vitamin and mineral supplement every day is an important part of living a healthy life because it helps fill in the "nutrient gaps" that everyone has. Still, the question is, which one? Is it best to go with the cheapest one?
Here are some questions you should ask about any discount vitamins or minerals you might want to buy:
Is the price low because the ingredients are cheap and not very good? The quality and price of each ingredient can vary a lot. Since your health is at stake, quality should come first, since the end product is only as good as the ingredients that went into it. Most beta carotene used in supplements, for example, is made in a lab and only has about 3% beta carotene. It costs about $60 per kg. But natural beta carotene with a potency of 98 percent is much more effective and costs about $2,800 per kg. The natural form of Vitamin E, d-alpha-tocopheryl succinate, is more effective than the synthetic form, dl-alpha tocopheryl, but it costs more.
- Do the discount vitamin and mineral products have anything wrong with it? Cheaper raw materials may have other things in them, some of which aren't wanted and shouldn't be in the product. Does the company test for heavy metals to make sure there is no mercury, lead, arsenic, or cadmium in the product?
- Do the listed strengths really exist in the product? How can you be sure that what you're paying for is in the product? And does the company have a way to make sure that the ingredients they use are what their suppliers say they are?
- Is there a money-back guarantee on the item? If you are not happy with the service, you should be able to get your money back.
- Does the process of making the drug meet the standards set by the pharmaceutical industry? High-volume discount manufacturers can cut costs by mixing faster and mixing for less time. This can mean that the product has to be made into harder tablets, which can make the vitamin harder to dissolve and more likely to pass right through your body.
When you buy a cheap vitamin and mineral, it's not like buying a cheap pair of socks or a shirt. It's about the nutrients and how well they work for your body. Most of the time, you get what you pay for, and there are dozens of one-a-day vitamins that are cheap. But taking a multivitamin once a day is probably a waste of money. You couldn't put all of the vitamins and minerals needed for a good supplement in a single pill or capsule because it would be too big to swallow.
Cheap supplements from the supermarket aren't worth the money because they are made of cheaper, lower-quality ingredients and don't have other nutrients that have been shown to be good for your health. Most of the time, these kinds of cheap vitamins and minerals have a lot of cheap ingredients in them, which can cause an unhealthy imbalance of nutrients. When it comes to nutrients, it's not always true that more is better. The part of nutritional supplements that costs the least is the part that has vitamins and minerals.
There ARE companies that make supplements that are of high quality and cost very little. There is one in particular that uses ingredients that are good enough to be used in hospitals, and many of them are backed by clinical studies. On their website, links to relevant clinical studies about the ingredients can be found.
Taking a good, cheap vitamin and mineral supplement should improve your health and energy, keep you from getting sick, make you more sexually active, and slow down the aging process. Learn as much as you can about what it means to find the best discount vitamin and mineral supplement. Before you spend your money, learn about the nutrients and substances you'll be putting into your body every day.
