Can you ever have too much a good thing? When it comes to vitamin C and its effect on the body, the answer appears to be an emphatic no.

As is the case with most vitamins, minerals, and pharmaceuticals, the body can only handle a certain amount. An overdose of many ingredients, especially those that are synthetic, can cause serious side effects, like toxicity or death. Yet in the case of vitamin C, we’ve seen instances where the opposite is true.

It was only a few years ago when New Zealand News 3 reported on Allan Smith’s “miraculous” recovery from the swine flu.

Doctors declared that Smith would not survive the illness in 2009, but before life support was turned off, his family insisted that Smith be supplemented with intravenous vitamin C at high doses. Smith, who had also been diagnosed with leukaemia after being admitted to the hospital with severe swine flu, was “brought back from the dead” with this powerful vitamin dose. Once Smith had recovered enough to sit up and drink liquids, his family began to administer oral vitamin C in its highly absorbable form, also called liposomal vitamin C.1

It was at this point that Smith’s recovery was signed, sealed, and delivered. Because of the vitamin C “mega-dose,” supported by multiple studies that Smith’s doctors failed to acknowledge, Smith was able to return home after being given a death sentence. A follow-up visit after Smith’s release also indicated no detection of leukaemia.

WHAT WE KNOW ABOUT VITAMIN C

While many medical doctors in Smith’s case opposed the vitamin C treatment, there are several credible physicians who are turning the tides. After Smith’s ground- breaking case made the news, Dr. Thomas Levy, a renowned expert on vitamin C and vitamin deficiency and author of books that include Curing the Incurable: Vitamin C, Infectious Diseases, and Toxins and Death by Calcium, visited New Zealand to present on the facts about vitamin C.

On his personal website, Dr. Levy recounts his own experience in using liposomal vitamin C, or the liposome- encapsulated version of the vitamin.2 When Dr. Levy came down with a bad case of the flu almost a decade ago, he began to take vitamin C powder as a remedy, also known to cause diarrhoea. It was then that Dr. Levy remembered the liposomal form of vitamin C that did not have the same diarrheal effect at a high dose. After taking just 5 to 6 grams of liposomal vitamin C with juice, Dr. Levy began to feel better within 45 minutes to an hour. According to his testimony, Dr. Levy recovered from a bad case of the flu faster than ever before, even compared to taking multiple IV infusions of vitamin C over several days.

As fantastical as these stories sound – with the potential for a cure through therapy from one simple vitamin – research supports these findings. In 2014, University of Kansas Cancer Center researchers found a high dose of vitamin C to be especially beneficial for patients with ovarian cancer. Researchers discovered that when combining infused vitamin C with conventional chemotherapy, ovarian cancer was stopped in the laboratory and chemotherapy side effects in ovarian cancer patients were reduced.3

It is for this reason that a growing number of doctors have begun to support vitamin C as an adjunctive cancer treatment. As nutrition coach and author Jack Challem explained in his criticism of a previously skewed study that discouraged vitamin C use during chemotherapy, published in Alternative and Complementary Therapies, high-dose vitamin C has shown “striking benefits” in animals, cancer cells, and human beings. High-dose vitamin C, as a common alternative and complementary cancer treatment, is thought to help trigger tumour cell death.4

As far back as 2005, researchers have been exploring the potent effects of vitamin C on the human body – and its potential as a “cure” for disease, in some cases. Oregon State University researchers made a breakthrough in 2005 when they discovered the specifics of the role vitamin C plays in the body. Researchers learned for the first time that vitamin C can react to and neutralise some toxic by- products of human fat metabolism, making the vitamin potentially protective against diseases triggered by lipid oxidation that results in genetic damage and chronic inflammation.5

This may explain why high doses of vitamin C in the blood have been linked to a reduced risk of heart disease and early death, according to 2015 findings from the University of Copenhagen based on high blood vitamin C concentrations from fruit and vegetables in the diet.6

Just a few months later in the same year, the American Physiological Society, with findings presented at the 14th International Conference on Endothelin: Physiology, Pathophysiology and Therapeutics, confirmed that taking a vitamin C supplement daily could benefit the hearts of overweight and obese adults as much as regular exercise.7

STRENGTH IN NUMBERS

To achieve this high dose that has been known to heal the body, and as Dr. Levy confirms, a liposomal vitamin C supplement provides a stronger and more effective delivery system compared to intravenous vitamin C fluids. Liposomal vitamin C, where the vitamin C nutrient is encapsulated in minute bubbles of healthy fat that better transport the high dose throughout the body, is up to 98 per cent bioavailable. This “smart” vitamin C dose allows almost all of the vitamin to reach the bloodstream after absorption, without any side effects related to bowel discomfort.

High doses of vitamin C are also available in non-liposomal formulations, taken as oral raw food concentrates that come from the whole fruit. This ultra-pure form of vitamin C is derived from the Camu Camu plant in the Peruvian Amazon rainforest and offers a highly concentrated, antioxidant-rich source of vitamin C that is similar to the lemon citrus fruit. Yet Camu Camu is distinct as it contains one of the highest natural vitamin C concentrations recorded – yielding more than 2700 mg of vitamin C per 100 grams of fruit, along with complex amino acids and a high dose of potassium.

Taking high doses of vitamin C has been known to have near-miraculous results in the face of grave illness, and taking a daily vitamin C supplement can stop many of these health problems before they start. As research has proven time and again, this is one instance where more may truly be better.

Sources
1. “Vitamin C Saves Man Dying of Viral Pneumonia.” Health Impact News.
2. “Exposing the Truth about Liposomal Nutrients.” Peak Energy.
3. Y. Ma, J. Chapman, M. Levine, K. Polireddy, J. Drisko, Q. Chen. High-Dose Parenteral Ascorbate Enhanced Chemosensitivity of Ovarian Cancer and Reduced Toxicity of Chemotherapy. Science Translational Medicine, 2014; 6 (222): 222ra18 DOI: 10.1126/scitranslmed.3007154.
4. Mary Ann Liebert, Inc./Genetic Engineering News. “Support For Adjunctive Vitamin C Treatment In Cancer.” ScienceDaily.
5. “Discovery Shows New Vitamin C Health Benefits.” Oregon State University.
6. “Vitamin C related to reduced risk of cardiovascular disease, early death.” University of Copenhagen The Faculty of Health and Medical Sciences.
7. “Vitamin C: The exercise replacement?” American Physiological Society (APS).