Aren’t the RDAs sufficient?
No. There is a large body of evidence showing that many vitamins and minerals – when consumed at higher than Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) levels – are beneficial in maintaining optimum health and preventing the development of chronic diseases. The RDAs only indicate the amounts of vitamins and minerals needed to prevent common nutrient deficiency diseases (such as rickets or scurvy) in the average person. They do not take into consideration a person’s individual metabolic needs, determined at the genetic level. Neither do they take into account a person’s dietary habits, lifestyle, health status or numerous other factors. Similarly, the RDAs also ignore the fact that nutrients operate in teams in our bodies, as opposed to as individual chemical substances in the way that pharmaceutical drugs do.
