How Much Iodine Should I Take?

 
 
 

 
 
 
 
Iodine is found in each cell in your body and without it life is not possible.

David Browstein M.D. explains in his book Iodine: Why You Need It, Why You Can’t Live Without It that of all the elements known so far to be essential for human health, iodine is the most misunderstood and the most feared.

Yet iodine is the safest of all the essential trace elements — provided it is in the inorganic nonradioactive form. In the correct form, it can be taken daily and for long periods of time, according to Dr. Brownstein.

 

How to Nourish the Cells of Your Body with Iodine

Over 80% of people tested in the Midwest are iodine-deficient (the Midwest is considered the goiter belt of America due to this deficiency) making it one of the most deficient nutrients!

Iodine is essential to life and as such is responsible for the production of all the hormones of the body.

Proper immune function requires adequate levels of iodine for warding off parasites, bacteria, viruses and maybe even cancer.

Iodine helps to alkalize the body pH (it’s a known fact that acidic body chemistry is a factor in many diseases).

Iodine is essential to the health of every cell in the body:

• ▸ women might find it helpful to know that high concentrations of iodine can be found in healthy thyroid glands, healthy ovaries, and healthy breast tissue.
• ▸ men might find it helpful to know that high testosterone levels depend on ample amounts of iodine.

How Much Iodine Does a Healthy Human Body Need?

The recommended daily allowance (RDA) for iodine is 150 mcg. per day for disease prevention. Dr. Brownstein believes this is too low and points out that:

• ▸ the Japanese on average ingest 86 times more than the suggested RDA amount of iodine.
• ▸ the U.S. has the highest incidence of breast cancer while Japan’s is the lowest in the world.
• ▸ life expectancy for Americans is 48th of 226 counties while Japan ranks 6th.
• ▸ Japan’s infant mortality rate is the lowest in the world at 3.5 per 1000 births while America is double that, at 7 per 1000.
• ▸ when Japanese immigrate to America they quickly join the U.S. statistics (there is more to this than just iodine, but it should make you stop and think about your daily intake of this essential nutrient!)

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Don’t Interfere with my Iodine!

There is more to the lack of iodine than just not ingesting enough. Let’s look at a little chemistry and the periodic table of elements:

The elements at the top of the table will displace elements that are below them on the table. Reading from the top of the table to the bottom with the halogen family of elements we have fluorine at the top, then chlorine, then bromine and finally at the very bottom and most easily displaced is iodine.

Fluorine will then displace iodine and can be found in municipal drinking water. Fluorine is also found in pharmaceutical drugs like Cipro, Lipitor, Prozac, Paxil and Effexor. Fluorine is an ingredient in the sweetener Splenda.

Chlorine will also displace iodine, and it is also found in our drinking water as well and in drugs such as Zoloft and Wellbutrin.

Bromine also displaces iodine, and since the 1980s bromine has replaced iodine as the anti-caking agent used in baked goods in America.

Therefore, the iodine we ingest can be displaced by these other, more aggressive elements — which are easily ingested on a daily basis by many Americans.

(this article is written by Dane Findley and Jim Harris ~ Jim is a Naturopath and Nutritional Consultant; a graduate from the American Naturopathic Medical Institute, Jim recognizes that our bodies have the innate capability for self-healing — especially when the correct information and energy is supplied in combination with the correct food, supplements and herbs.)

I have said this before and I quote my Grandmother: “We are what we eat.” By keeping a watchful eye on our potential accidental intake of fluoride and chlorine, and ingesting good natural sources of iodine such as sushi, California rolls (the outer seaweed wrap is a good source) and marinated seaweed salad (see top photo), our health could be well-served. I encourage you to ask your naturopath and nutritionist about excellent supplemental sources of this essential trace element — but do consult your holistically minded health professional, as the quality of nutritional supplements vary greatly.