History of Nutrition
Nutritional discoveries from the earliest days of history have had a positive effect on our health and well-being. The word nutrition itself means “The process of nourishing or being nourished, especially the process by which a living organism assimilates food and uses it for growth and replacement of tissues.” Nutrients are substances that are essential to life which must be supplied by food.
Today more than ever, obtaining nutritional knowledge can make a big difference in our lives. Air, soil, and water pollution in addition to modern farming techniques, have depleted our soils of vital minerals. The widespread use of food additives, chemicals, sugar and unhealthy fats in our diets contributes to many of the degenerative diseases of our day such as cancer, heart disease, arthritis and osteoporosis. Here is a brief history of the science that offers the hope of improving our health naturally.
460 – 377 B.C. – Hippocrates, the "Father of Medicine", said to his students, "Let thy food be thy medicine and thy medicine be thy food". He also said “A wise man should consider that health is the greatest of human blessings.
Born of a family of priest-physicians, and inheriting all in traditions and prejudices, Hippocrates was the first to cast superstition aside, and to base the practice of medicine on the principles of inductive philosophy. He changed the course of Greek medicine with his certainty that disease was not caused by gods or spirits but was the result of natural action. Hippocrates based his principles and practice on the theory of the existence of a spiritual restoring essence or principle, the vis medicatrix naturae, in the management of which the art of the physician consisted. He largely employed powerful medicines and bloodletting both ordinary and by cupping. He advises, however, great caution in their application. He placed great dependence on diet and regimen, and here, quaint as many of his directions may now sound, not only in themselves, but in the reasons given, there is much which is still adhered to at the present day. His treatise Airs, Waters, and Places contains the first enunciation of the principles of public health. He is credited with healing many, including the king of Macedonia whom he examined and helped to recover from TB. Hippocrates favored the use of diet and exercise as cures but realized that some people, unable to follow such directions, would need medicine. His writings teach that physical handling could cure some physical troubles, like a dislocated hip, by the doctor moving it back into place. In A Short History of Medicine E. A. Ackerknecht summed it up: "For better or worse Hippocrates observed sick people, not diseases." This attitude is a timely solution to those who formerly insisted on the coldly scientific approach of the Hippocratic physician, who seemed to be so callous toward his patient.
400 B.C. -- Foods were often used as cosmetics or as medicines in the treatment of wounds. In some of the early Far-Eastern biblical writings, there were references to food and health. One story describes the treatment of eye disease, now known to be due to a vitamin A deficiency, by squeezing the juice of liver onto the eye. Vitamin A is stored in large amounts in the liver.
1200’s A.D. -- The king of England proclaimed the first food regulatory law, the Assize of Bread, which prohibited bakers from mixing ground peas and beans into bread dough. Ever since, it has been a cat and mouse game between the food industry and the public (fast forward to China 2008 – cheap poisonous melamine in milk powder). In the US, food regulation dates back to early colonial times. Here is a brief overview of the last 150 years of government and industry food regulation:
1500’s -- Leonardo da Vinci, scientist and artist, compared the process of metabolism in the body to the burning of a candle.
1753 -- Dr. James Lind, a physician in the British Navy, wrote A Treatise of the Scurvy where he detailed the first scientific experiment in nutrition. At that time, sailors were sent on long voyages for years and they developed scurvy (a painful, deadly, bleeding disorder). Only non-perishable foods such as dried meat and breads were taken on the voyages, as fresh foods wouldn't’t last. In his experiment, Lind gave some of the sailors sea water, others vinegar, and the rest limes. Those given the limes were saved from scurvy. As Vitamin C wasn’t discovered until the 1930’s, Lind didn’t know it was the vital nutrient. As a note, British sailors using limes became known as “Limey’s”.
1770 -- Antoine Lavoisier, the “Father of Nutrition and Chemistry” discovered the actual process by which food is metabolized. He also demonstrated where animal heat comes from. In his equation, he describes the combination of food and oxygen in the body, and the resulting giving off of heat and water.
Early 1800’s – It was discovered that foods are composed primarily of four elements: carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen and oxygen, and methods were developed for determining the amounts of these elements.
1816-1908 -- Antoine Béchamp, MD, PhD. On the 16th of October, 1816, at Bassing, in the department of Bas-Rhein, (France, since ceded to Germany), was born a child by whose name in the nineteenth century came to be known as Antoine Béchamp, He should have been recognized in the same way as Copernicus, Galileo and Newton. Unfortunately the magnitude of what professor Béchamp's decades of research had to offer was buried and discredited by a jealous and flamboyant student named Louis Pasteur.
Antoine Béchamp died on the 15th of April, 1908, fourteen days after he was first visited by an aged American physician who had been in correspondence over the past several years on the subject of research and wonderful discoveries of Professor Béchamp and his collaborators. The American physician made his visit to Paris for the purpose of becoming personally acquainted with Professor Béchamp, who, as his family stated, had looked forward with eager anticipation to such a visit. The translator had previously submitted to the professor, an extensive summary of his physiological and biological discoveries, and by him it was revised and approve.
The information to follow was intended to be introduced as a special chapter in an extensive work on inoculations and their relations to pathology, upon which the translator of this work had been engaged, almost exclusively, for some fourteen years.
"In the lengthy and nearly daily interviews between Professor Béchamp and myself before the his death, I suggested that instead of a summary it would be better to place before the English speaking peoples, an exact translation into their language. Some of the more important discoveries of Professor Béchamp, in my opinion, would not be easy to convey. Especially that "conspiracy of silence" by means of which the discoveries of Béchamp had been buried in favor of distorted plagiarisms. Such as the Microbian or Germ Theory of disease, "the greatest scientific silliness of the age," it had been correctly styled by the Professor.
To this suggestion Professor Béchamp gave hearty assent, and told me to proceed exactly as I might think best for the proliferation of the great truths of biology, physiology, and of pathology discovered by him. He authorized me to freely publish either summaries or translations into English, as I might deem most advisable.
In pursuance of this authorization, the present volume is published and is intended to introduce to the peoples of the English tongue the great discoveries of Professor Béchamp.
The subject of the work is described by its title, but it is well to remind the medical researcher and to inform the lay public, that the problem of the coagulation of the blood, so beautifully solved in this volume, has until now been an enigma and opprobrium to biologists, physiologists and pathologists. The professor was in his 85th year at the time of the publication of the translated work . To the best of the translator's knowledge it has not yet been plagiarized and is the only one of the Professor's more important discoveries which has not been so treated. Because at the date of its publication the arch plagiarist (Pasteur) was dead, though his evil work still lives.
One of the discoveries of Bechamp was the formation of urea by the oxidation of albuminoid matters (Annales Physiques et Chimiques, 3d., Vol XLVIII p348 (1856) C.R. Vol XLIII p348). The fact, a novel one at the time, was hotly disputed, but is now definitely settled in accordance with Bechamp's view. His memoir described in detail the experimental demonstration of a physiological hypothesis of the origin of the urea and of the organism, which had been supposed to proceed from the destruction of nitrogenous matter.
By a long series of exact experiments he demonstrated clearly the specificity of the albuminoid matters and he fractionized it into numerous defined species of albuminoid matters described theretofore as constituting a single definite compound.
He introduced new yet simple processes of experimentation of great value. This enabled him to publish a list of definite compounds and to isolate a series of soluble ferments to which he gave the name of zymases. To obscure his discoveries, the name of diastases has often been given to these ferments, but that of zymas must be restored. He also showed the importance of these soluble products (the zymases) which are secreted by living organisms.
He was thus led to the study of fermentations. Contrary to the then generally received chemical theory, he demonstrated that the alcoholic fermentation of beer-yeast was of the same order as the phenomena which characterize the regular performance of an act of animal life - digestion. In 1856 he showed that molds1 transformed cane sugar into invert sugar (glucose) in the same manner as does the inverting ferment secreted by beer yeast. The development of these molds is aided by certain salts, impeded by others, but without molds there is no transformation. He showed that a sugar solution treated with precipitated calcic carbonate does not undergo inversion when care is taken to prevent the access to it of external germs, whose presence in the air was originally demonstrated by him (Repertoire de Chimie pure, 1859, Vol. I. p. 69).
If a solution of the calcareous rock, Mendon or Sens be added instead of pure calcic carbonate, molds appear and the inversion takes place (Role de la craic dans les fermentations, Bull. Soc. Chim., 1866, Vol. VI. p. 484).
These molds under the microscope, are seen to be formed by a collection of molecular granulations which Béchamp named microzymas. Though not found in pure calcic carbonate, they are found in geological calcareous strata. Béchamp established that they were living beings capable of inverting sugar and some of them to make it ferment. He also showed that these granulations under certain conditions evolved into bacteria.
To enable these discoveries to be appropriated by another, the name microbe was later applied to them. This term is better known than that of microzyma.(a) The original name must be restored and the word microbe must be erased from the language of science into which it has introduced an overwhelming confusion. It is also an etymological solecism.
Beuchamp denied spontaneous generation, while Pasteur continued to believe it. Later Pasteur denied spontaneous generation, but he did not understand his own experiments. Those experiments were of no value against the arguments of the sponteparist Pouchet, which could be answered only by the microzymian theory. Pasteur never understood either the process of digestion nor that of fermentation, both of which processes were explained by Béchamp. By a curious imbroglio (was it intentional?) both of these discoveries have been ascribed to Pasteur.
About Dr. Lister it was said, "he most probably derived his knowledge of antisepsis (which Béchamp had discovered) from Pasteur". This is rendered probable by the following peculiar facts. In the earlier antiseptic operations of Dr. Lister the patients died in great numbers, so that it came to be a gruesome sort of medical joke to say that "the operation was successful, but the patient died." But he was a surgeon of great skill and observation, and he gradually reduced his employment of antiseptic material to the necessary and not too large dose, and then his operations were successful and his patients lived. [a. The Greeks used the term macrobe to signify persons whose lives were of long duration. By analogy, microbe would be appropriate to persons whose lives are of short duration. Béchamp proved that his microzymas were of immense longevity; hence to them the term macrobe might have been applicable, though that of microzyma, meaning small ferment, is not less so. So, contrasting the life term,—while the microzymas might be termed macrobes, men would be microbes. —Trans.]
Had he learned his technique from the discoverer of antisepsis (Béchamp), he would have saved his earlier patients. But deriving it second hand from a savant who did not understand the principle he was plagiarizing, Lister had to acquire his subsequent knowledge of the proper technique through his practice, i.e., at the cost of his earlier patients.
Béchamp carried further the aphorism of Virchow - Omnis cellula e cellula - which the state of microscopical art and science at that time had not enabled the latter to achieve. Not the cellule but the microzyma must, thanks to Béchamp's discoveries, be today regarded as the unit of life. For the cellules are themselves transient and are built up by the microzymas, which, physiologically, are imperishable, as he has clearly demonstrated.
Béchamp studied the diseases of the silk worm then (1866) ravaging the Southern provinces of France and soon discovered that there were two of them - one, the pebrine, which is due to a parasite;2 the other, the flacherie, which is constitutional. A month later, Pasteur in a report to the Academy of his first silkworm campaign, denied the parasite, saying of Béchamp's observation, "that is an error." Yet in his second report, he adopted it, as though it were his own discovery!
The foregoing is but a very imperfect list of the labors and discoveries of Béchamp, of which the work now translated was the crowning glory.
The present work describes the latest of all the admirable biological discoveries of Professor Béchamp. It is proposed to follow it up with a translation of The Theory of the Microzymas and the Microbian System now in course of translation, and The Microzymas, the translation whereof is completed. Other works will, it is hoped, follow, viz.: The Great Medical Problems, the first part of which is ready for the printer, Vinous Fermentation, translation complete; New Researches upon the Albuminoids, also complete, etc., etc.
The study of these and of the other discoveries of Professor Béchamp will produce a new departure and a sound basis for the sciences of biology, physiology and pathology. Today, it is hoped this information will bring the medical profession back from floating in chaotic uncertainty and confusion; to the right path of investigation.
1840 -- Justus Liebig of Germany, a pioneer in early plant growth studies, was the first to point out the chemical makeup of carbohydrates, fats and proteins. Carbohydrates were made of sugars, fats were fatty acids, and proteins were made up of amino acids.
1851-1940 -- John H. Tilden, MD. Dr. John H. Tilden, the son of a physician, was born in Van Burenburg, Illinois, on January 21, 1851. He received his medical education at the Eclectic Medical Institute, Cincinnati, Ohio, a medical school founded in 1830 as a protest against the allopathic and homeopathic schools of medicine of that time. He was graduated in 1872, with the degree of doctor of medicine. From the best information we can obtain, his father was a Dr. Joseph G. Tilden, who came from Vermont in 1837 to Kentucky, in which State he married.
Dr. John H. Tilden started the practice of medicine at Nokomis, Illinois, then for a year at St. Louis, Missouri, and then at Litchfield, Illinois, until 1890, when he moved to Denver, Colorado. In Denver he located in the downtown business section, in an office with other doctors. Later he established a sanitarium in an outer section of the city. This sanitarium and school he conducted until 1924, when he sold the Institution, for about half of what he had plowed back into its development, to a Dr. Arthur Voss of Cincinnati, Ohio, intending to devote himself to writing and lecturing. However, he soon became discontented without his school and after a period he bought two residences on Pennsylvania Avenue, in Denver, united them into one and opened a new sanitarium and school, having to borrow from a friend a part of the money with which to make the purchases. This probably was in 1926. This school continued until the Doctor's death, on September 1, 1940.
It was during the early years of his practice in Illinois, that Dr. Tilden began to question the use of medicine to cure illness. His extensive reading, especially of medical studies from European medical schools, and his own thinking, led him to the conclusion that there should be some way to live so as not to build disease, and in this period his thoughts on toxemia began to formulate and materially develop. From the beginning of his practice in Denver, the Doctor used no medicine but practiced his theory of clearing the body of toxic poison and then allowing nature to make the cure, teaching his patients how to live so as not to create a toxic condition and to retain a healthy body free of disease. An uncompromising realist and a strict disciplinarian, the Doctor wasted no time on those who would not relinquish degenerating habits, but to his patients and disciples he was both friend and mentor.
In 1900 he began the publication of a monthly magazine called "The Stuffed Club," which continued until 1915, when he changed the name to "The Philosophy of Health," and in 1926 the name was changed to "Health Review and Critique." His writing for his publication was almost entirely done in the early morning hours, from three until seven. The purpose of the publication was not to make money but to spread knowledge of the Doctor's teachings. In time it attained a wide circulation, not only in this country but also abroad, even in Australia, but it never produced revenue, for the Doctor refused to make it an advertising medium, as often urged to do by advertising firms. As his death revealed, after sixty-eight years of practice, the Doctor had accumulated only an exceedingly modest estate. His life was pre-eminently one of self-sacrifice and of devotion to service, searching after truth, with an indomitable will and with an intense fortitude to adhere to the truth when discovered. In his day the Doctor's thoughts received no support from the established medical profession but brought the strongest of opposition and condemnation.
1862 -- President Lincoln launches the Department of Agriculture and the Bureau of Chemistry, the predecessor of the Food and Drug Administration.
1870-1948 -- Weston A. Price, DDS. The moniker “Charles Darwin of Nutrition” has been designated to Dr. Weston A. Price. In attempting to find the causes of dental decay and physical degeneration of teeth, he took his knowledge outside the lab and toured the world to study human beings.
In the early 1930s, he studied isolated groups, such as secluded villages in Switzerland, Gaelic communities in the Outer Hebrides, Eskimos and Native Americans of North America, Melanesian and Polynesian South Sea Islanders, African tribes, Australian Aborigines, New Zealand Maori and the Native Americans of South America. In all cases, Dr. Price found that the characteristics of beautiful straight teeth, freedom from decay, stalwart bodies and resistance to disease were typical of the indigenous populations who were accustomed to traditional diets which were rich in essential food factors. After analyzing the foods consumed by isolated primitive peoples, Dr. Price discovered that they furnished at least four times the water-soluble vitamins, calcium and other minerals, and at least 10 times the fat-soluble vitamins from animal foods, such as butter, shellfish, fish eggs and organ meats. Another part of Dr. Prices findings was that these primitive people living on their natural diet, not tainted from what he called the foods of commerce (white sugar and white flour) had little or no signs of degenerative disease or dental caries. His studies were the first to point out that these isolated groups with only 0.1% dental caries consistently had blood chemistry readings of 10 parts calcium and 4 parts phosphorus.
These discoveries and conclusions are presented in Dr. Price’s classic volume Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, available from the International Foundation for Nutrition and Health. This book contains stunning photographs of handsome and healthy peoples and illustrates the physical ultimate degeneration of native human groups when they discard nourishing traditional diets and replace them with modern convenience foods.
1883-1934 -- Henry R. Harrower, MD. Dr. Henry R. Harrower was one of the early pioneering endocrinologists during the first half of the 20th century. His textbook, "Practical Endocrinology" is the foundation of many of today's writings on endocrinology. It was first published by the Harrower laboratories in Glendale California in 1932 and later re-published by the Lee Foundation for Nutritional Research. In this text Dr. Harrower goes into an extensive discussion on the endocrine system and the relationships between the different glands.
Dr. Harrower and many of his colleagues found themselves under attack for their use of endocrine extracts; many of these extracts were used in a homeopathic manner which was looked upon with disfavor by the fledgling pharmaceutical industry. Because of his work in 1921, Harvey Cushing, a noted neurosurgeon and endocrinologist, headed an assault on practitioners doing pluriglandular therapy, singling out Dr. Harrower and his work as a non-scientific approach to medicine.
Dr. Harrower's academic contributions to the understanding of the relationships of the glands that make up the endocrine system unfortunately were not the focus of his adversaries towards the end of his life. Their total focus was on the natural endocrine extracts produced by Harrower laboratories which overshadowed these academic contributions. Today Harrower's endocrine chart shows those functional co-relationships in a classic manner that can never be denied.
1893-1975 -- Dr. Henry G. Bieler. Dr. Harvey G. Bieler was a prominent American physician to the Hollywood stars.” He was widely recognized as a pioneer in alternative medicine who used non-pharmaceutical, diet-based therapies to cure or control various diseases including asthma, diabetes, and cancer.[1][2] One of his well known remedies was Bieler's Broth a very effective detoxifying and cleansing vegetable broth.
Dr. Bieler convictions about whole foods and their therapeutic value stirred up a hornets nest with the pharmaceutical companies and the food manufacturers in Southern California. He was interviewed about his unorthodox opinion on health for an article in the Los Angeles Times, this article ruffled a few feathers in 1961 when it was released, “My position is improper foods cause disease; proper foods cure disease. Nothing else needs to be said.”
He also wrote in 1965 in his book Food Is Your Best Medicine “As a practicing physician for over 50 years, I have reached three basic conclusions as to the cause and cure of disease. The first is that the primary cause of disease is not germs. Rather, I believe that disease is caused by toxemia which results in cellular impairment and breakdown, thus paving the way for the multiplication and onslaught of other complications.”
“My second conclusion is that in almost all cases the use of drugs in treating patients is harmful. Drugs often cause serious side effects, and sometimes even create new diseases. The dubious benefits they afford the patient are at best temporary. Yet the number of drugs on the market increases geometrically every year as each chemical firm develops its own variation of the compounds. The physician is indeed rare who can be completely aware of the potential danger from the side effects of all of these drugs.”
“My third conclusion is that disease can be cured through the proper use of the correct foods. This statement may sound deceptively simple, but I have arrived at it only after intensive study of a highly complex subject: toxemia and endocrine chemistry.
”My conclusions are based on experimental and observational results, gathered through years of successfully treating patients. Occasionally I have resorted to the use of drugs in an emergency situation, but those times have been rare. Instead, I have sought to prescribe for my patients’ illnesses antidotes which Nature has placed at their disposal.”
Dr. Bieler came under the lifelong influence of Dr. Martin Fischer, a physiologist and philosopher while studying medicine at the University of Cincinnati. Due to his college experiences, the influence of Dr. John H. Tilden and his writings on toxicity he went on to study nutrition and endocrinology in hospitals and diet centers in London, Berlin, Paris, Vienna and Rome in 1933 and in 1935 he continued his studies in Mexico City and Honolulu. For over fifty years Dr. Bieler’s belief in the therapeutic property of whole natural foods was the cornerstone of his medical practice.
Henry Bieler was born in 1893 in Milford, Ohio. In about 1905 his family moved to Cincinnati, Ohio. He studied medicine at the Ohio-Miami Medical College and graduating with his medical license in 1916. He started his medical practice in West Virginia's coal region, moving to Idaho in about 1922, followed by a move to Pasadena, CA in 1926, before settling permanently in Capistrano Beach, CA in 1954. Bieler practiced medicine for more fifty years, and gained a reputation as a gifted healer who was able to cure or control difficult health conditions. He died in his home in 1975.
1894-1983 -- Melvin E. Page, DDS. Dr. Melvin E. Page was born in 1894 in Picture Rocks, Pennsylvania. He was the son of a physician and the eldest of three brothers, two of whom were successful inventors. Dr. Page was one of the early pioneers in nutritional biochemistry. After one year in college, Dr. Page discontinued his studies and embarked on a career as a school teacher. After two years, he decided to return to the University of Michigan where he obtained his Doctor of Dental Surgery degree, was made Captain in the ROTC, became middle weight boxing champion, and a member of Sigma Epsilon Fraternity.
In 1919, Dr. Page began a successful dental practice in Muskegon, Michigan. where he became known as one of the top prosthodontists in the country. He invented dentures based on engineering principles which diminish trauma, the loss of vertical distance, and the loss of alveolar bone kept to a minimum. During this time he also became aware that it was necessary to remake the classic dentures for many of his patients within two and one-half years. Their mandibles (jaw bones) would resorb under the dentures and bridges. This is a common problem that still exists today owing to inadequate nutrition caused by over consumption of refined carbohydrates and white sugar.
In a quest to learn why the mouths of his patients deteriorated. Dr. Page studied Dr. Weston Price's work with primitive people and started his investigations at Mercy Hospital and Hackley Hospital in Muskegon. He ran more than two thousand blood chemistries and discovered that no absorption of bone occurred (and no cavities) when the calcium to phosphorus ratio were in a proportion of 10 to 4 in the blood. The Department of Dental Research of the United States Air Force confirmed his findings of a calcium/phosphorus ratio to be correct 42 years later. Dr. Page also found, according to test readings, that the blood sugar level should be at 85, plus or minus 5 (Sclavo test) and that resorption would stop when restoring the 2.5 ratio of calcium to phosphorus.
Thus, the basic research of Dr. Page uncovered the knowledge that white sugar and refined carbohydrates increases serum calcium. Calcium is drawn from the bone tissue and is then carried in the serum calcium.
Dr. Page was the youngest man to have been on the staff of either hospital. His idea that diet and nutrition could cause a biochemical condition affecting the teeth, and the fact that he dared to suggest that patients should change their eating habits and eliminate white sugar and white flour from their diet was beyond acceptability. He was ostracized by his professional colleagues for his approach and so he temporarily terminated his research in blood chemistry at the hospital.
Dr. Page decided to leave Michigan and resettled in St. Petersburg, Florida. While waiting to acquire his dental license, he became a deep sea commercial fisherman. Once again, difficult times drove him back to nature and the outdoors which he loved. This love permeated the very heart of the practice which he established in Florida in 1940 and continued until his death. At the age of 84, this nutritional pioneer still walked a mile to and from his office almost daily. His treatment and philosophy was simple and logical. The harmful effects of the use of white sugar and refined carbohydrates can't be ignored. The harmful effects of using chemical additives and other food preservatives for the sake of “shelf life” upsets body chemistry. Using whole food Vitamins concentrates, Minerals and Digestive Enzymes to supplement daily food intake might be necessary. That milk is not the perfect food for everyone.
While in St. Petersburg, Florida Dr. Page developed a set of measurements from the elbow to the wrist and from the knee to the ankle which reflected genetic disposition. These anthropological measurements became the backbone of his practice using micro doses of endocrine extracts to balance the body chemistry from his measurements. Since most of his patients were at his clinic for a minimum of two weeks, Dr. Page would track them by checking their blood chemistry and especially the calcium phosphorus ratio every three to four days.
The Page Food Plan was developed during this time not because Dr. Page was trying to create a diet but simply because he noticed certain foods upset the body chemistry more than others. His food plan was developed on the glycemic index encouraging patients to eat unlimited quantities of green leafy vegetables. Ironically, today Dr. Page is better known for his diet than for the anthropological measurements which are amazingly accurate.
In the early 1960s Dr. Page found himself and his method of practice under scrutiny from the federal government when he was indicted for practicing outside his scope of practice. After a lengthy trial in which Dr. Page introduced over 3600 case studies and was able to substantiate his findings with over 40,000 blood tests as well as 35 years of research a federal judge found him not guilty. The judge went on to reprimand the American Medical Association and the FDA for not trying to figure out what he was doing rather than harassing him.
Dr. Page was a member of the Academy 100 of the State of Florida, of the New York Academy of Science, and the International Society for Comprehensive Medicine. He was a life member of the American Dental Association. He was a Fellow of the International College of Applied Nutrition and of the Royal Society of Health (England). Recognition certificates from many associations and professional fraternities, too many to list, lined one complete wall of his office. He published numerous articles on his work in nutrition in such periodicals as the Journal of the American Dental Association, Applied Nutrition, the Western Society of Periodontology, Nutrition and Health, Prosthodontics, the Dental Digest and Prevention Magazine as well.
Dr. Page was a true pioneer in his work and research. He went ahead with his ideas despite tremendous adversities launched by colleagues in the dental and medical profession, as well as the press and others who scoffed at his forward-thinking ideas.
Only today are we gaining a fuller understanding of the value of Dr. Page’s research into Calcium-Phosphorus levels and how it works in the balancing of body chemistry. His unique system of graphing the endocrine system has proven extremely valuable in determining a more encompassing comprehension of a person’s genetic potential for life. Dr. Page, using the system he developed, consistently was successful in healing many of the degenerative diseases most common today.
1895-1967 -- Royal Lee, DDS. Dr. Lee's family emigrated from Norway in 1845 and settled in the Milwaukee area. It was here that Dr. Lee's great intellect and mechanical genius first began to manifest itself. While in high school, he convinced the principal to allow him to teach an advanced physics course. Completing formal training as a dentist at the age of 24 at Marquette University, he focused on the connection between dental caries and improper nutrition. Dr. Lee became interested in nutrition at a very young age. By age 16, he had catalogued most of the nutritional references in print at that time. The events leading to his discovery of Catalyn are quite profound. In 1929, his mother came down with a strange flu, and was diagnosed with a bad heart. She was given six months to live. When Dr. Lee heard about his mother's prognosis, he immediately went to work on what would later be known as Catalyn. He brought her this potent vitamin and quickly she began to improve. In fact, she lived for another 12 years (into her 80's ). His great love for his family, as well as his love for humanity in general, motivated him to discover other whole-food supplements, and eventually led to the founding of Standard Process, Inc..
Around 1937, Dr. Lee conceived the Endocardiograph (an earlier prototype of what is now known as the Acoustic CardioGraph), a tool for graphing heart sounds and a means for measuring nutritional status. Previously, most nutritionally-minded healthcare providers had depended on the stethoscope for a reading of the heart. Dr. Lee realized how subjective this technique could be, this motivated him to invent the Endocardiograph. This tool provided the practitioner with an accurate and detailed recording for evaluation. For his outstanding work in the field of human nutrition, Dr. Lee was the recipient of many awards, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science's highest award, which appointed him Fellow in 1942. Dr. Royal Lee was a maverick in the field of nutrition, providing the healthcare provider with the tools to determine nutritional deficits and the means to treat those same deficits.
1897 -- Christiaan Eijkman, a Dutchman working with natives in Java, observed that some of the natives developed a disease called Beriberi, which caused heart problems and paralysis. He observed that when chickens were fed the native diet of white rice, they developed the symptoms of Beriberi. When he fed the chickens unprocessed brown rice (with the outer bran intact), they did not develop the disease. Eijkman then fed brown rice to his patients and they were cured. He disovered that food could cure disease. Nutritionists later learned that the outer rice bran contains vitamin B1, also known as thiamine.
1901-1967 -- Francis M. Pottenger Jr., MD. Independent and original thinkers have always been at the forefront of crucial advances in medicine and dentistry. Common elements of their findings have included observation, imagination, integrity and common sense. Dr. Francis A. Pottenger was such a man. He applied the principles of nutrition and endocrinology early in his practice. Dr. Pottenger was a pioneer in using crude extracts of the adrenal cortex for allergic states and the syndrome of depletion. In his practice, he always highlighted proper diet based on the principles discovered by Weston Price. He was known for his classical experiments in cat feeding because he discovered a disproportionately high level of high mortality among cats undergoing adrenalectomy. A chance observation about their food led to his experimentation.
More than 900 cats were observed during a 10-year period. Dr. Pottenger discovered that a diet consisting exclusively of raw milk and raw meat was the only adequate intake which insured the maintenance of optimal health for the cats. Cats on the all-raw diet showed good bone structure with wide palates and plenty of space for the teeth as well as excellent bone density, shiny fur, and lack of parasites and disease. They reproduced with ease and were gentle and easy to handle. Cooking the meat, or substituting heat processed milks for raw, resulted in heterogeneous reproduction and physical degeneration that escalated with each successive generation. Kittens of the third generation did not survive six months.
There was an abundance of parasites and vermin while skin diseases and allergies increased from an incidence of five percent in normal cats to over 90 percent in the third generation of deficient cats. Bones became soft and pliable and the cats suffered from adverse personality changes. Males became docile while females became more aggressive. The cats suffered from most of the degenerative diseases encountered in human medicine and died out totally by the fourth generation. The changes in facial structure and beginning of degenerative diseases that Dr. Pottenger observed in cats on deficient diets mirrored the human degeneration that Dr. Price found in tribes and villages that had abandoned traditional foods.
1906 -- -- The original Food and Drugs Act is passed. It prohibits interstate commerce in mis-branded and adulterated foods, drinks and drugs. Harvey Washington Wiley (October 18, 1844 – June 30, 1930) was a noted chemist best known for his leadership in the passage of the landmark Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 and his subsequent work at the Good Housekeeping Institute laboratories. He was the first commissioner of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and was awarded the Elliott Cresson Medal of The Franklin Institute in 1910. He fought many battles against adulterated food, but probably his biggest was against synthetic sweeteners—mostly adulterated corn products like glucose to corn sugar and now fructose corn syrup. One challenge was to force the corn products company to stop using flourine in the making of wheat flour. Dr. Wiley was forced out of office by big food companies who had a vested interest in adulterating food for commerce instead of nutrition. Commerce has always been for money, not for health.
1906 -- In the aftermath of “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair, which detailed the horrendous sanitary and working conditions in the meatpacking industry, the Meat Inspection Act is passed.
1912 -- E.V. McCollum, while working for the U.S. Department of Agriculture at the University of Wisconsin, developed an approach that opened the way to the widespread discovery of nutrients. He decided to work with rats rather than large farm animals like cows and sheep. Using this procedure, he discovered the first fat soluble vitamin, Vitamin A. He found that rats fed butter were healthier than those fed lard, as butter contains more Vitamin A.
1912 -- Dr. Casmir Funk was the first to coin the term “vitamins” as vital factors in the diet. He wrote about these unidentified substances present in food, which could prevent the diseases of scurvy, beriberi and pellagra (a disease caused by a deficiency of niacin, vitamin B-3). The term vitamin is derived from the words vital and amine, because vitamins are required for life and they were originally thought to be amines -- compounds derived from ammonia.
1924 -- The Supreme Court rules that the Food and Drugs Act condemns every statement, design, or device on a product’s label that may mislead or deceive, even if technically true.
1930’s -- William Rose discovered the essential amino acids, the building blocks of protein.
1938 -- A revised and expanded Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic (FDC) Act of 1938 is passed. Highlights include: safe tolerances to be set for unavoidable poisonous substances, standards of identity, quality, and fill-of-container to be set for foods, and authorization of factory inspections.
1939 -- First Food Standards issued (for canned tomatoes, tomato purée, and tomato paste).
1940’s -- The water soluble B and C vitamins were identified.
1940’s -- Russell Marker perfected a method of synthesizing the female hormone progesterone from a component of wild yams called diosgenin.
1949 -- FDA publishes guidance to industry for the first time, called “Procedures for the Appraisal of the Toxicity of Chemicals in Food,” (aka the “black book”)
1950 -- Oleomargarine Act requires prominent labeling of colored oleomargarine, to distinguish it from butter. (Yes, swindlers tried to sell folks cheap margarine in the guise of butter.)
1958 -- Food Additives Amendment enacted, requiring manufacturers of new food additives to establish safety. Going forward, manufacturers were required to declare all additives in a product.
1958 -- FDA publishes the first list of food substances generally recognized as safe (GRAS).
1962 -- President Kennedy proclaims the Consumer Bill of Rights. Included are the right to safety, the right to be informed, the right to choose, and the right to be heard.
1965 -- Fair Packaging and Labeling Act requires all consumer products in interstate commerce to be honestly and informatively labeled, including food.
1968 -- Linus Pauling, a Nobel Prize winner in chemistry, created the term Orthomolecular Nutrition. Orthomolecular is, literally, "pertaining to the right molecule". Pauling proposed that by giving the body the right molecules in the right concentration (optimum nutrition), nutrients could be used by people to achieve better health and prolong life. Studies in the 1970's and 1980's conducted by Pauling and colleagues suggested that very large doses of vitamin C given intravenously could be helpful in increasing the survival time and improving the quality of life of terminal cancer patients.
1971 -- Artificial sweetener saccharin, included in FDA’s original GRAS (generally recognized as safe) list, is removed from the list pending new scientific study.
1973 – The year Stanley Adams, Roche's World Product Manager in Basel, contacted the European Economic Community with evidence that Roche had been breaking antitrust laws, engaging in price fixing and market sharing for vitamins with its competitors. Roche was fined accordingly, but a bungle on the part of the EEC allowed the company to discover that it was Adams who had blown the whistle. He was arrested for unauthorised disclosure — an offence under Swiss law — and imprisoned. His wife, having learnt that he might face decades in jail, committed suicide. Adams was released soon after but arrested again more than once before eventually fleeing to Britain, where he wrote a book about the affair, Roche Versus Adams.
In 1999 Roche was the worldwide market leader in vitamins, with a market share of 40%. Between 1990 and 1999, the company continued to participate in an illegal price fixing cartel for vitamins, which also included BASF and Rhone-Poulenc SA. In 1999, Roche pleaded guilty in the United States and paid a US$500 million fine, then the largest fine ever secured in the U.S. The European Commission fined Roche €462 million for the same infraction in 2001, also a record fine at the time. Roche sold its vitamin business in late 2002 to the Dutch group DSM.
Note: Price fixing is an agreement between participants on the same side in a market to buy or sell a product, service, or commodity only at a fixed price, or maintain the market conditions such that the price is maintained at a given level by controlling supply and demand. The intent of price fixing may be to push the price of a product as high as possible, leading to profits for all sellers but may also have the goal to fix, peg, discount, or stabilize prices. The defining characteristic of price fixing is any agreement regarding price, whether expressed or implied requiring a conspiracy between sellers or buyers in order to coordinate pricing for mutual benefit of the traders.
1973 -- California Certified Organic Farmers (CCOF) is formed. Begins with 54 farmers mutually certifying each other’s adherence to its own published, publicly available standards for defining organic produce.
1977 -- Bowing to industry pressure, the Saccharin Study and Labeling Act is passed by Congress to stop the FDA from banning the chemical sweetener. The act does require a label warning that saccharin has been found to cause cancer in laboratory animals.
1980 -- Infant Formula Act establishes special FDA controls to ensure necessary nutritional content and safety.
1980 -- The USDA Food and Nutrition Information Center (FNIC) publishes the 1980 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. The guidelines are to be updated every 5 years. In 1980 there were 7 relatively simple guidelines. In the 2005 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, there were 41 recommendations in a 71 page booklet!!!
1982 -- FDA publishes first “red book” (successor to 1949 “black book”), officially known as “Toxicological Principles for the Safety Assessment of Direct Food Additives and Color Additives Used in Food”.
1990 -- Nutrition Labeling and Education Act (NLEA) is passed. It requires all packaged foods to bear nutrition labeling and all health claims for foods to be consistent with terms defined by the Secretary of Health and Human Services. As a concession to food manufacturers, the FDA authorizes some health claims for foods. The food ingredient panel, serving sizes, and terms such as “low fat” and “light” are standardized. This is pretty much the nutrition label as we know it today.
1991 -- Nutrition facts, basic per-serving nutritional information, are required on foods under the Nutrition Labeling and Education Act of 1990. Food labels are to list the most important nutrients in an easy-to-follow format.
1994 – 2000 -- Have you ever wondered why vitamin bottle labels and nutritional web sites include a phrase saying that their products and information are not intended to diagnose, cure or prevent any disease? These also usually state that their health claims have not been evaluated by the Food & Drug Administration (FDA). Here’s why: The Dietary and Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) was approved by Congress in October of 1994 and updated in January 2000. It sets forth what can and cannot be said about nutritional supplements without prior FDA review. While this law limits what vitamin manufacturers can claim about preventing or curing diseases, its passage has been a major milestone in the natural health field. It acknowledges the millions of people who believe dietary supplements can improve their diets and bestow good health. It opens the way for people to obtain the information they need to make the best nutritional choices for themselves.
In January of 2000, the FDA clarified that supplement makers can state their products can improve the structure or function of the body or improve common, minor symptoms. Allowable statements include things such as: “maintains a healthy heart”, “helps you relax”, “is good for symptoms of PMS”, “strengthens joint structure”, etc. Overall, due to this law, vitamin, herb and nutrient manufacturers have greater freedom to say what their products can do to improve our health.
1995 -- Saccharin Notice Repeal Act repeals the saccharin notice requirements of 1977. People can get their saccharin without having to read about its risks.
1995 -- American Heart Association initiates a food certification program including AHA’s Heart Check Symbol to appear on certain foods. Criteria is simple – low in saturated fat and cholesterol for healthy people over age 2. Oh and also, a certification payment to AHA by the food manufacturer. Now you know why sugary cereal is Heart Checked.
1998 -- Transfair, the US Fair Trade organization is established, with a mission “to build a more equitable and sustainable model of international trade that benefits producers, consumers, industry and the earth”.
2002 -- The 2002 Farm Bill requires retailers provide country-of-origin (COOL) labeling for fresh beef, pork, and lamb. After repeated debilitation and stakeholder pressures, the law would finally go into effect only 6 years later, on Oct 1, 2008, and even then with many loopholes.
2002 -- The National Organic Program (NOP), enacted. It restricts the use of the term “organic” to certified organic producers. Certification is handled by state, non-profit and private agencies that have been approved by the US Department of Agriculture (USDA).
2003 -- Announcement made that FDA will require food labels to include trans fat content. Labeling went into effect in 2006.
2003 -- The FDA announced plans to permit the manufacturers of food products sold in the United States to make health claims on food labels which are supported by less than conclusive evidence. From “significant scientific consensus” before a claim can be made, industry can now rely on “Some scientific evidence” or “Very limited and preliminary scientific research” to make a health claim. Opponents criticize it as opening the door to ill-founded claims. Advocates believe it will make more information available to the public.
2004 -- Passage of the Food Allergy Labeling and Consumer Protection Act. Requires labeling of any food that contains one or more of: peanuts, soybeans, cow’s milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish, tree nuts, and wheat.
2004 -- PepsiCo launches Smartspot – designating the “more nutritious” of its products with an easy to spot symbol on the front of package. Baked Doritos in. Fried Doritos out.
2005 -- Kraft launches Sensible Solutions, a similar initiative for its gamut of products including sugar-free Jello, vitamin water, and Nabisco toasted chips.
2005 -- President’s Choice launches Blue Menu to designate its healthier products.
2006 -- Hannaford Brothers Supermarket Chain launches Guiding Stars intended to help customers choose healthy foods. Foods are ranked 0 to 3 stars, with three stars awarded to most nutritious foods. Only 20% of the supermarket stocked items are starred, but sales of these items increase by several percentage points.
2007 -- Kellogg’s launches Nutrition at a Glance based on the European Guideline Daily Amounts (GDA) system. Front of Package information includes daily percentage values for 6 nutrients: calories, total fat, sodium, sugars, vitamin A, and vitamin C.
Sept 2008 -- NuVal announced – The Nutritional Value (NuVal) System scores food on a scale of 1 to 100. The higher the NuVal Score, the higher the nutrition of a food product. The score is based on a complex and *top secret* Overall Nutritional Quality Index (ONQI) that takes into account 30 different nutrients in food.
Oct 2008 -- Mars International launches GDA labeling of its foods and snacks in the US.
Oct 2008 -- Smart Choices launched – a pan industry effort to promote a standardized benchmark for front of package consumer information. Initial supporters include General Mills, Con-Agra, Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, and Unilever.
January 2009 -- Healthy Ideas launched at Giant Foods and Stop & Shop supermarkets. Around 10% of the items qualify for this benchmark, developed by the grocers’ nutrition experts and based on FDA and USDA guidelines.
January 2009 -- Sara Lee introduces Nutritional Spotlight front of package labels for bread, bun, and bagel products. This move is in contrast to an industry wide attempt by manufacturers to create a unified Smart Choice label. This label is similar to Mars’ and Kelloggs’ recent efforts.
January 2009 -- SuperValu introduces nutritionIQ shelf signage at its Albertsons stores. The color-coded, easy-to-spot shelf tags, or cards, are supposed to aid shoppers in choosing low fat, high fiber and other good foods.
January 2009 -- Regional Grocery Chain, United Supermarkets, Introduces TAG Nutrition Labeling Program. Five color coded shelf labels point to Heart Healthy/Diabetes Management, Gluten-Free, Organic, Lean/Low-Fat for Meat and Dairy and Sugar-Free/Reduced Sugar products.
June 2009 -- SuperValu introduces Healthy Elements program for its independent retail partners.
Summer 2009 -- Smart Choices launches formally with several hundreds of products labeled with the green check mark. Froot Loops becomes the poster child for everything wrong with an industry backed nutrition rating system.
October 2009 -- The FDA sends a “Dear Manufacturer” letter to boards of the Smart Choices Program and other Front of Pack nutrition rating systems, stating its concern with the potential to mislead consumers. A week later the Smart Choices program suspends itself.
January 2010 -- Whole Foods adopts ANDI Rating System – a new rating system for foods. There wasn’t too much follow-up to this pilot and it seems to have fizzled away.
October 2010 -- The Institute of Medicine recommends only 4 nutrients be considered when preparing front of pack labels: Calories, Saturated Fat, Trans-Fat and Sodium.
December 2010 -- The USDA requires cuts of meat to display nutrition as well, starting in January 2012.
January 2011 -- The Grocery Manufacturers Association announces Nutrition Keys, a new front-of-pack labeling system, just months before the FDA is to issue its guidance to industry on the matter. Preemption anyone?
February 2011 -- Safeway announces Simple Nutrition shelf tags, boasting 22 colorful encouragements for people to buy more, not less foods.
September 2011 -- The Grocery Manufacturer’s Association renames Nutrition Keys (See January 2011) as Facts Up Front, allocating a $50 million budget to promote this initiative and preempt any regulatory ruling on the matter.
February 2012 -- Wal-Mart Launches it’s “Great for you” Seal of Approval. The standards are the most conservative to be seen from the food industry so far.
What’s next for food labels? Consumers interest groups will continue to demand more visibility and more information from manufacturers. More data will become available, but translating the wealth of information to a decision at the supermarket shelf will not necessarily become easier for consumers. Programs such as Guiding Stars and NuVal may help consumers make better decisions, but with the FDA’s renewed interest and vigor, perhaps we shall see a uniform, standardized format on all products in the not too distant future.
Visionaries see a day where each ingredient of every product on a shelf can be connected directly to the farm, factory, and other stakeholders involved in its processing. Now how do you fit all that information on a pack of gum?
Sources: FDA, USDA, AHA, IFNH, Wikipedia, company and organization websites
