I hope you don't forget when your mother used to advise you to eat your carrots to make sure you can see properly. The main reason was due to vitamin A. Now as you'll notice, her generous advice was a little misguided, but the concept still applies. Without Vitamin A, you will have a a lot harder time surviving a disaster.
The reason vitamin A is among your important emergency supplies
According to mom's advice, Vitamin A is essential for maintaining eyesight. The scientific term for Vitamin A is retinol, which is related to retina, the layer at the back of your eye responsible for helping you to see. Without having retinol, your retina can not work correctly. This actually starts to be noticed in the form of night blindness, however at some point can result in loss of sight.
It's especially necessary for the children under the age of five, who require it for their developing bodies. Vitamin A deficit affects 1/3rd of kids worldwide and results in approximately 670,000 deaths and the blindness of up to 500,000 more. If you are planning to live with children, it is definitely essential that vitamin A is among your emergency supplies.
In addition to eye-sight, Vitamin A plays a number of other roles within the body. It plays a big part in cellular health, that has an effect on immune function, bone metabolic process, as well as the development of blood cells. The truth that it was one of the primary vitamins found is a testament to vitamin a's noticeable effect on overall health.
The variety of forms, and sources
Prepare yourself, this part will contain some biochemistry. As we previously mentioned, the genuine form of Vitamin A is retinol, that is in fact an alcohol. This isn't a stable form seen in nature so the form you would take in originates from a plant or animal source. The primary animal source is retinyl palmate, present in fatty tissues and the major form present in plants is among four types of carotene (like carrots, get it?).
The difficulty with carotene is that it isn't easily converted into retinol in the body. Vitamin A is a fat soluble vitamin, meaning it is stored in fat. The fatty retinyl palmate is much closer to retinol than the carotenes one can find in plants. In the absence of fats, the absorption of carotenes can be as little as 1:12, below 10%!
The ultimate way to supplement vitamin A, in home as well as in the field
That said, there is a very simple way to supplement Vitamin A both at home as well as in survival situations. It is also, in my humble viewpoint, a fairly yummy option. The best source of Vitamin A available to a lot of people is eating liver.
Because Vitamin A is fat soluble, there is the ability for the body to store it in the fat and use it as needed. Because of this, it doesn't need to be taken daily. While there is a proposed daily allowance of 3,000IU, this might quickly be converted into a weekly allowance of 20,000IU. This is equal to around 300 grams of liver weekly, or half a pound. I am basing these figures from beef liver but there is Vitamin A is the liver of any animal you could think of; including fish (such as cod liver oil).
This gels perfectly with a bugout strategy of surviving in the wild. Vitamin A supplementation is difficult from a pantry survival viewpoint because lots of the plant sources just are not absorbed as effectively as animal sources. As you understand by now, all nutrients were not created equal. Thus if you intend on staying in one place, be sure you keep hunting in mind, until you intend on being a post-collapse Ray Charles.
The reason vitamin A is among your important emergency supplies
According to mom's advice, Vitamin A is essential for maintaining eyesight. The scientific term for Vitamin A is retinol, which is related to retina, the layer at the back of your eye responsible for helping you to see. Without having retinol, your retina can not work correctly. This actually starts to be noticed in the form of night blindness, however at some point can result in loss of sight.
It's especially necessary for the children under the age of five, who require it for their developing bodies. Vitamin A deficit affects 1/3rd of kids worldwide and results in approximately 670,000 deaths and the blindness of up to 500,000 more. If you are planning to live with children, it is definitely essential that vitamin A is among your emergency supplies.
In addition to eye-sight, Vitamin A plays a number of other roles within the body. It plays a big part in cellular health, that has an effect on immune function, bone metabolic process, as well as the development of blood cells. The truth that it was one of the primary vitamins found is a testament to vitamin a's noticeable effect on overall health.
The variety of forms, and sources
Prepare yourself, this part will contain some biochemistry. As we previously mentioned, the genuine form of Vitamin A is retinol, that is in fact an alcohol. This isn't a stable form seen in nature so the form you would take in originates from a plant or animal source. The primary animal source is retinyl palmate, present in fatty tissues and the major form present in plants is among four types of carotene (like carrots, get it?).
The difficulty with carotene is that it isn't easily converted into retinol in the body. Vitamin A is a fat soluble vitamin, meaning it is stored in fat. The fatty retinyl palmate is much closer to retinol than the carotenes one can find in plants. In the absence of fats, the absorption of carotenes can be as little as 1:12, below 10%!
The ultimate way to supplement vitamin A, in home as well as in the field
That said, there is a very simple way to supplement Vitamin A both at home as well as in survival situations. It is also, in my humble viewpoint, a fairly yummy option. The best source of Vitamin A available to a lot of people is eating liver.
Because Vitamin A is fat soluble, there is the ability for the body to store it in the fat and use it as needed. Because of this, it doesn't need to be taken daily. While there is a proposed daily allowance of 3,000IU, this might quickly be converted into a weekly allowance of 20,000IU. This is equal to around 300 grams of liver weekly, or half a pound. I am basing these figures from beef liver but there is Vitamin A is the liver of any animal you could think of; including fish (such as cod liver oil).
This gels perfectly with a bugout strategy of surviving in the wild. Vitamin A supplementation is difficult from a pantry survival viewpoint because lots of the plant sources just are not absorbed as effectively as animal sources. As you understand by now, all nutrients were not created equal. Thus if you intend on staying in one place, be sure you keep hunting in mind, until you intend on being a post-collapse Ray Charles.
About the Author:
Thank you for reading! Terrance Franklin writes about survival and nutrition on a number of sites on the web. For more information on emergency supplies, be sure to check out emergency supplies. And for even deeper reading, follow the link at this site
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