Nutrient Deficiency and Early Childhood Caries

These graphs are the ones I used to show the importance that Mother's to be need to consume high nutrient foods. The statistics for Men and children are almost the same. On average, with certain vitamins, like vitamin E, 69.4% of the US population is below the USRDA, and the USRDA is sets a MINIMUM standard for life.

Table 3A.--Nutrient intakes: Percentages of individuals with diets below selected levels of the (RDAs), by sex and age, 2-day average [intakes], 1994-96

Vitamin A	Below 50% RDA	Below 75% RDA	Below 100% RDA
Women Ages 20-29	31.7%	52.8%	68.4%
Women Ages 30-39	30.5%	48.4%	61.0%

Vitamin E	Below 50% RDA	Below 75% RDA	Below 100% RDA
Women Ages 20-29	24.2%	53.6%	73.8%
Women Ages 30-39	21.6%	49.9%	71.1%

What this means is for example that on average, 73.8% of Women ages 20-29 are below meeting the level of the US RDA requirements for health. 24.2% of all Women in the US ages 20-29 do not eat meet half of the US RDA requirements for minimum nutrition related to vitamin E.

Table 3B.--

Percentage of Women who begin to near the level of Nutrients of Indigenous Peoples (In other words, the amount of nutrients our bodies really need)
Vitamin A Above     200% RDA
Women Ages 20-29 - 10.5%
Women Ages 30-39 - 11.5%

Vitamin E Above     200% RDA
Women Ages 20-29 - 3.9%
Women Ages 30-39 - 3.0%

What this means is that only 3.9% of all Women in the US eat more than twice what the US RDA recommends for health for vitamin E. In other words, only 3.9% of Women are possibly close to eating the same level of Vitamin E that Dr. Price found Indigenous peoples ate, the amount of vitamin E required for health.

Calcium

Teeth are made of calcium and phosphorus. Would it surprise you to learn, that we are far below the standard for these minerals when compared to the intake of calcium and phosphorus of our ancestors?

65.1% of Women on average are below the Standard of 1 gram of calcium per day. Only 3.7% of women are at twice the standards, which means, that going into pregnancy, approximately 96% of women are calcium deprived.

Source: Supplementary Data Tables, USDA, 1994-1996 http://www.barc.usda.gov/bhnrc/foodsurvey/home.htm

Early Childhood Tooth Decay is caused by a Nutrient Deficiency according to Weston Price

Caption Page 172: “Note the magnificent dental arches and beautiful teeth of these primitives. Tooth decay was almost unknown in many districts.”

Caption page 173: “Wherever the primitive Aborigines have been placed in reservation and fed on the white man’s foods of commerce dental caries has become rampant… Note the contrast between the primitive woman in the upper right and the three modernized women.”

Source: Weston Price, Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, Page 172, 173
Images used with permission of Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation http://www.price-pottenger.org/
Please note, these industrial foods where the same foods that white people in Australia regularly ate at the time, and so the modernized Aborigines had a similar incidence of tooth decay and other diseases as the white population versus the disease and decay resistant Aborigines on their natural diet.

Left: [Fijians] The development of the facial bones determines the size and shape of the palate and the size of the nasal passages. Note the strength of the neck of the men above and the well-proportioned faces of the girls below. Such faces are usually associated with properly proportioned bodies. Tooth decay is rare in these mouths so long as they use an adequate selection of native foods.

Right: These natives of the Fiji Islands illustrate the effect of changing from the native food to the imported foods of commerce. Tooth decay becomes rampant and with it is lost the ability to properly masticate the food. Growing children and child bearing mothers suffer most severely from dental caries.
Source: Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, Weston Price
Image used with permission of Price-Pottenger Nutrition Foundation http://www.price-pottenger.org/