Newsweek goes insane, says antioxidants bad for health

Saturday, February 05, 2011 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: Newsweek, antioxidants, health news

(NaturalNews) Just when you think you've heard it all, a major mainstream media source goes off the deep end and says that natural antioxidants can kill you. Yes, you heard that right. Citing a few sketchy studies that contradict the bulk of published research on the subject, a report in Newsweek, presumably intended to be taken seriously, actually alleges that the antioxidants found naturally in fruits, vegetables, and various superfoods, are dangerous to your health. And you just might want to stop taking them, the report humorously states.

Of course, the idea that natural antioxidants are harmful to health is complete nonsense, as countless studies have shown they boost immunity, prevent oxidative damage, protect against the negative effects of aging, and generally improve overall health (https://www.naturalnews.com/antioxidants.html). Nevertheless, some in the mainstream media seem hellbent on slandering the very nutritional components that give us life, while remaining largely silent about the numerous detriments brought about by conventional medical interventions like pharmaceutical drugs.

The Newsweek piece quotes a British "chemist and science writer" named David Bradley as saying that "oxidizing agents," also known as free radicals, are a "front-line of immune defense against pathogens and cancer cells." He goes on to claim that because antioxidants eliminate these free radicals, they are damaging to health.

But the foundational science behind both antioxidants and the oxidative agents they target completely contradicts Bradley's unfounded statement. Oxidative stress causes the body's cells to become damaged, and this cell damage leads to a host of chronic diseases, not to mention rapid aging and health deterioration. It is the antioxidants that scavenge and root out these damaging offenders and protect the body from harm, not the other way around as the Newsweek piece suggests.

What the report suggests is to eliminate the very components needed by the body to protect against things like heart disease and cancer, in order to protect against heart disease and cancer. It literally makes no sense at all. And urging people to avoid antioxidants based on this flawed hypothesis is nothing more than highly irresponsible conjecture, which is best ignored for the sake of public health.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.anh-usa.org/newsweek-publishes-di...