You may have heard of them. You have no doubt eaten them. If you want to support your immune system, lower your cholesterol, you definitely need more of them. One specific group of phytonutrients, “plant sterols”, could influence your health now and for decades to come!
We know that eating fruit and vegetables is good for our health. But not all are rich in the nutrients we need to maintain good health.
Why would this be?
Unfortunately, modern agricultural practices have succeeded in minimizing the levels of plant sterols in fruits and vegetables through the development of modern plant varieties and the use of agrochemical crop sprays. The reason that plants produce these phytonutrients, plant sterols, is to protect themselves against fungus and insect attacks. They also have other important functions in human health such as immune balancing effects, reduce nasty inflammatory markers, and have anti-microbial activity.
When plants are sprayed with herbicides and pesticides, the immune response in the plant does not activate the natural defense mechanisms, therefore the plant produces much less of these important phytonutrients. Studies show that the everyday intake should be approximately 300 mg per day of plant sterols. (4) In fact this is not the case in the majority of our diets. One study showed that pure vegetarians were only getting 40mg per day from eating a fruit/vegetable-based diet. (5) You would think that pure vegetarians would be getting more than enough plant sterols, but in fact, they are not. This means that we have to supplement daily in order to make sure we obtain these nutrients.
But what if we don’t eat enough – Sterol Deficiency Syndrome?
The US Department of Agriculture, Research Service did a study to show that plants sprayed with herbicides and pesticides produced much less active phytonutrients than those unsprayed. In particular, the study showed resveratrol, a rich antioxidant/flavonoid from grapes much higher in vines that were unsprayed vs vines sprayed with 4 fungicides registered for grapes.
Since plant sterols have the capacity to balance the immune system, reduce nasty inflammatory markers, defend us against bacterial and even viral infections, an insufficient phytonutrients diet will lead to more issues with immune-related conditions.
Now What?
One capsule of Immuno-Care, a plant sterol, the antioxidant combination will supply the daily requirement to help bring the phytonutrient count to a healthy level. Not all sterol products are equal. Immuno-Care is enteric coated to get the nutrients into the body and bypass the acidic area of the stomach which destroys a lot of these delicate phytonutrients. No other product has this important component!