A real benefit or a scam?

Written for "easy reading" in layman's terms,
this article provides an objective comparison
between "claims", scientific evidence,
and our own experiences. 

by Jon Peniel

Everyone from monks, to psychics, dietitians, doctors, researchers, etc., have their own points of view on much of what we're about to discuss. We'll get into the calcium issue soon, but first let's look at some of the things that people say it may relate to, so we can think for ourselves.

pH is what they use to measure and determine acidity, and alkalinity. The two are essentially opposite to each other. One of the most familiar things you might relate to it by, is that you have to keep swimming pools within the right pH balance, to keep it healthy and clean from things like algae. 

Well, foods, beverages, and even our bodies tissues also have various pH levels, and with bodies, you can alter it by what you consume. And whether you're too acid or too alkaline, can impact your health - sometimes very seriously.

You may remember from the Lost Teachings book, the importance the teachings place of striking the proper acid/alkaline balance through diet.

An odd thing about all that too, is that if you bought some pH strips at a drug store, and tested something like a lemon, it would show it as an acid. But it is listed as an "alkaline forming" food, because it changes after you eat it.

We’ve heard claims ranging from the prevention/healing of colds, cancer, arthritis, immune problems, senility, to a variety of other health problems,  just by keeping your dietary pH more alkaline. So true or not, that's one of the topics we'll explore here.

Besides the Lost Teachings book, some nutrition authorities have espoused diets that maintain a slightly alkaline pH in your body for overall health and well-being. 

Whether or not you're a fan of the psychic Edgar Cayce, as with most things, balance & moderation are always the way to go. Even he said during his trance readings, that if your body was more alkaline, it would keep you from getting colds or the flu, but if you went to far in that direction, it could have far more serious consequences than a mere cold.

In the past, proper nutrition, including pH balance, could be solely accomplished through dietary means by eating lots of fresh veggies and fruits (alkalizing), and eating less of the acid forming foods like meat, and most grains.  

However, for many years, soil depletion and growing methods have often created food lacking in the proper balance and complete nutrition we need. So besides the acid/alkaline balance, we also face vitamin and mineral deficiencies in the way nature intended for us to assimilate them. 

Thus we have been forced to either find or grow food with the proper nutrients (very difficult - and that doesn't just mean it being "organic"), or turn to other means to supplement what we're missing from our food.

Recently, more mainstream research has pointed to the vital connection between many health issues, pH, vitamins, minerals, and trace minerals.  Calcium is especially important and may be a key nutrient, which can help us keep pH levels optimal (along with its other functions which we'll get into later). 

I may also have mentioned the incredible health and longevity of the Hunza people. Calcium is something I believe is related to both, which I’ll explain in more detail as we go on.

CALCIUM

Apparently, this is one of the positive ways it works in the body (my opinion and paraphrased):

When your body absorbs calcium, and your body has an easier time alkalizing/oxygenating at a cellular level. Apparently, your body's enzymes work better when the tissue pH moves up out of an acid range. Then the exchange of nutrients, oxygen and waste products are all better facilitated.  

You can see where a host of health issues can be positively affected by this.  What part of your body wouldn’t be glad to get more nutrients, more oxygen use and better trash removal service? 

So what is the best way for our bodies to absorb calcium?  Possibly dairy. But in my opinion, it is more likely to be a certain type of CORAL calcium, balanced with the other nutrients necessary for absorbing it, such as vitamin D, which our bodies produce from sunlight.

I want to qualify that what I’m saying here about coral calcium, is to the best of my knowledge only. I have looked into it enough to satisfy only MY requirements that it is a very good and beneficial product, and all our monks are now taking it.  We also asked it to be checked over by an MD with an additional doctorate in chemistry, who is also a specialist in pharmaceutical development. This doctor thinks it makes good sense.

But I am not a doctor, haven't participated in any clinical research, haven’t personally seen the mine it comes from or inspected the facilities or ozone treatments they say kills any possible bacterial contamination. Nor have I conducted lab tests on it. I’m just running on intuition and what I consider my common sense or inner sense. 

That being said, I’ve heard amazing claims about it, including alkalizing the body, preventing osteoporosis, increasing oxygenation and retarding cancer. So let's discuss the background info I have on it.

Obviously calcium in some form, is essential for preventing osteoporosis, and good clinical studies have reported promising impacts in the field of anti-cancer research. 

But we’ve heard that coral calcium is used by the body better than anything else, and benefits our health in all kinds of ways. I’ve heard these things for some time, but the claims were not scientifically substantiated to my knowledge. 

But a recent claim regarding scientific evidence from clinical studies about calcium in general, gave me reason to look into it further, and check out their validity.  

They claimed of clinical studies published in the most prestigious medical journals, that show "dietary calcium" has positive effects on certain types of pre-cancerous our cancerous cells, but I didn't check out the details, and I'm sure they were not done using Coral Calcium. 

One of their claims, a recent study, gave sufficient scientific details to at least give look it up to check out their validity. It was that the Journal of the American Medical Association published research indicating that calcium cured cancer. Well, we checked that out, and yes, there was a study that indicated something along those lines. But as I recall, it was more specifically that cancer related cells in the colon returned to normal after increasing calcium intake from non-fat dairy products. Even though it isn't absolute proof of calcium curing cancer, it is still very exciting and major news in my opinion. And reason enough for me at least, to give other forms of calcium added credibility and feel better about using it myself.

Another claim I haven’t checked out, was that a scientist won a Nobel prize for essentially "discovering the cure for cancer" based on cancer cells being anaerobic (an anaerobic organism is something that does not do well or survive in an oxygen rich environment). I have not checked that claim out. But if true, it has tremendous implications, including in my uneducated opinion, a variety of possible new ways to kill cancer just by starving it of oxygen.

This is one of the sources of the claims I heard. That if coral calcium somehow helps oxygenate by altering the pH or by some other means, it could help to "suffocate" anaerobic organisms. 

So given the scientific research about increasing calcium from non-fat dairy being beneficial, the question I have, is Coral Calcium truly far more absorbable and would it have the same effects as dairy based calcium.  Again, I don't know. All I can say is I personally feel very good about it, don't use non-fat dairy products, take it myself, and so do our monks.

One of our monks who was having serious health problems related to a genetic condition, recently had a nutritional blood workup done.  The MD who analyzed it said he was so acid, that parts of his body were essentially being eaten away from the inside, and that it was so severe, he had immediate concern for his life.  He was nutritionally oriented, and prescribed major dietary changes and other things, but expected it to take about a month and a half for him to become less acidic. 

Well, the monk started taking the coral calcium, and in a few days, got another blood test that shocked the doctor – he was now in a healthy alkaline range. Was it from the calcium? Well of course we can’t say for sure scientifically. But I bet you know what my feelings are about it.

Why is calcium so important? We’re very calcium oriented beings. Next to water, I think it’s what we’re primarily made of.  And our diets have been pitifully low in absorbable calcium for a long time.

Claims I've heard are that most calcium supplements only absorb from a few percent, to 17 percent. Even special powdered ones mixed with magnesium, which is supposed to help you absorb it. They also claim that the coral product, is, or is nearly, 100% usable by the body.

Well, whether or not all such details are true, we can all feel it, and have noticed significant health improvements, including a better ability to handle the effects of the high altitude, low atmospheric pressure, low oxygen situation at high elevation monastery sites, and our "skiing in robes with no underwear" trips to Vail (joke).

Another interesting thing we noted, is with our dogs. We add it to their food, and the differences we've observed have been astonishing. Especially with our very old Tibetan dog (the bitch). She was always in such pain, and so low energy/exhausted, that she'd just lay around all day, whimpering sometimes, yelping if you tried to move her, plus she had great difficulty and pain getting up, and walking.  We started giving her the pure coral calcium powder, and she now appears to have no pain, and has the fun and energy of a puppy (or at least an adolescent).

Now to the Hunza.  The Hunza have long been famous for living ridiculously long and remaining amazingly "young" and healthy even in "old age". And having no crime or violence. 

Those who have studied them in the past, have focused on their diet, nutrition, environment, etc. 

For instance,  their drinking water looks awful - a milky conglomeration. Oddly enough, it looks a lot like water with coral calcium mixed into it.  It definitely has minerals in it, and I'd suspect trace minerals also.  I don’t know if a real good analysis has been done, and I intend to study it more sometime, but I’d be willing to bet that it has a high level of absorbable calcium. 

But one thing ignored in all these studies, was the fact that they practiced mediation throughout the day. And I don't mean like our schedule. Last time I heard it was something like a med break every ten minutes, or half-hour. Of course, I totally believe that the effects of the meditation - peace of mind, stress reduction, Reiki/Universal life energy re-energization, etc., is directly related to their health and paradisiacal lifestyle, but I also do not eliminate other factors, like the diet, and water. I believe in a holistic approach to most everything.

Looking around the globe for people with similar longevity and health to the Hunza, we find an interesting correlation to Okinawa's population. Looking more into that, we find that long ago, they started eating coral as a dietary supplement.

Coral is actually the skeleton of a very unique creature that is going extinct because of global environmental changes and pollution. Unlike humans who have their skeletons on the inside, they have it on the outside.  

We refuse to contribute to the harm any living coral, whether it's killed for a home decoration piece, jewelry, or a supplement. We need all the living coral reef we can get on this planet.  The reefs are like the rainforests of the ocean, and a beginning part of the food chain.  So our next requirement was that a coral supplement be only from dead coral.  That eliminated some of the coral supplements that were already available.

Next, we found some that allegedly only vacuum up dead coral off the ocean floor, but that could be polluted. We had to find something pure, since things have changed in the industrial age, and coastal ocean waters are now often very polluted. So we didn’t want contaminated coral.  Plus, how do you know they're not "accidentally" getting some of the live coral? That eliminated anything like that. 

What we eventually found was a source that provided it from ancient coral deposits now on land, that could be mined.  It lived before the era of industrial pollution.

We can’t and don't make any claims, but as with anything we feel really good about, we want to "pass it on". 

The brand offered on this site is ground ultra-fine, and to eliminate the possibility of bacterial contamination, our source tells us they use Ozone to purify it. 

Ozone harmlessly kills bacteria, viruses, and fungi, all with no residue. 

There are also two kinds. We would have preferred one of them,  because of other ingredients it has which are purported to increase the absorption and benefits of calcium. But it has what we consider a serious glitch. They’re putting the mixture in gelatin caps, which we are avoiding because of our vegetarian leanings and the concerns over unknown mad cow crossovers in the animal source gelatins. The manufacturers are considering someday switching to vegan caps. If the gelatin is of no concern to you, those may be the best bet if your doctor feels you need a calcium supplement.  

For now, we are using the other kind - the pure fossilized coral calcium powder ourselves, and just taking a our own magnesium and hydrochloric acid supplements with it, and getting our vitamin D from the Sun. 

If you want to order some, click on the link ironically called fossilized coral calcium supplements  fossilized coral calcium supplements