SUPPLEMENT Iodine Made America Smarter!

Posted by & filed under Uncategorized.

www.chiropractic-lane.com 07105
www.safety-lane.com

SUPPLEMENT Iodine Made America Smarter!

I read this article in the latest issue of Discover magazine.

Iodized salt is so commonplace in the U.S. today that you may never have given the additive a second thought. But new research finds that humble iodine has played a substantial role in cognitive improvements seen across the American population in the 20th century.
Iodine is a critical micronutrient in the human diet—that is, something our bodies can’t synthesize that we have to rely on food to obtain—and it’s been added to salt (in the form of potassium iodide) since 1924. Originally, iodization was adopted to reduce the incidence of goiter, an enlargement of the thyroid gland. But research since then has found that iodine also plays a crucial role in brain development, especially during gestation.
Iodine deficiency today is the leading cause of preventable mental retardation in the world. It’s estimated that nearly one-third of the world’s population has a diet with too little iodine in it, and the problem isn’t limited to developing countries—perhaps one-fifth of those cases are in Europe, where iodized salt is still not the norm.
Nationwide, that averages out to a 3.5-point rise in IQ because of iodization, the researchers report in a paper for the National Bureau of Economic Research.
But on the positive side, iodine deficiency and its symptoms were vanquished almost overnight. And iodine’s mental benefits may even help explain the Flynn Effect, which observes that IQ rose about 3 points per decade in developed countries throughout the 20th century. It’s been thought that improved health and nutrition were the driving forces of the Flynn Effect. Now, it appears that iodine alone was responsible for roughly one decade of that remarkable climb. All the more reason, then, for the rest of the world to follow suit and relegate iodine deficiency to the history books.

via Blogger http://chiropractic-lane.blogspot.com/2013/07/supplement-iodine-made-america-smarter.html