The Content Of Multivitamins And Minerals And Their Role In The Body

Vitamins and minerals are two of the six classes of food we have. The others are carbohydrates, protein, fats and oils and water. Unlike the others that are needed in large quantities and necessary for energy generation, minerals and vitamins are needed in small quantities and are essential nutrients.
The body have different mechanism in place to produce nutrients the body needs. Unfortunately, not all nutrients can be produce by the body. In other cases, the quantity produce by the body may not just be enough to carry out certain duty. In other to get the right quantity, these classes of food need be supplied through the food we eat or through the skin. There is the right amount for each of the nutrients the body needs. Consuming too much may cause harm to the body than good. Too little may cause disease.
Vitamins and minerals are called micronutrient because they are needed in small quantities in the body. There are 30 vitamin and mineral the body need. Each perform one or more roles in the body. Some fight or prevent illnesses such as scurvy, blindness, rickets, etc.
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Unfortunately, many of the natural food we eat may not contain the exact quantity we need. This may be due to the way the food was process or prepared. In other to meet up with the required quantity many food manufacturers add them to their products. Many drug manufacturers started producing supplements with different amount of vitamin and mineral. Many of them are term multivitamins. This may be the reason many people may not know that in these multivitamins are also minerals added. This bring us to another topic; what are vitamin and mineral? What is the difference?

Vitamins
Food that contain minerals and vitamins
vegetables rich in vitamins and minerals

Vitamins are organic compounds. That is why they are called vital amines where the name vitamins came from. That makes them easily degraded during food processing. Heat, air, acid are some of the few things that can break down vitamin to a worthless entity.
All the vitamins discovered today are needed by our body at different quantity. They are divided into water soluble and fat soluble vitamins.
Water soluble vitamins are found in the watery part of the food we eat. They are absorbed directly into the blood stream as it gets broken down in the body during digestion. They have  a short life in the body. Although there are few exceptions such as vitamin B12 that can last for years. Vitamin C and the B complex last a couple of days. This means some of these vitamins should not be taken in too many quantity or too often.
The fat soluble vitamins can only be absorb into the body through the intestinal wall through the lymph channels. In the blood stream, they need a protein carrier. The excess are stored in the liver and fat tissues for future use. These vitamins are not really needed in supplements except in confirmed deficiency.
Since vitamins are easily broken down to useless forms during processing and preparation of food, we need be careful how we store and prepare the food we eat. Vitamins are in every natural food you can think of in various quantity. But the food with much vitamin are fruits and vegetables. Preserving fruits using the wrong methods can reduce the vitamins it contains. Cooking vegetables for a long time or rewarming vegetable food kills the vitamin in it. A little amount of heat can alter the configuration of a vitamin in no distant time.

Minerals

There are many minerals on earth today. Humans need only few that are healthy. Others may be deadly. Minerals are inorganic compounds not affected by the things that can affect vitamins. It retain its shape and structure over heat, air or acid. They are found in air, water and soil. Humans get minerals naturally from the food we eat too. Plants get minerals from the soil, water and air. Because it remain unaffected by the heat and other conditions, we get the full dose when we eat these plants. Same way the animals eat plants with minerals in them and when we eat these animals, we get the minerals.
Humans eat healthy vegetables. Unfortunately, plants have certain minerals they need to survive. They end up taking up the needed minerals and leaving the others. That is why Humans only get certain minerals from plant. On the other hand, the other plants humans don't consume but contain certain needed minerals will be supplied to humans when we eat animals that consume those plants. That is why it is good vegetarians consider using supplements to get some of these extra nutrients.
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Minerals play vital roles in our body. The list is much. They are the body electrolyte. They are also divided into major minerals and trace minerals. Major minerals are required in high quantities while the trace minerals are required in small quantities. Major mineral include calcium, chloride and sodium. Trace mineral are fluoride, zinc and iron.
Some minerals behave like vitamins in the sense that some are like water soluble and others like fat soluble. Water soluble-like minerals are potassium while fat soluble-like are calcium.

Multivitamins
Produce drug containing vitamin and mineral
A multivitamin Soft gel capsule

The dangers of consuming too much of vitamins and minerals are not that much. But there are standard daily dose called recommended diary allowance for a day for each group of persons. Whatever the case, you can see we need more of vitamins than minerals
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