Glutathione
What Glutathione is and What it Does
What is glutathione? It’s a very simple molecule that may well be the most important molecule you need to stay healthy and prevent disease. It’s a key for preventing aging, cancer, heart disease, dementia, and other chronic diseases. It’s also essential for treating everything from autism to Alzheimer’s disease to cancer and much more.
Glutathione is a combination of three simple building blocks of protein or amino acids − cysteine, glycine, and glutamine − and it is produced naturally in the body. It is called “the master antioxidant” because it can regenerate itself in the liver after each fill-up of free radicals and go back to work." Free radicals are often the byproduct of normal cellular metabolic oxidation and toxic overload. They can lead to autoimmune diseases, several types of cancer, and even heart attacks.
Keeping yourself healthy, boosting your performance, preventing disease, and aging well all depend on keeping glutathione levels high. It is critical for immune function and controlling inflammation. It is the master detoxifier and the body’s main antioxidant, protecting our cells and making our energy metabolism run well.
Research has shown that raised glutathione levels decrease muscle damage, reduce recovery time, increase strength and endurance, and shift metabolism from fat production to muscle development.
Glutathione is critical in helping the body’s first line of defense against disease and illness – the immune system − do its job of fighting infections. It further supports the immune system in preventing cancer and other illnesses. Studies have also shown that glutathione can help in the treatment of AIDS.
Glutathione is also essential for maintaining healthy cellular mitochondria. It is notable that damaged or malfunctioning cellular mitochondria are part of the cancer process. This occurs when exposure to toxins and unhealthy cellular terrain combine to trigger a cellular defensive response. During this process healthy cells become cancer cells when they revert to a primitive form of respiration that uses glucose (sugar) instead of oxygen for respiration. They then refuse to die and keep multiplying.
The secret of the power of glutathione may be the sulfur (SH) chemical groups it contains. Sulfur is a sticky, smelly molecule which acts to grab and help eliminate all the bad things in the body. Its stickiness allows it to capture damaging free radicals and toxins like mercury and other heavy metals.
As natural health author Paul Fassa wrote:
“Glutathione is critical for one simple reason: It recycles antioxidants. You see, dealing with free radicals is like handing off a hot potato. They get passed around from vitamin C to vitamin E to lipoic acid and then finally to glutathione which cools off the free radicals and recycles other antioxidants. After this happens, the body can “reduce” or regenerate another protective glutathione molecule and we are back in business.”
Dr. Mark Hyman calls glutathione the “mother of all antioxidants” and says that he has found glutathione deficiency to be common in virtually all the seriously ill patients he has treated. These include people with chronic fatigue syndrome, heart disease, cancer, chronic infections, autoimmune disease, diabetes, autism, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, arthritis, asthma, kidney problems, liver disease, and more.
Source: The TRUTH About Cancer
