Why MOST Take Calcium & Vitamin D Wrong! [2024 Studies Update]

This is Tom Brachy. You need calcium to get into your bones, but there's a huge number one calcium mistake that people are making. It's the calcium and vitamin D mistake. We're going to go over all the new research, the best foods, the best supplements, the best tricks, and the number one mistake that most people are making regarding the calcium. And we're starting now. Calcium is an important component in the human body and critical for human health. It has well been established that calcium intake is helpful and a deficiency can cause osteoporosis. And this is one of the biggest problems across the world. Health-wise osteoporosis and an adult over 18 up to age 50 needs about 1000 milligrams or one gram per day over 50. So between 50 and 70, you need over 1000 milligrams per day and women especially need 1.2 grams or 1200 milligrams per day. And then when you're in your seventies or later, you need 1200 milligrams as well. You want at least one to 1.2 grams every day. And when you're a post-menopausal woman, that's the highest rate of osteoporosis because women go through hormonal changes. It affects their bones and they require higher calcium intake. It's even recommended like 1.5. Grams or 1500 milligrams, 25% of women over 50 develop osteoporosis. Very, very common. How do you get that 1.5 grams of calcium? The easiest way to get it is dairy products. So milk one cup or about 250 milliliters of cow's milk contains about 300 milligrams of calcium. Two to three cups right there. You've already got a thousand milligrams yogurt. A typical plain yogurt in a cup is about three to 400 milligrams of calcium cheese. One slice of cheese, about 28 grams contains about 200 to 250 milligrams of calcium. Essentially you drink one glass of milk, one cheese slice and one yogurt. And you're close to being good. If you're a vegan or vegetarian, kale gives you about 200 milligrams of calcium per cup. Collard greens gives you about two to 300 milligrams. Spinach is a great source. And many foods now are fortified with calcium, such as orange juice, almond milk, soy milk, breakfast cereals, a lot of breakfast foods. Tofu has a lot of calcium in it. Two to 300 milligrams of calcium per four ounce serving. Canned sardines. So fish have everything. Fish have vitamin D. They have calcium. They have omega-3 fatty acids. That's a great choice. Almonds have a good amount of calcium, 76 milligrams of calcium. Dried figs, one cup of broccoli. These are all in the 50 to 60 milligram range. Cooked white beans offer 100 milligrams. Salmon, leafy greens, fortified foods, tofu, sardines, almonds, figs, broccoli, white beans, salmon. They all were great. And what are the best and worst calcium supplements? Factors to consider when taking a calcium supplement is absorption. Want to make sure your body can absorb it. How much calcium does it have? The cost and availability. You don't want to pay a lot for something you're not absorbing. And how well do you tolerate it? Sometimes people don't tolerate certain types of calcium sources. And again, depending on health issues, some people might not want to take calcium. It does have side effects like potentially causing constipation, can cause kidney issues if you have kidney failure. So check with your doctor. But we're going to do a countdown from worst to least. These are less favorable options. Coral calcium. This is less favorable due to environmental concern. And it's basically not the most absorbed type. Another type is oyster shell calcium. While it does contain some trace minerals and is more organic, there might be contaminants in there and you're probably not absorbing a ton. Calcium gluconate. This is a lower percentage of elemental calcium. And the forms might not be the most desirable. The ones that are kind of in the middle, not the worst, not the best, but calcium phosphate, it's well absorbed, has a middle amount of elemental calcium. But here's the good options. Here's what you want to focus on. Calcium carbonate. It contains a high amount of elemental calcium, making for increased calcium intake, it's absorbed best with food and well tolerated on an empty stomach. And then you have calcium citrate. This is considered to be one of the better, if not the best option. It's very well absorbed with food intake and it is suitable for people with digestive issues. But here's the big secret on calcium by itself. Calcium, unless you're completely deficient, it does not do you good. There is calcium that's readily available. As long as you're eating non-processed foods all day. If you're eating anything reasonable, like any type of vegetables or any type of dairy, you're going to be good. The lack of calcium is not what causes osteoporosis in America. This is the huge secret. Calcium, in my opinion, is one of the least important factors when it comes to osteoporosis, but people give it the most credit. This is the huge secret. Some studies actually revealed that excessive calcium intake and not balancing it properly actually increases cardiovascular disease, actually developing bone in your arteries, in your blood vessels, that's what stiffens them. That's called calcification. A study took a look at calcium supplementation by itself. It actually potentially caused more danger rather than helping. It didn't really make bones stronger. It didn't really help. This is what you need to be doing instead. And this is our osteoporosis home remedy guide. Number one, adequate vitamin D. Vitamin D in the news has been downplayed, in my opinion. They always scare you with toxicity and other changes. And yes, while it's possible theoretically to get toxicity, you'd have to take an insane amount. And number two, they make it seem like people are over supplementing with vitamin D. But the truth is a study was just performed that looked at 308 studies. This was just this year. We're talking 2023 going into 2024, 78% deficiency around the world. People are just as deficient as ever. And there's so many pros and cons to vitamin D, your immune health, your depression, your mood, your sleep, your osteoporosis. It's all so important. I can name so many benefits to vitamin D, but 70% deficiency odds are you, the viewer are deficient. And odds are you're not getting the benefits for as far as immune health, depression, sleep, muscle strength, and bone strength. Calcium is worthless without vitamin D. Now, 78% of people in the world are vitamin D deficient. This is the big secret. Calcium without vitamin D is worthless. And realistically with proper vitamin D almost everybody's getting enough calcium, except for potentially someone who's a vegan or someone who's malnourished is not getting enough calcium. We've kind of seen from food. It's very easy. If you're eating any dairy at all, any vegetables at all, you're probably getting your levels of calcium, but if you don't have that vitamin D, you're not uptaking it into your bloodstream. The study took a look at 308 different studies, and this was 8 million people in total around the world, and they found 78% of people in 2023 were deficient. They found that between 2000 and 2010, the deficiency was a couple of points higher than between 2010 and 2020. So the media is basically making it seem like the supplements are not needed. This study, which is a high quality source is showing the exact opposite. Almost everybody is deficient in vitamin D. There's the fear of vitamin D toxicity, but the reality is if you go on PubMed and look for actual toxicity reports, there's hardly any, and the people that do develop vitamin toxicity, number one, it's pretty readily reversible. Even people who are taking a million units per day, once they stopped doing that, they got better. So symptoms were like nausea, vomiting, chills, that kind of thing. Now, listen, I'm not saying to go out there and go crazy. But these are the studies. If I'm missing anything, tell me down in the comments. But this is the really big thing is people are encouraged to take calcium, but somehow in new sources, I'm seeing vitamin D discouraged, but that's the one that takes up the calcium and prevents it from leaving your body. In my opinion, what you want to focus is on vitamin D. That's the big secret.