Folic acid is one of these vital vitamins. It is involved in the replication of DNA and RNA. It helps to keep levels of homocysteine down in our blood, which in turn is thought to help reduce the risks of cardiovascular diseases, and different kinds of dementia. And because folic acid is used in the DNA replication process its of great importance in the prevention of certain kinds of birth defects.
As such there are governments around the world that require the fortification of foods with folic acid. The United States required that foods such as flours, breakfast cereals, pasta and other grain based products be fortified with folic acid by the year 1998.
Now it’s possible to find a name brand breakfast cereal that will supply about twenty percent of the recommended daily amount of folic acid. This program was instituted to help ensure that people were getting some of their daily requirement without having to worry about it.
The recommended daily amount of folic acid for the average adult is about four hundred mcg. Those who are pregnant, could become pregnant or are lactating should get between six hundred and eight hundred mcg. in their diet daily.
It’s possible to find folic acid in a variety of foods such as, asparagus, bananas, beans, whole wheat and wheat products, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, kale, citrus, lettuce, liver, oatmeal, oysters, potatoes, rice, salmon, spinach, and baker’s yeast. Each of these foods has folic acid in varying amounts, for example liver has the highest amount at one hundred and seventy four mcg. and one medium banana has twenty mcg. of folic acid.
It can be very difficult to get enough of any nutrients in the modern diet. Farmers pump up their produce with fertilizers and water so that the average person needs to eat more in order to get the same amount of nutrients. Fast food phenomena has swept the globe and many are tempted or forced to eat diets high in processed meats and starches.
Also many vitamins can’t hold up under heat and pressure and they are lost through the cooking process. It’s possible to lose between twenty five and seventy five percent of the folic acid in raw food once its cooked. The canning process for vegetables today destroys many vitamins due to the extreme heat and the pressure. So a canned vegetable isn’t going to have as much folic acid as a raw vegetable.
Or a person may simply not be able to keep track of how much of what should and should not be eaten for optimum health. To this end many choose to take a daily multivitamin which contains some or all of the daily requirements for a variety of nutrients.
