The Healthiest Way to Get the Calcium You Need

Calcium is the fifth most abundant element in the earth’s crust. It’s just about everywhere in

the form of rocks and minerals. And it makes its way into plants and then into the animals who eat plants.

Calcium is an essential mineral for human health

Calcium helps:

• Carry messages between your brain and the rest of your body;
• Your nerves and muscles to move;
• Transport enzymes and hormones through your blood to where they need to go;
• Keep your muscles, nerves, and blood vessels functioning well; and
• Play a vital role in maintaining healthy blood pressure.

Calcium also enables the most critical muscle in your body — your heart — to receive signals and contract. Without calcium, your heart wouldn’t work!

How Much Calcium Do You Need?

According to the U.S. FDA, the Recommended Dietary Allowance for adults 18 years and older is 1,000 to 1,200 mg of calcium per day

The FDA says that your calcium needs increase to 1,300 mg per day during teenage years, pregnancy, and lactation. And that postmenopausal women may also need to increase their calcium intake.

But these numbers may be high. The National Health Service of Britain recommends

So how much calcium you need apparently depends on which side of the pond you stand! (Or maybe, just possibly, it could also depend on how much food industry lobbyists influence your government bureaucrats.)

Calcium Myths and Controversies You Need to Know

Calcium may be one of the most talked-about nutrients. But that doesn’t mean everything you hear is necessarily true.

Especially when information is coming from trade organizations, food companies, or manipulated governments. (See more about the dairy industry’s whitewashing in our article here.)

Here are some of the most widespread myths about calcium:

Myth #1 — Dairy Products Are the Best Sources of Calcium

Dairy is high in calcium. But contrary to popular belief, high dairy consumption doesn’t correlate with better bone health

In fact, osteoporosis and bone fractures are most common in the United States, Finland, Sweden, and the United Kingdom — the countries where people consume the most dairy products.

Eating a lot of dairy products can also increase your risk for certain cancers, such as prostate, breast, lung, and ovarian. This may be due to sex hormones like estrogen and other growth factors naturally present in milk.

Dairy products deliver a lot more than just calcium. They come with animal proteins, lactose, hormones, contaminants, and even antibiotics

Of course, there are other downsides to the industrialized dairy industry, like that it’s cruel to animals and damaging to the planet. (For more concerns about dairy, check out this article.)

Myth #2 — Getting Enough Calcium Is the Most Important Thing You Can Do for Bone Health

Calcium is important for bone health. But calcium isn’t the only thing your bones need to be strong.

Vitamin D — which you make with the help of the sun — is also essential.

People in countries like India, Peru, and Japan, eat around one-third the amount of calcium that Americans do, yet in these countries, bone fractures are rare. They have much higher exposure to sunlight due to geographic location, which naturally increases their vitamin D levels.

You can get the vitamin D you need with just about 15 minutes per day in the sun. Taking a vitamin D-containing supplement can also be beneficial.

Being active as you age is also highly recommended, and has been proven to help prevent fracture. Exercises to focus on for bone health especially include weight-bearing activities, such as walking, running, tennis, dancing, stair-climbing, and weight-lifting.

Myth #3 — Everyone Should Take a Calcium-Containing Supplement, Just to be Safe

I’ve known many people who take calcium supplements fervently in an attempt to keep their bones strong as they age. Around 43% of Americans take a calcium-containing supplement, including 70% of older women.

But is this helpful?

Research suggests that for many people, calcium supplements may do more harm than good.

The risks of calcium supplementation are especially significant for people with a history of kidney stones.

And this isn’t a new finding. A large epidemiological study published in the New England Journal of Medicine

The women, who had never had a kidney stone at the outset of the study, were followed with questionnaires from 1980 to 1992. The researchers found that those women with higher dietary calcium intakes had reduced risk for kidney stones, while those who took calcium supplements increased their risk for kidney stones by 20%.

The 2011 Women’s Health Initiative randomized clinical trial observed

Those on calcium and vitamin D daily for seven years had a 17% increase in kidney stone incidence. This is thought to be because high doses of supplemental calcium make your body excrete more calcium in your urine, promoting kidney stone formation.

Calcium Supplements May Also Increase the Risk for Cardiovascular Disease

A study published in BMJ in 2008 followed 1,471 healthy postmenopausal women in New Zealand over five years, looking for adverse cardiovascular outcomes. Half of the women were given a placebo, while the other half were given calcium supplementation.

Those who took calcium supplements experienced more heart attacks, strokes, and other unwelcome cardiac events.

Calcium supplements may increase blood calcium, which can cause stiff arteries and increase blood pressure. Both of these contribute to the development of heart disease.

Calcium supplements can also prevent certain medications from working, as well. Specifically, they can reduce the absorption of certain antibiotics, anticonvulsants, and even, ironically enough, medications used to treat osteoporosis.

So if dairy products aren’t the best source of calcium, and if calcium supplementation comes with considerable drawbacks, the question is: Where should you get your calcium?

You might want to look at where cows get their calcium from: Plants.

https://foodrevolution.org/blog/calcium-rich-foods/