If you don't eat organic, according to Patrick Holford, author of The Good Nutrition Bible, you dramatically increase your cancer risk because of the organo-phosphates sprayed on crops - not to mention the risk of genetically modified products. Holford calculates that the average person consumes up to a gallon of potentially carcinogenic pesticide residues in the course of a year.
But even eating organic doesn't guarantee you'll get any more minerals and vitamins. One of the findings of the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro was that European farmland was up to 72 per cent deficient in mineral content. And if the minerals aren't in the soil, they aren't in the plants that grow in it.
The human body is designed to work efficiently with a daily intake of 90 nutrients - 61 minerals, 16 vitamins, 12 amino acids and three essential fatty acids.
Your immune system can resist any infection or disease, but it needs the proper fuels to work on. Many years ago Dr Linus Pauling, winner of two Nobel Prizes said: "You can trace every sickness, every disease, and every ailment to a mineral deficiency." It's just as true today.
One of the answers could be to take mineral and vitamin supplements. But here again there are problems of bio-availability - the amount of benefit the body actually gets from taking these. At the best of times, you only absorb 8-12 per cent from any mineral supplement in tablet form. And this figure starts dropping to 3-5 per cent from the age of 40.
Fortunately there's a way to ensure your body gets its full daily supply of minerals, vitamins, amino acids and essential fatty acids - by taking them in colloidal form. Humic shale deposits in the USA preserve the mineral-rich plant life of 75 million years ago, and extracts from these are available as a daily supplement, Maximol, manufactured by a company called Neways, of Salem, Utah. Maximol, which is 98 per cent bio-available, offers one of the best ways to guarantee the health of your immune system.
Neways also produce Revenol, a powerful anti-oxidant which independent research has established as the best of its kind on the market. Revenol is described as a "botanic powerhouse" containing OPCs, curcuminoids and other natural ingredients which all have the power of attacking and suppressing free radicals.
Apart from Maximol, Revenol and a wide range of nutritional supplements, Neways manufacture personal care products which include no harmful substances, in particular toxic chemicals such as sodium lauryl sulphate and propylene glycol, found in virtually every other toothpaste, shampoo or moisturiser. Neways products contain no GM ingredients and are not tested on animals (the company has won several commendations from animal protection groups in the USA and Australia).
Neways products are available in Edinburgh from: