Mangosteen versus Tart Cherry Juice

As public awareness increases about the importance of anti-oxidants as part of a healthy diet, dozens and dozens of marketing schemes and questionable products are clamoring for attention. No food is a miracle cure for anything, and research into the connection between nutrition and health is ongoing and we have much to learn.

While ongoing research is making a strong connection between nutrients in fresh fruits and vegetables and health, and while tart cherries are continually scoring very high in anti-oxidant capacity (to our surprise as much as anyone's), we should not get carried away with ideas of miracle cures and magic bullets.

Fruit is an important part of a healthy diet, and cherries can play an important role in helping to maintain good health and be more pain-free. Prunes, raspberries, strawberries, red grapes, spinach and kale also score high in anti-oxidant capacity, and these fruits and vegetables along with tart cherries have been rigorously tested and analyzed and have been safely eaten for centuries. So eat your fruit and veggies, use common sense about your diet, use caution in assessing claims of miracle cures, work with your doctor, and support our family farmers. Working together we can help make a healthier future for everyone.

Let's take a look at the latest fad - "Mangosteen juice" and see how it stacks up against tart cherry juice. Mangosteen is a tropical fruit from Southeast Asia, and the information below was taken from a website of a distributor of the product.

	Tart Cherry Juice	Mangosteen Juice
pure?	yes	no - mostly common fruit juice?
preservatives?	no	Sodium Benzoate
heat pasteurized?	no	yes
source for fruit	family run orchard in Michigan	unknown
ORAC value (anti-oxidant strength)	12,800 units	unknown
tested by	Brunswick Labs	unknown
price per quart	$2.50	$51.00
company type	family farm	multi-level marketing
product type	food	"supplement"
cures all major diseases	of course not	so claimed
makes you wealthy	no	so promised

Notes:

• "Cures all major diseases" - None of the publicly visible mangosteen written copy makes this claim, but distributors do in what seems to be a canned pitch.

• An explanation of ORAC values and results of the testing done by the independent nutrition laboratory, Brunswick Labs, in Wareham MA - Tart cherry juice concentrate is highest in ORAC units

• One quart (32 oz.) of tart cherry juice concentrate costs about $14.00 and reconstitutes to 2 gallons of juice. Mangosteen juice in the examples we saw is ready to drink in 25 oz. bottles for approximately $40 per bottle.

• "While the ORAC values for most fruits and vegetables have been determined by standard laboratories and published in scientific journals, this is not so for mangosteen." - Ralph Moss, PHD, from Ralph Moss looks at new MLM scam.

• Food and "supplements" are under a different set of regulations.

  "In October 1994, the Dietary Supplement Health and Education Act (DSHEA) was signed into law by President Clinton. Before this time, dietary supplements were subject to the same regulatory requirements as were other foods. This new law, which amended the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, created a new regulatory framework for the safety and labeling of dietary supplements.

  Under DSHEA, a firm is responsible for determining that the dietary supplements it manufactures or distributes are safe and that any representations or claims made about them are substantiated by adequate evidence to show that they are not false or misleading. This means that dietary supplements do not need approval from FDA before they are marketed. Except in the case of a new dietary ingredient, where pre-market review for safety data and other information is required by law, a firm does not have to provide FDA with the evidence it relies on to substantiate safety or effectiveness before or after it markets its products.

  Also, manufacturers do not need to register themselves nor their dietary supplement products with FDA before producing or selling them. Currently, there are no FDA regulations that are specific to dietary supplements that establish a minimum standard of practice for manufacturing dietary supplements."

  From the U. S. Food and Drug Administration Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition - Overview of Dietary Supplements

• For more reading on dietary supplements, see Dietary Supplements - Be An Informed Consumer from Colorado State University.

• Ingredients list for Mangosteen juice:

  - reconstituted garcinia mangostana juice from whole fruit
  - apple juice concentrate
  - pear juice concentrate
  - grape juice concentrate
  - pear puree
  - blueberry juice concentrate
  - raspberry juice concentrate
  - strawberry juice concentrate
  - cranberry juice concentrate
  - cherry juice concentrate
  

also see:

Why is the FDA Picking on Cherry Growers?
Do Lemons Cure Scurvy?
The French Connection
FDA Tyranny
Letter to Representative Bart Stupak
Letter to U.S. Representatives
The FDA and You
The Health Freedom Protection Act
Ron Paul's Speech to Congress
Jonathan Emord's Speech
Response to Dr. Stephen Barrett, Quackwatch