Optimal Dose

by Gerald Aardsma; March 3, 2018

In Aging: Cause & Cure I pointed out that the determination of the optimal dose of vitamin MePA was likely to be a lengthy process.

Though the chemical compound corresponding to vitamin C, ascorbic acid, was discovered in the 1930’s, the optimal dose is still an ongoing debate today. …

Determination of the optimal dose of any vitamin is not a trivial exercise. MePA is no exception. Determination of the optimal dose of MePA is likely to be an area of active research for years.

The purpose of this Summary Report webpage is to keep abreast of the latest information relevant to this topic.

Background

A broad foundation and framework for the optimal dose of vitamin MePA was presented in chapter 14 of Aging: Cause & Cure. Chapter 14 concluded as follows:

Taken together, these estimates suggest that the optimal dose of MePA will likely be found to be within a factor of ten of a few micrograms per day.

There seems to me to be less reason for concern about overdosing than there is for underdosing with MePA. Mice show no adverse effects, even at very high doses, as previously mentioned. For example, I have maintained one group of 36 ICR (Harlan) female mice at 100 milligrams MePA per liter in their drinking water for seven months now. This is equivalent to a human dose of roughly 250,000 micrograms per day. These mice are just over a year old. So far, there has been no mortality nor any sign of adverse health effects in any mouse of this group.

Water-soluble vitamins, especially those which are small acids, do not generally pose a risk of overdose, as any excess is readily removed from the body by the kidneys.

This property seems to be shared, as expected, by MePA. Tolerance to overdosing with MePA in humans seems to have been demonstrated by the full life spans enjoyed by both Noah and Seth who lived through the Spike, as well as by the first three post-Flood generations who were born during the Spike. All of these individuals appear to have been subject to very high MePA doses during the Spike, and these high doses seem to have done them significant good and no harm, at least as far as longevity is concerned.

Meanwhile, underdosing is known to produce the ravages of “old age,” dramatically reducing potential life expectancy.

We tend to fear the unknown. The MePA vitamin is unknown relative to “aging,” with which we have become comfortably familiar. But make no mistake, “aging” is the thing to be feared in this instance—it is the dread disease.

Prudence seems to me to call for immediate adoption of a 2 microgram MePA per day intake regimen for adults, pending recommended daily allowance refinement based upon further research.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the normal dose for someone using Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement?

Normal use is 1 drop per day, which gives a dose of 2 ug MePA/day.

Why are some users taking more than 1 drop per day?

At this stage in our understanding of the vitamin, the main guiding principle is that it is better to take too much than it is to take too little. This is moderated by the possibility of unknown negative side effects at too high a dose.

The normal dose of 1 drop per day was designed to give the best compromise between the possibility of unknown negative side effects at too high a dose and the known, ultimately fatal, aging disease resulting from too low a dose.

Initial impetus for dosing at more than 1 drop per day came from individuals dealing with serious health issues. These individuals hoped, by increasing the dose, to avoid impending, unpleasant, and expensive medical interventions. Increasing the dose of MePA seemed likely to increase the rate of any healing MePA might provide. Individuals facing serious medical intervention viewed potential negative side effects at higher doses as a risk they were more than willing to take.

By the time these situations arose, I had already experimented on myself at 2 and then at 3 drops per day. My purpose had been merely to look for negative side effects, of which none were ever encountered. My experience in this regard was subsequently corroborated by those individuals facing serious medical interventions who chose to increase their dose.

As more and more people have taken Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement at 1 drop per day, with no reports of any negative side effects, concerns about negative side effects at 2 drops per day have diminished. This has led to the current situation in which some normally healthy individuals are taking 2 drops per day.

Should I be taking 2 drops per day?

My initial dose was 1 ug MePA per day (equal to 1/2 drop). This dose cured my CIDP, cleared up several chronic skin infections, improved sleep, speeded healing, and improved skin moisture. Clearly, this dose is already efficacious. But the possibility remains that it is not high enough to completely cure aging.

To improve the probability of being at a high enough dose to completely cure aging, Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement is formulated to provide users with twice my initial dose when it is used at 1 drop per day. Obviously, this dose is not guaranteed to be high enough either. But because laboratory work giving more empirical guidance on the optimum dose seems likely to yield results before too many more months have passed, any shortfall should have minimal practical effect on the longevity of normally healthy individuals.

For normally healthy individuals, whether to take 1 or 2 drops per day is a matter of personal preference at present. If 1 drop per day seems to be working well for you, there is probably not much to be gained by changing to 2 drops per day, but there is probably no harm in doing so either.

For the very elderly, or for individuals facing serious medical situations, even more than 2 drops per day seems a reasonable choice at present, especially at the start of dosing when the vitamin’s body reservoir is being filled.

The following question was added September 25, 2018.

What should I do if I miss my daily dose?

Based both on theory and the little data available on this at the present time, it does not appear to be a good idea to miss your daily dose of vitamin MePA.

I explained the the current thinking behind this in a letter to my daughter, Jennifer, published in the “Correspondence” section of the Biblical Chronologist website, on the “vitamin MePA” page.

… both you and Steve had bad results following a brief lapse in taking the vitamin. I strongly recommend that you not allow any such lapse in the future.

We don’t yet know the optimum daily dose of vitamin MePA (we are diligently working on this in the lab), but we do know that zero is too little. In Noah’s day, everybody got a dose of vitamin MePA every time they took a drink of water. This makes it possible that the residence time of the MePA molecule in the body is very short. (In Aging: Cause and Cure [see page 52, footnote 19] I noted the possibility that one or more metabolites of MePA, rather than MePA itself, may be responsible for the very long biological half-life associated with the anti-aging function of the vitamin. Other functions of the vitamin may have no such long-lived metabolites buffering them in the absence of the MePA molecule.) If the residence time of the MePA molecule in the body is on the order of a day, and you stop taking it for a few days, your body will rapidly enter a deficient state, with negative health consequences the likely result.

A deliberate effort to explore what happens when dose is decreased was recently made by Joey Contreras, Sr. He observed definite negative health consequences when he decreased his dose.

On 01 May 2018, I intentionally decreased vitamin MePA from 3 to 2 drops daily to monitor any changes to BPH [Benign Prostatic Hyperplasia] symptoms, energy level and sleep quality. On 11 May, my BPH symptoms recurred, but were mild. Over the next 2 days my symptoms returned to pre-vitamin MePA severity. My energy level and my speed while running, which had improved very much since starting the vitamin, slowly decreased. BPH symptoms continued to worsen, so on 15 May I started taking 4 drops daily. BPH symptoms slowly decreased and by 01 June they had returned to minimal. It took about 1 week for energy level, running and speed to return. I did not notice any change in sleep quality during time of taking 2 drops daily.

If I accidentally missed my daily dose of Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement, I would take the missed dose as soon as I remembered, up to and including the time of my normal dose the next day (i.e., if I only remembered the next day, I would double up the dose on that day).

February 26, 2019 Update

Foreword by Gerald Aardsma

The need to launch clinical trials to learn more about vitamin MePA has been intensifying over the last year. A few months back, I explained the need to my son, Matthew, who was finishing up a PhD focused on animal nutrition and physiology. I asked him to consider joining with Aardsma Research & Publishing in the role of Clinical Research Scientist when he finished his degree. Matthew responded positively to my request and is now a big part of our small research team.

One of the first tasks I assigned to Matthew was to determine the best estimate of the optimal dose of Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement possible at the present time, based on everything we currently know about physiological response to the vitamin. My intention is to submit a second New Dietary Ingredient Notification to the FDA as soon as we have a firm idea of what the optimal dose is. Meanwhile, I want to keep users of the vitamin intelligently informed with the most current information, so MePA can be used as effectively as possible in combating the ravages of aging. The following report is the result of this assigned task.

Report by Matthew Aardsma; February 15, 2019.

Background

It is clear from the physiological aging model of Figure 12 of Aging: Cause and Cure reproduced below that the dose of vitamin MePA is very important. If the dose is insufficient, the physiological disease of “aging” will still occur, although at a slower rate than if no vitamin MePA were being consumed. Healing of the disease of “aging”, resulting in a gradual return of physiological youthfulness, will only occur at or above 1.09 times the daily dose of MePA that people living before Noah’s Flood were receiving. So how many drops of Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement are required to achieve 1.09 times the pre-Flood daily dose of MePA?

So far, we do not know, but researchers at Aardsma Research & Publishing continue to press urgently toward a solid answer to this question. Below is some updated information that may help users of Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement as they ponder the question of optimal dose.

How A Revised Dose Was Estimated

The assumptions underlying my calculation of a revised daily dose are as follows:
1. The daily dose of vitamin MePA that pre-Flood people consumed was determined by the concentration of vitamin MePA in the drinking water and how much water they consumed each day.
2. The concentration of vitamin MePA in pre-Flood drinking water can be assumed to be constant, leaving the amount of daily consumed vitamin MePA reliant on daily water intake.
3. The total non-food derived fluid intake of people today is similar to that of pre-Flood people.
4. Pre-Flood fluid intake was primarily water.
5. Pre-Flood infants and toddlers through age 3 consumed fluid primarily as breast-milk.

To calculate an estimated daily vitamin MePA dose, non-food derived fluid (water) intake for people at various ages and physiological states was obtained from the National Academies of Science Electrolyte and Water Summary Table (http://nationalacademies.org/hmd/Activities/Nutrition/SummaryDRIs/DRI-Tables.aspx). This serves to approximate the water intake of pre-Flood peoples. This information alone yields relative pre-Flood dose differences between, for example, males and females, simply based on differences in water intake between the sexes.

The next piece of information required to calculate an estimated daily dose is the concentration of vitamin MePA in pre-Flood drinking water. Since this is presently not available, a different route of estimation is required. As discussed in earlier posts on this page, a conservative dose of 2 micrograms of vitamin MePA (1 drop) was given as a potential starting place to individuals desiring to take vitamin MePA. As reported in the Vitamin MePA Testimonials, some individuals gradually increased their dose after a period of time. Two to 3 drops of vitamin MePA seemed to be a common place where individuals no longer felt a need to increase their dose. Perhaps most informative is the September 16, 2018 testimonial from Joey Contreras, Sr., who intentially experimented with reducing his daily vitamin MePA dose from 3 drops per day to 2 drops per day. The results clearly indicated that, for this mature male, 2 drops of vitamin MePA per day (4 micrograms) was not enough. While this evidence is preliminary in nature, it gives enough evidence to indicate that 1 drop of vitamin MePA may not be enough for a mature male. Therefore, 3 drops (6 micrograms) of MePA was assumed to be our current best estimated dose for a mature male. With a water intake of 2.96 L per day for a mature male, this yields a water concentration of 2.027 micrograms of MePA per L of water if the vitamin MePA had been uniformly distributed in the drinking water as it would have been pre-Flood. Using this water concentration value and the water intakes of other demographics allows estimated doses to be calculated.

Estimated Dose Information

The estimated doses of vitamin MePA for males and females are given in Table 1. Results are rounded to the nearest whole drop. These results are presented as estimates only, and are subject to revision as research to establish the optimal vitamin MePA dose continues.

Table 1. Estimated daily supplementation of vitamin MePA in drops per day,
with each drop equal to 2 micrograms of vitamin MePA
  Male  Female 
Age, years  
0-300
4-811
9-1322
≥1432
Reproductive Status  
Pregnant 2
Breast-feeding 

3

How To Use This Information

This information is given to help individuals desiring to take vitamin MePA make an informed decision regarding what dose of MePA to consume. This is not meant to be a definitive guide, nor is it intended to supplant the advice of a medical or nutritional professional.

Infants and Toddlers (birth through 3 years of age)

In antiquity, as well as some parts of the world today, it was not unusual for babies to receive their primary nourishment through breast-milk for several years after birth. Therefore, babies pre-Flood would not have consumed substantial amounts of drinking water and therefore would not have been receiving substantial amounts of vitamin MePA through drinking water. While it is currently unknown if vitamin MePA passes from the mother to the baby in breast-milk, this is likely the case, and therefore any need of the baby for vitamin MePA would be satisfied by breast-feeding assuming the mother is consuming vitamin MePA. Conversely, if vitamin MePA is not found in breast-milk, then babies pre-Flood would not have consumed vitamin MePA until weaning. It is also unknown what concentrations of vitamin MePA might exist in breast-milk, so there is currently no basis for a vitamin MePA recommendation for non-nursing children under 4 years of age. This is reflected in the information in Table 1, with no recommended vitamin MePA supplementation for children under 4 years of age.

Children (4 through 8 years of age)

During this age range pre-Flood children are presumed to be weaned and therefore consuming water (and thus vitamin MePA) as their primary source of hydration. Given the small size of children in this age range, water intake at this stage is understandably lower than in an adult, and this difference is reflected in a lower estimated MePA supplementation rate than in an adult.

Pre-teen through early teenager (9 to 13 years of age)

Many children increase in body weight and size rapidly during these years, resulting in an increase in water intake over that of younger children. This is reflected in the increase in estimated vitamin MePA supplementation over that of younger children.

Teenager through adult (14 years of age and older)

Males, reaching mature body weight somewhat later than females, increase at 14 years of age to 3 drops of vitamin MePA per day. Females remain steady at 2 drops of vitamin MePA per day. Water intake does not change substantially from 14 years of age through death, so the estimated doses for males and females is applicable for the remainder of their lives.

Pregnant women

Recommended non-food water intake for a pregnant woman is about 2.4 L per day. While this is an increase over water intake for a non-pregnant woman, this is not enough of an increase to bump up to the next whole drop of vitamin MePA, therefore the suggested supplementation rate remains unchanged for a pregnant versus a non-pregnant mature woman. Up to the present, the limited information available on vitamin MePA supplementation during pregnancy has been with 2 micrograms (1 drop) of MePA per day or less (see Erica and Esther testimonials). Women who are or may become pregnant are encouraged to discuss vitamin MePA supplementation with their physician prior to use, as is recommended for all nutritional supplements.

Pregnancy is obviously a sensitive time developmentally for the unborn baby, and therefore the newness of the vitamin MePA discovery may understandably raise concerns. While there is still much to learn about vitamin MePA, there is considerable theoretical and experimental evidence as to its safety (see Aging: Cause and Cure, pg 112 for a more detailed discussion). Something that may be helpful to those evaluating whether to consume vitamin MePA during pregnancy is consideration of caffeine intake during pregnancy. Unlike vitamin MePA, caffeine is toxic, and consumption of coffee or other sources of caffeine during pregnancy is controversial. However, after much research, the consensus is that about 1.5 cups of coffee per day (about 200 milligrams or 200,000 micrograms of caffeine) is regarded as reasonably safe for the developing baby. Read more here. Thus, the estimated safe level of the toxic compound caffeine during pregnancy is 50,000 times higher than the suggested daily dose of 2 drops (4 micrograms) of vitamin MePA per day for a pregnant women given in Table 1. This comparison hopefully gives some context to the conversation of the safety of MePA supplementation during pregnancy.

Breast-feeding women

Breast-feeding women have a substantial increase in recommended water intake, at just over 3 L of non-food-derived water per day. Therefore, estimated MePA supplementation increases to a rate of 3 drops per day. While this is the calculated dose, the highest dose currently known to have been taken by a breast-feeding woman is 2 drops per day (see Esther testimonial). Women who are breast-feeding are encouraged to discuss vitamin MePA supplementation with their physician prior to use, as is recommended for all nutritional supplements.

Conclusion

Until more empirically-based recommendations can be made, MePA supplementation rates have been estimated for various demographics using our understanding of pre-Flood MePA distribution in drinking water, and modern-day estimates of water intakes. Individuals can work from this framework to help inform their choice of vitamin MePA supplementation rate.

Conclusion

Afterword by Gerald Aardsma

As this update was being prepared, my brother, Allen, sent the following, independent observation:

I “think” and “feel” that I do better on at least two drops, morning and evening, than I do on one.

This is typical of anecdotal evidence shared by other users of Dr. Aardsma’s Vitamin MePA Dietary Supplement, implying that one drop per day may be too low a dose for adults. Matthew’s table, above, is the best guide to optimal dose at present.