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Dear Friend,

When it comes to various health claims, most of them are pure hype fueled by personal agendas. It’s rare when something actually lives up to its expectations or to the exposure it gets in the media.

In fact, in my years as a health researcher, omega 3 fatty acids may be the only thing that deserve all the praise they get.

What’s particularly fascinating about omega 3 fatty acids is that both conventional and alternative medicine  agree on how wonderful its many health benefits are.

If you know anything about alternative health, or are knowledgeable about the natural health field, you know this is something that doesn’t usually happen too often. Normally, conventional medicine supports the interventionist approach, not the preventative one.

Studies are often released by conventional medical sources on how vitamin supplements are worthless, and using herbal remedies are almost on a par with witchcraft. Sure, I’m exaggerating — but only a bit!

Mind you, I’m not saying I agree with this. In fact, I think these studies are often biased and distorted, and if you follow the money trail, you’ll see they’re often funded by pharmaceutical interests. After all, if preventative health care took root in a big way, the demand for prescription drugs, which you basically only need when you’re already sick, would collapse.

In any event, it seems the evidence about omega 3’s are so overwhelming that even most conventional medical practitioners will often recommend increasing their intake in the diet through foods or supplementation.

Many health experts and researchers believe that omega 3 fat is the one essential nutrient that is missing the most  in today’s diet. This deficiency is now believed to play a major role in the rampant increases in heart disease, cancers, and brain disorders.

Not surprisingly, studies have shown that many of these diseases and disorders improve when omega 3 supplementation is used.

But before we talk about specific conditions that may strongly benefit from the use of omega 3 supplementation, of which purified fish oils are the best source, I’d like to tell you briefly why omega 3’s are so vital for good health to begin with.

The human body requires a tremendous amount of omega 3 fatty acids to function properly.

Omega 3 Fatty Acid Fact: The human brain is comprised of 60% fats, and approximately half of that fat is DHA omega 3.

Your brain, the master organ, the one that controls your entire body, is made up of a tremendous amount of fat by weight.  And a significant portion of this fat is the omega 3 fatty acid known as DHA.

This means that nature intended the human brain to be “powered” by fats, so to speak, and if you don’t have enough, your brain won’t function at peak levels. Although it’s not a perfect metaphor, it’s somewhat like trying to run a car without fuel.

However, it’s even worse, because whereas a car would simply not run, the human brain instead begins to suffer from ailments and diseases.

The Miracle of Omega 3 for Health

So, why do I, and so many others, consider omega 3 a health miracle?

Let’s consider just some of the many conditions and disorders that it may help improve.

Brain Health

Deficiencies in omega 3 fats have been linked to depression, anxiety, mood swings, bipolar disorder, postpartum depression, Alzheimer’s disease and ADHD.

Millions upon millions of people suffer from just these conditions alone. Maybe even you do, or have a loved one who does.

Researchers from institutions as prestigious as the Harvard School of Public Health have demonstrated some of these conditions greatly improve with increased omega 3 fatty acid intake.

Other studies have shown that even if you don’t have any of these conditions, memory and focus can improve greatly with consistent use of fish oil.

Heart Health

“Omega 3 fatty acids benefit the heart of healthy people, and those at high risk of — or who have — cardiovascular disease.”
– The American Heart Association

One of the best known and studied benefits of omega 3 fatty acids is for heart health. Until recently, heart disease was the number #1 killer in the Western world, but has been recently surpassed by cancer.

Fish oil supplements which are very high in omega 3 fats, have been shown to help those with heart disease, and help protect those who don’t, but might be susceptible to it down the line due to family history or genetics.

How does it do this? Well, for starters, omega 3’s make the blood thinner. This prevents blood cells from clumping together and forming clots, which can lodge in coronary arteries and cause a heart attack or a stroke.

In addition, omega 3’s can reduce triglycerides, which are blood fats closely related to cholesterol.  When they are coupled with high levels of LDL cholesterol, your chances for heart disease can go up dramatically.

Research has also shown that omega 3’s can help reduce or prevent heart rhythm abnormalities by making the electrical system of the heart stronger.  This is especially helpful for individuals at risk of sudden death from cardiac arrest such as those with heart failure or a history of heart attacks.

It is interesting to note, heart disease is not just caused by poor diet and high cholesterol.  Inflammation of the lining of the arteries can also contribute substantially to the development of plaque build up and blood clots.  It just so happens that omega 3’s have potent anti-inflammatory properties that can counter this.

Arthritis Aches and Pains

Did you know that a lot of the aches and pains associated with arthritis are due to inflammation? This is why studies have shown that fish oil supplementation, rich in omega 3’s, can help alleviate these pains in those who suffer from rheumatoid arthritis.

Crohn’s Disease & Inflammatory Bowel Disorders

The same is true for Crohn’s disease, which is characterized by painful inflammation of the bowel. In one particular year long study, 69% of Crohn’s sufferers who used a fish oil supplement stayed symptom free as opposed to only 28% who were administered a placebo.

Pregnant or Nursing Mothers

It’s irrefutable now that for the fetal brain to develop properly, it needs a great deal of omega 3’s.

If you are a pregnant mother, you should strongly consider using a molecularly distilled fish oil supplement so your developing baby’s brain has the best chance of developing properly. Of course, speak with a doctor before beginning any kind of self treatment or supplementation.

If you are a nursing mother, you should also be taking an omega 3 supplement or at least eating enough omega 3 foods. Since our bodies do not manufacture omega 3 fatty acids on their own, supplementation through fish oil capsules or through diet is important.

It is important to note that the omega 3 you obtain from your diet is passed along to your baby when you breastfeed.

Even if you are no longer breastfeeding, you should be careful to take in enough omega 3 for your own health. If you have young children, adequate levels of omega 3 intake are associated with better focus in school and during the formative years as well as higher IQ’s.

Lastly, the omega 3’s in fish oil have also been shown to help ease menstrual cramps.

Psoriasis, Acne, and Other Skin Disorders

If you know anyone who suffers from psoriasis or acne, you know how painful and embarrassing these conditions can be. Maybe you have them yourself. One of the primary problems in these conditions is inflammation. Although fish oils are not going to cure these conditions, its anti-inflammatory properties often help make them much better.

Cancers

As I said earlier, cancer has now overtaken heart disease as the leading cause of death in the US. Of course, there are numerous types of cancers. Some exciting new research is showing that omega 3’s may not only help prevent cancer from occurring, but may also help prevent it from progressing if it has already occurred.

Although more studies need to be done urgently in this area, DHA and EPA omega 3’s, found in fatty fish and fish oil supplements, may protect against the following types of cancers: breast, prostate, testicular and ovarian.

In the meantime, although the studies that have been conducted are not conclusive, the evidence seems to overwhelmingly suggest that increasing one’s intake of omega 3 fats can help in the battle against cancer.

The List Goes On

Please understand that this page is not exhaustive. I could write another 10 pages on the miracle of omega 3 fatty acids, and include a discussion of other conditions such as Lupus and Raynaud’s disease. But I think you’re starting to get the picture. And that picture is that if there’s one supplement everyone should be taking to fight disease, keep the brain sharp, and stay in peak health, it should be an omega 3 supplement.

And the best kind? Again, purified fish oil supplements, especially those made from a fatty type fish species naturally high in DHA and EPA.

What’s Wrong With The Modern Diet?

Modern farming practices, for both the meat and agricultural industries, has made food a lot less nutritious than it used to be. One of the consequences is that foods that used to contain high levels of omega 3 fats are now a poor source.

In a nutshell, large scale farming raises meat for one purpose: profit. There’s nothing wrong with profit per se, but when you are feeding millions of people, you want to raise the animals as fast as you can, make them as fat as you can, so you can produce as much meat as you can.

What this means it that the beef, chicken, lamb, you name it, that you buy at the local grocery store is typically grain-fed and fattened meat. By contrast, it’s the animal’s natural diet, like grass-grazing cattle and lamb that makes them such naturally rich sources of omega 3’s. Once you force them to eat grain-based feed to fatten them up, their omega 3 content virtually disappears.

You’ve all heard the saying that you are what you eat. Well, animals are what they eat too. And if you eat the animals….then you are what they eat. And that is largely grains and corns.

What about fish? Unfortunately, fatty fish, the formerly best source of omega 3’s, harbors many pollutants such as PCB’s, mercury, lead, and the like. This is due to industrial pollution that has accumulated in many of the oceans and waterways of the world.

Fish Oils: The Absolute Best Source

So what’s the solution?

Well, if you want all the benefits of omega 3 fatty acids without the harmful toxins that you’d get by eating a lot of fish, the solution is to take a molecularly distilled fish oil supplement.

Molecular distillation allows the oils to be separated from the contaminants and provides a clean, pure source for omega 3 intake. The rich, healthy omega 3 oils can then be encapsulated into soft gels for easy swallowing. Of course, there’s a little more to it than this, but this is the most important point to understand.

Not only are purified fish oil supplements the best source, they are also the most economical. A month’s supply of a top notch product will set you back less than $20 dollars a month. If you go buy a few filets of salmon or tuna at the local fish market, you’ll spend that much just for one dinner.

If you’ve decided that you should start including a fish oil supplement as part of your daily health regimen, what you need to do now is know how to compare one brand against another. This, of course, will allow you to get great value for your money and the best product you can buy.

I have compared dozens of brands before deciding on one.

Many times companies that cannot substantiate their claims about purity and freshness will charge up to twice as much for their product. “Why do they do that?” you ask. One would think that the worse a product is, the less expensive it would be. Well, it’s an old marketing trick that’s been used many times very effectively. Our minds tend to equate spending more money with achieving higher quality. Many people tend to think, “Hey, I’m spending $2,000 on this television, therefore it has to be amazing.” Not so fast! Often, higher prices mask hidden downsides. Don’t fall for this. Your health is far too precious.

On the other end of the spectrum, some products are ridiculously cheap. Upon further investigation you find out the oils aren’t molecularly distilled (which means they harbor contaminants), or the fish species being used isn’t rich in omega 3’s, or that the oils have no process to keep them fresh. Fish oils are subject to oxidation quickly.  Oxidation is the process by which the fish oil becomes rancid.

Here are my criteria for the evaluation of fish oil supplements:

• Type of fish being used — is it naturally high in DHA and EPA omega 3? And especially DHA?
• Is it purified by molecular distillation?
• Is the fish caught locally to where the product is produced, ensuring freshness? Or is rancidity a concern?
• Is it a deep ocean fish?
• Does the product tell you the exact breakdown between DHA omega 3 and EPA omega 3 and not just the total omega 3 content per serving? Does it even tell you the total omega 3 per serving?
• How many servings does it contain per bottle?

If you have the answer to these types of questions, then you can do true price comparisons to see what kind of value you are getting.

For example, if product A costs $18 dollars for a month’s supply, and product B costs $16 dollars for a month’s supply, most people just think, well, product B is a better buy. Not so fast!

Let’s just take one of the above criteria. What if product A has 1,000 mg of omega 3 per capsule, and product B has 500 mg. They both have 60 soft gels, and the recommended dosage is 2 per day, which means it’s a one month supply of product for each. Well, now the $16 dollar product definitely doesn’t seem like the better buy because product A is only $2 dollars more but contains twice the omega 3 fats per capsule.

So, you see, there’s a little analysis and research that goes into this. And none of that analysis is difficult.

And, believe me, it’s worth doing. Omega 3’s are indisputably one of the most important substances for good health and well-being.  if you are going to use a product like I have for years and conceivably take it for the rest of your life, doing a few minutes of research as you have just done by reading this page, can pay off immensely over the years when it comes to your health or your family’s health.

What I Personally Take

After researching the market and doing just the type of comparisons I mention above, I decided on a fish oil supplement product from New Zealand.

Here’s why I decided on this product.

1. It is made from a fish species called hoki. Hoki are a sustainable, natural resource regulated by the New Zealand government. They thrive natively in the cold, deep waters off the Southern coast of New Zealand, one of the most pristine areas of the world, virtually untouched by industry and pollution issues.

2. Even more important, hoki are one of the few fish species that are naturally high in omega 3’s, particularly containing a higher level of DHA omega 3 than EPA omega 3. DHA can be converted by the body into EPA when more EPA is needed, but not the other way around. It’s very important your fish oil supplements have more DHA than EPA.

3. The fish oil product, produced by a company called Xtend-Life Natural Products, is molecularly distilled. Why does it need molecular distillation if the fish is already coming from the cleanest area of the world? Because nature can create pollution too! Just think how much contamination is spewed into the atmosphere and waters when a volcano erupts, for example. All fish oil products should undergo molecular distillation, period.

4. Cost. Given the amount of DHA and EPA, and total omega 3 per serving, I have yet to find a better priced product than the Omega 3 fish oils produced by Xtend-Life Natural Products.  If you can find a premium fish oil for what Xtend-Life is charging, with the same attention to quality control processes, purity, freshness, customer satisfaction, public documentation and transparency, and I’ll be amazed.

I now have been using the Xtend-Life Omega 3 fish oil product for years, and so has my whole family.  In my opinion, it has been and will continue to be one of the best health decisions I have ever made. Especially when it comes to dollar to dollar value.

It amazes me that people will spend hundreds upon hundreds of dollars (sometimes well over a thousand dollars) per month for organic produce, grass-fed meats, smoothies, gym memberships, etc., in order to try to live a healthier lifestyle — and all of these things can be good — but for less than $20 dollars a month they can be doing more good for their health than many of these other things put together.

Even if you decide on using a different brand than the Xtend-Life fish oils, you should at least read the information presented at their page, as it will educate you much further, and in simple fashion, on how to choose a really good omega 3 product.

To Your Health,
Fish Oil Supplements Central