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Glutathione, Part 2

© Dr. David L. Phillips

In the first part of this article on the subject of glutathione (GSH), we looked at the importance of this compound in maintaining a healthy and strong immune system. This is especially so as one ages because the GSH levels of youth wane after mid-life. Many of the diseases of aging have been attributed to a lowering of cellular glutathione. Factors that cause diminishment of one’s GSH are the usual gang of suspects plus some interesting ones that may surprise you: alcohol, smoke, radiation from all sources including sunlight, chemical exposure such as lawn chemicals, automotive fuels and oils, infections, emotional and physical stress, and mostly all drugs but especially acetaminophen (Tylenol).

The question then becomes: how can I raise my glutathione level or at least ensure that it stays high enough to remain healthy? The first thing I’d like to clear up is that supplementing with oral glutathione won’t work. The glutathione in your cells needs to be made by your cells. Taking GSH orally, like a vitamin, is a waste of money. Your digestive system will break it down and little good will come of that effort.

GSH precursors, such as cysteine, methionine and glutamine will raise the GSH levels to a minor degree; however, all have side effects and are not well tolerated by most people. Milk thistle, melatonin and lipoic acid can be helpful as well but the bio-response and degrees of bioavailability can vary widely and investigations are on-going.

Whey proteins seem to be the best method of obtaining the building blocks of glutathione. You see, breast-fed infants have high GSH levels and for the most part enjoy better health until about the age of 15 until their GSH level off to that of non-breast-fed infants. The whey content of raw milk contains several albuminous proteins that supply potent GSH precursors. However the heat of Pasteurization and the extreme agitation of homogenization easily denature these proteins. This denaturing process renders their GSH enhancing abilities next to useless.

You need to be very careful of the source of your whey protein if GSH is what you are concerned with. These glutathione-building protein factors are extremely sensitive to denaturing by heat and agitation. To maintain bioactivity of glutathione precursors, whey proteins must be extracted from milk under exacting, almost laboratory conditions, and then concentrated. Most whey products vary from 20-90% in their protein content.

Much of the research into whey proteins and their stellar glutathione enhancing ability came from McGill University in Canada resulting from an accidental discovery while studying protein supplementation in the 1980’s. Over the last 20 years, much research has been done to prove its value to human glutathione enhancement. An interesting product has resulted from all this research and is known commercially as Immunocal or in Canada as HMS90. This product has unquestionably proven to be highly bioavailable and effective in raising GSH levels both in the blood and intracellular.

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