28/10/2022
First records of vitamin deficiency diseases date as early as 1500s. During the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, many sailors eating a diet of salty meat and fish, butter, cheese and bear developed scurvy and as many as 10,000 diet of this vitamin C deficiency disease. When the men were introduced to sources of vitamin C (vegetables, notably greens) their symptoms disappeared rapidly.
Beri Beri, Vitamin B1 deficiency, another potentially fatal disease, was also prevalent in 1800s amongs Japanese sailors who ate a diet low in whole grains. Once the whole grains were added to their diet the severity of the disease dissipated.
Most vitamins were discovered through diseases caused by their deficit.
In 1900s Sir Frederic Galen Hopkins published a report in which he suggested that ‘accessory nutrients’ are essential for our diets, so that our good health can take place.
In 1911, Thiamin (vitamin B1) was extracted from rice. It was found that it was an amine (a compound containing nitrogen), and so the name vit-amine (life amine) was coined.
