Your mother always told you eating carrots would help you see better, but did she ever tell you why? No, this wasn’t just a trick to get you to eat your vegetables. It turns out carrots really do give your eyes a boost because they contain beta-carotene, which the body is able to convert into vitamin A, an essential vitamin for healthy vision.

Vitamin A, also called retinol, is key in fighting vision problems like cataracts, glaucoma, macular degeneration and night blindness. It is found primarily in fish oils, liver, eggs and fortified dairy products. However, if you don’t eat animal products, you can make sure you are getting plenty of vitamin A by eating fruits and vegetables that contain carotenoids like beta-carotene, which the body then converts to useful vitamin A, called “provitamin A.”

Vitamin A  Also  Produces Astonishing Leukemia Cure Rate, Even Without Chemotherapy

New research conducted at the University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center shows that vitamin A cures as many as 33% of patients with a rare form of leukemia — without using chemotherapy. In the study, the vitamin A was being delivered inside “bubbles of fat” to enhance bioavailability. Out of 34 patients participating in the trial, an astonishing 10 remained cancer-free after five years, despite receiving no chemotherapy.

So what’s the real story here? Researchers are calling this form of vitamin A a “drug,” which seems odd, since it’s just vitamin A. Perhaps they don’t want to admit that a vitamin is better than chemotherapy for curing cancer. And this is definitely a cure — that term is even being used by the researchers here. To take a group of cancer patients and watch them remain cancer-free for five years is nothing short of astonishing, especially since they were only taking one vitamin. Imagine how well they’d do if they also consumed chlorella (a strong anti-cancer superfood), spirulina (another superfood containing phytochemicals known to destroy breast cancer tumors), graviola (an Amazonian herb known for its powerful ability to destroy cancer cells), licorice root (a more popular anti-cancer herb) and other health-promoting foods and supplements. With the help of this collection of health-promoting substances, the cure rate could have easily risen to 75% or more.

Still, that’s just a guess. Organized medicine isn’t really interested in studying things that don’t generate profits, and herbs and superfoods certainly fall into that category. But it is exciting to see vitamin A having such a dramatic, positive impact on patients with leukemia who might otherwise be subjected to chemotherapy. And perhaps someday these researchers will have the courage to admit that it’s a vitamin, not a drug, that’s working the healing magic here.