Heavy Metals Testing & NMN #1 - My NMN Experiment

Table of Contents

heavy metals testing in foods

So, what’s the big deal with heavy metals testing? Why can’t we ingest heavy metals, there are heavy metals in some foods that we eat including fish such as Swordfish, Tuna, Bass and Snapper, in vegetables such as potatoes, celery and cabbage, even water and if we do ingest heavy metals, what are the negative implications?

We all know that heavy metals can be bad for us (in some cases ingesting heavy metals can be lethal), but there is not a lot of data on what is safe and what an acceptable level is, that’s even if there even is an official acceptable level for heavy metals testing.

the problem

Neither the USDA nor the FDA have set any limits on heavy metals testing in food, including organic foods, meaning that products can contain unregulated levels of mercury, lead, cadmium, arsenic, copper and even tungsten while still being legally sold in the USA and to make matters worse heavy metals are now being found in USDA certified organic foods, super-foods, vitamins, herbs and dietary supplements.

If this is true in the USA, you can bet your bottom dollar that it is going on in other countries too, especially those were testing and regulation is far less stringent than places like the USA, Canada, the UK, the EU, Australia, New Zealand etc.

third party test certificates

Thankfully reputable distributors of NMN like DoNotAge.org, Alive by Nature and ProHealth Longevity send their NMN for heavy metals testing to an accredited Third Party Lab and post their test certificate results for all customers to see BEFORE they part with your hard earned cash; the guidelines I follow when it comes to third party test certificates are:

No heavy metals testing certificates: If a company has no third-party certificates, I would give them a miss
Say they do: but no certificates are visible, again give them a miss
Send on request: If a company will send a copy of the heavy metals testing certificate with your purchase, IMHO give them a miss
First Party: If a company can only show you a third-party heavy metals testing certificate supplied by the first party, again give them a miss, IMHO these cannot be trusted

heavy metals testing official standard?

But, what is the official standard for heavy metals testing; even if a reputable company like ProHealth or DoNotAge.org post their results and stipulate that the lead content is <0.5 ppm in their NMN, is that good or bad?, where can you go to find out? The short answer is, at the time of publishing this article, nowhere, there is no official standard for heavy metals testing with NMN.

what is the solution?

If the is no standard, what is the solution? The industry desperately needs a standard, even a voluntary standard to which products can be compared for their heavy metals composition. Neither the USDA nor the FDA have expressed any interest in promoting or enforcing such a standard, so an organization called Low Heavy Metals Verified has developed and published an unofficial standard. They say, this logarithmic heavy metals testing standard is a purely voluntary, companies may wish to use it or not…and individuals, we may wish to use it to measure heavy metals levels in our supplements, or not.

I really believe that there should be a standard, but as I could not find an official standard; because one doesn’t exist, I had to look to for an unofficial/voluntary standard, this was the only one I could find, so I checked it out.

the verification standard

This verification standard uses a coin system that measures the levels of Lead, Cadmium, Arsenic and Mercury and awards an ascending grade depending on how low the levels are, the heavy metals testing standard goes from A+++ to F, you can see the full range in this link. If your supplement meets all the standards in A+++, you get an A+++, if however it meets all the standards in A+++, but let’s say Lead is 0.030, then you’re your grade or standard would drop down to an A++.

the suppliers scores

In regard to NMN heavy metals testing scores, I tested the big three; let’s see how they stack up against this unofficial, standard

All Test certificates checked on 18 July 2020, the score were as follows:

ProHealth NMN scored an A
DoNotAge.org also scores an A
Alive by Science scored a FAIL, Alive by Science (formally Alive by Nature) do not display a heavy metal certificates of analysis; they say that their method of production differs from others so there is little to no chance that heavy metals will be found in their product.

Is this acceptable? In my humble opinion regardless of the production method I would like to see the heavy metals scores, if only of peace of mind, of course there is no official standard of purity for either heavy metals or NMN, but the acceptable norm seems to be a Purity Test of both NMN and heavy metals for reputable distributors.

comparison of all scores

The only real difference between ProHealth and DoNotAge was that DoNotAge scored an A+++ for arsenic and ProHealth only scored an A++, the actual difference was a mere 0.883 ppm, but does that matter? Until there is an official standard, we don’t; know.

conclusion

There are heavy metals in some foods that we eat including fish and vegetables, even water and if we do ingest heavy metals, what are the negative implications? We all know that heavy metals can be bad for us (in some cases ingesting heavy metals can be lethal), but there is not a lot of data on what is safe and what an acceptable level is, that’s even if there even is an official acceptable level.

Neither the USDA nor the FDA have set any limits on heavy metals in food, meaning that products can contain unregulated levels of mercury, lead, cadmium, arsenic, copper and even tungsten while still being legally sold in the USA. If this is true in the USA, you can bet your bottom dollar that it is going on in other countries too.

Thankfully reputable distributors of NMN like DoNotAge.org, Alive by Science and ProHealth Longevity send their NMN for testing to an accredited Third Party Lab and post their test certificate results for all customers to see.

The industry desperately needs a standard, even a voluntary standard to which products can be compared for their heavy metals composition. Neither the USDA nor the FDA have expressed any interest in promoting or enforcing such a standard. An organization called Natural News Labs has developed and published an unofficial standard, they say this logarithmic standard is a purely voluntary.

Unfortunately, I had to close comments on the Blog because of spammers, more than fifty a day! If you have any questions, please leave them in the comments section of this video.