VALUE OF OYSTERS

Waipa Post, Volume 49, Issue 3554, 6 December 1934, Page 6

VALUE OF OYSTERS

A PERFECT FOOD “Healthy oysters, coming from sanitary beds, inspire enthusiasm in biochemists and health specialists, for the oyster is a perfect food,” according to Dr. Rene Noel, a French physician. Taking (he oyster as made up of a hundred parts, seven of these comprise albuminoid material, two parts are fatty, four "parts are of hydrocarbonated matter, and one part is mineral salts. “The oyster is a vitalized food with a remarkable richness in vitamins,” sajs'Dr. Noel. “U contains the four fundamental vitar-N'is—vitamin A, the so-called growth vitamin; vitamin B, foe of the beriberi disease, the vitamin of nutritive utility; vitamin C, which is antiscorbutic, an.l vitamin D, antirachitic or neutralizing rickets. “The oyster contains valuable chemicals and great emphasis should he laid on its high content of phosphates of calcium and magnesium. “The presence of iron must be noted specially. Moreover, in ‘green’ oysters is a pigment which contains copper, evolved by a. diatom. “Such biochemical details led experimenters to look into the power of the oyster as a preventive of anemia, and recent reseat cites establish its blood-producing power. Its potency in anemia seems to he greater than that of veal extract, a heroic e:.pedient-in cases of aneRna. It is well known that the oyster contains iodine in relatively strong doses if the bivalve is raised in beds supplied with seaweed. Thus the oyster is not only a valuable food, but is also a precious medicine.”