Sharon Schultz says, is there any way we can know our zinc/copper ratio is optimal without testing?
No, and I don't agree with using the zinc/copper ratio in testing. So it is the case that zinc
and copper need to be in a very loose range of ratios. So you don't want your dietary zinc to be
more than 15 times your dietary copper, and you don't want your dietary zinc to
be less than two times your dietary copper. But other than that, you're really looking at
them individually, and you're looking at, do I have enough zinc? Do I have enough copper?
Do I have signs of zinc deficiency? Do I have signs of copper deficiency? Do I have
signs of too much of one or the other? Much more than you're looking at the ratio. And in
plasma, I think the ratio just reflects disease responses. For example, inflammation will
suck zinc into cells, immobilize copper out of the liver and so it's going to lower the
zinc-to-copper ratio of plasma. And I don't think that has anything to do with nutrition.
And so I think it can be a marker in observational studies of disease processes.
I don't think it's a useful clinical marker except as a, hey, something's wrong here lets look at
inflammation markers, but why not just look at inflammation markers? And so in blood testing,
I really would only want to see plasma zinc around 100 to 120 and plasma copper, fairly close to the
middle of the range, pretty similar at a 100 to 120, generally speaking. And in the diet,
I would want to see a ratio of zinc to copper, at least two to one, no more than 15 to one,
and otherwise just manage them individually. Thank you, Sharon, for your question.