The way nature works in a more or less "natural" state is that tree roots go deep in the soil and bring up vital minerals that are replaced as the trees die and decompose.  In addition, animals that eat and contain the minerals themselves die and decompose and are returned to the soil.  Similarly, animal and human waste matter is returned to the soil.

In modern times, we have disrupted the natural cycle of mineral replenishment by clear-cutting the forests and trees to make crop land, removing most of the waste and dead animals, and we have over-farmed virtually all of our soil without allowing time for micro-organisms to convert the remaining minerals into usable forms for plants.  Thanks to the advent of petro-chemical fertilizers in 1908, we have mostly returned to the soil only petroleum derived nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus - which produce lush growth but nutrient-poor plants.

To make matters worse, we have applied pesticides and herbicides that have killed off vital micro-organisms which help convert remaining soil minerals to usable forms.

Thanks to the extended use of fertilizers and "maximum yield" mass farming methods the soil in the North American continent has had an average of 85% mineral depletion over the past 100 years - the worst of any other country in the world.

 The end result is that a bowl of spinach most of us eat today contains perhaps 1/8th the nutrition of the bowl our grandparents and great grandparents ate.

I, for one, do not think it is much of an overstatement, because minerals are the most basic of building blocks for proper nutrition and health.  Quite simply, without minerals, nothing else works.  Amino acids and enzymes don't work and so vitamins and other nutrients don't get broken down and absorbed properly and we end up with major deficiencies in both vitamins and minerals. The end result is a chain reaction of poor health where nothing works as it should.

"In the absence of minerals, vitamins have no function. Lacking vitamins, the system can make use of the minerals, but lacking minerals vitamins are useless."

- Dr. Charles Northern, researcher and MD

Another major area where mineral deficiency manifests itself, in addition to poor health and immune system support, is obesity.  Similar to the cats and dogs one sees eating grass when they instinctively know they are either deficient in vitamins and minerals or need extra ones to combat an illness or infection, I believe that the human body also sends such instinctive signals at times that it is missing vital nutrients, but we no longer recognize what it is our bodies are telling us and where to find what we need to silence the signals.

Such confused signals often lead to cravings oftentimes, and so we eat and eat to try to satisfy them, but what we really crave is missing nutrition.  Instead of turning to a nutritious diet or other healthy way to furnish minerals (such as the plant derived minerals from the prehistoric clays in Utah available from  Utopia Silver), we turn to the SADS diet, fast foods, nuked meals, sweets, junk food, etc. often to no avail. Perhaps many of us can relate to that familiar quandary of eating and eating to the point of being gorged, and yet still feeling hungry for "something".  That something very often is likely minerals!