Glutathione along with the enzyme superoxide dismutase are the body’s “master” antioxidants. Glutathione is made up of three amino acids: glutamine, cysteine and glycine and has a sulfuric smell.
It is used up and is deficient in a wide variety of diseases such as Alzheimer’s, diabetes, cancer, inflammatory bowel diseases (such as Crohn’s) and neuro-degenerative diseases like multiple sclerosis.
Inside each cell, glutathione fluctuates rapidly between the reduced (active) and the oxidated (inactive-GSSG) forms. In a 1997 study (3) of critically ill ICU patients it was shown that the ICU patients had about 60% lower levels of total and reduced (active) glutathione levels than a control group of patients.