I’m not trying to be a drama queen or wanting to scare you but the supplement company has a dirty little secret that they’re not wanting you to know about.

Consumer Reports just came out with a study where they found trace amounts of toxic metals inside many of the popular protein supplements.

EAS Myoplex Original Rich Dark Chocolate Shake ranked above the U.S. Pharmacopeia’s maximum limits for Arsenic and Cadmium.

Muscle Milk proved to be the worst of the bunch and had above recommended levels for Arsenic, Cadmium, LEAD and MERCURY.

Yep and we’re putting this stuff in our bodies everyday.

No Bueno.

So is this a reason why we should stop taking protein supplements, or any supplements for that matter?

To be honest, we should getting our daily protein intake from real whole foods, not protein supplements.

I only use protein supplements (not the ones listed in the Consumer Reports study) around 3-5x a week total.  Mostly post-workout.

It’s a shame when I see high school kids taking protein supplements because they learned from their athletic peers and bodybuilders that it’s the best way to build muscle.

An American Academy of Pediatrics study found that protein powders and shakes were the most commonly used supplements by those aged 12-18.

This is the age when they SHOULD be getting down proper eating habits and even though it probably won’t kill them, I firmly believe they should wait until they’re 18 before they start using supplements.

It’s also a lot cheaper to get your protein intake from whole foods compared to protein supplements.  Some cheaper and effective examples could be grilled chicken breasts, chocolate milk, scrambled eggs, salmon, etc.

You also don’t need to take in 40-50g of protein in one setting.  You’re body obviously can’t break that much protein down and absorb it all so the rest is converted to fat or excreted out of the body.

20-30g is the right amount of protein you’ll want to be taking in post-workout, I usually take in around 26g.

So if you’re like me and care whether or not you want to be poisoned by your protein shake then it’ll be a wise idea to sparingly use them and definitely not the ones I mentioned above.

The only protein powder I like to use is the naturally sweetened and pharmaceutical quality ProGrade brand.  See more about Prograde supplements in my personal review.

Click Here to see my recommended protein supplement.

So let’s stop falling for the supplement industry’s dirty little tricks and we don’t have to pay them $2.7 billion a year.

But unfortunately there are still those people out there who won’t listen and would prefer to keep killing themselves but the choice is yours.