Science Forums 2

[Michaelangelica]

In utero and in childhood, not getting enough vitamin D can cause growth retardation, skeletal deformities and increase the risk of future hip fractures. In adults, too little vitamin D can lead to or exacerbate osteopenia, osteoporosis, muscle weakness, fractures, common cancers, autoimmune diseases, infectious diseases and cardiovascular diseases.

In the July 19 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine, Michael Holick, director of the General Clinical Research Center at Boston University School of Medicine and director of the Bone Healthcare Clinic at Boston Medical Center, published an overview of his work on vitamin D.

According to Holick, it has been estimated that one billion people in the world are vitamin D deficient or insufficient.
Without vitamin D, only 10 percent to 15 percent of dietary calcium and about 60 percent of phosphorus is absorbed by the body. This can have a direct effect on bone mineral density.

One Billion People Don't Get Enough Vitamin D

D minus. Vitamin D can also be obtained from fortified milk and sunshine—and many kids should be getting more of both. In another new study, reported in the July issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers found that 55 percent of outwardly healthy children and teenagers they tested didn't have enough vitamin D to grow healthy bones. Dark-skinned children were particularly likely to be short of the bone-building vitamin, according to Babette Zemel, an author of the study and director of the Nutrition and Growth Laboratory at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. The reason: The melanin that makes their skin dark also blocks ultraviolet rays, which the body uses to make vitamin D. In winter, when the sun was weakest, more than 90 percent of blacks in the study were vitamin D deficient.

The older teenagers tended to have reduced levels of vitamin D even when they drank plenty of milk. That may be because they play outside less than younger kids do, Zemel says. Her advice: Point kids outside, and wait a few minutes before putting on sunblock; 10 minutes of midday summer sun provides 10,000 international units of the vitamin—more than enough for a day. (Like melanin, sunblock prevents the skin from making vitamin D, so a bit of lotion-free exposure is necessary to grab the benefit.)

Children Found Lacking in Vitamin D - US News and World Report

Sweeping cancer edict: take vitamin D daily
Recommendation comes on heels of U.S. study suggesting supplement slashes risk of disease by as much as 60 per cent

MARTIN MITTELSTAEDT

From Friday's Globe and Mail

June 8, 2007 at 12:00 AM EDT

TORONTO — The Canadian Cancer Society plans to announce Friday that all adults should start taking vitamin D, coinciding with the release of a groundbreaking U.S. study indicating the supplement cuts the risk of cancer by an astounding 60 per cent.

The move is believed to be the first time a major public-health organization has endorsed daily use of the sunshine vitamin as a cancer-prevention therapy for an entire population.
. . .
The society says whites should take supplements containing 1,000 international units a day during fall and winter, the six months of the year when sunlight falling on Canada isn't strong enough for skin to fulfill its vitamin D role. Those with dark skin, who don't go outside frequently or wear full body clothing for cultural or religious reasons, such as veiled women, should take 1,000 IU year-round.
. . .
Among the cancers linked to low levels of the vitamin in previous research are those of the breast, rectum, ovary, prostate and pancreas, as well as multiple myeloma.

globeandmail.com: Sweeping cancer edict: take vitamin D daily

So, instead of all this hysteria about taking supliments, what ever happened to the FDA proposal to give mushrooms a burst of sunlight before going to market? This elevates their Vit D levels drastically. (see early posts).
I mean mushrooms used to grow in fields, not caves.