Posted on 12/06/2009 9:00:19 AM PST by STARWISE
The claims have been sensational. Martin Mittelstaedt checks up on the research behind the hype
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In the summer of 1974, brothers Frank and Cedric Garland had a heretical brainwave.
The young epidemiologists were watching a presentation on death rates from cancer county by county across the United States.
As they sat in a lecture hall at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore looking at the colour-coded cancer maps, they noticed a striking pattern, with the map for colon cancer the most pronounced.
Counties with high death rates were red; those with low rates were blue. Oddly, the nation was almost neatly divided in half, red in the north and blue in the south. Why, they wondered, was the risk of dying from cancer greater in bucolic Maine than in highly polluted Southern California?
*snip*
Exposure to sunshine varies dramatically depending on the latitude. What if that's what was behind the varying cancer rates?
Their hypothesis, painstakingly developed and published six years later in the International Journal of Epidemiology, was that sunlight has a powerful anti-cancer effect through its role in producing vitamin D in bare skin.
Those living at northern latitudes, they theorized, receive less sunlight and make less of the vitamin, which in turn increases their risk of dying from cancer.
Today, with vitamin D so much in the news, it's hard to believe that it took decades for the Garlands' hypothesis to gain traction in the mainstream medical community.
But the benefits of vitamin D are no longer restricted to cancer prevention:
Studies have linked a shortage of the compound to such serious, chronic ailments as multiple sclerosis, diabetes, heart disease, influenza and schizophrenia.
Rest @ link
(Excerpt) Read more at theglobeandmail.com ...
It's made a huge difference for me and my 92 yr old Mom. The recommended dose for adults by those who know its benefits is 5,000IU a day, especially in the gloomy winter, sunless northern climes. I up my dose a bit, if I'm out sloshing in bitter cold weather and around sick folks, especially with the swine flu still around. More and more docs are getting the picture and testing for Vit D levels.
Mayo Clinic and collaborators find vitamin D levels associated with survival in lymphoma patients"
I’m currently on 50,000 units 3 days a week. My level was 9. The stuff can be very toxic at those levels. One more week and I’ll be retested to see how much I’ve recovered. My kidneys are going south and they are the greatest contributor to the problem.
I take 4,000 IU of vitamin D daily.
~~Please forgive any duplicates. Thought this
was important to get out to all ......... ;)
I can personally attest to the incredible benefits
of Vit D3.
There is now also a study showing that Niacin (B3) helps treat and prevent Alzheimer’s and dementia.
This sounds like a Sunday afternoon paid radio program.
“and Bob...what about earwax? Funny you should ask Dave, vitamin D has been shown to completely eliminate earwax in 87% of adults....
“You know my mother in law has a problem with in-grown toenails, underarm itch, and and thinning eyebrows... Then this product is for her Dave,. You might want to get her a whole case of vitamin D because there is hard data to show substantial reported relief in all of those areas and more!”
I’ve heard varying figures myself. I don’t think there is a set amount that everyone has agreed upon.
So:
GLOBAL WARMING WILL CURE CANCER???
LOL
That doctor on Fox this morning says it’s good for elderly people to take Vitamin D for inbalance.....he takes 2000 ICU’s a day.
The megadose is hurting your kidneys?
Did the doc directly link that thru tests?
Prayers that this chapter ends well for
you and leaves you in good health.
Same here. I was very ill 2 years ago with all sorts of autoimmune disorders. Things started to turn around for me 2 weeks after an endocrinologist put me on Vitamin D.
let me get this straight
you cook in sun to get skin melanoma and keel over from it
but its a good thing because the globules of vitamin d will fight the same cancer
how about some common sense
i know its crazy
That’s why you take the vitamin form.
Why is that so hard to believe? If the FDA can't regulate it and the drug companies can't make money off it, then it must not be real, right?
Or how about just 12 oz of milk everday?
No. Flip it. My kidneys aren't synthesizing Vitamin D. I have chronic kidney disease and it isn't uncommon to have the deficiency, my MD tells me.
I think the amount of Vitamin D needed is provided well before you start to get sunburn.
I’m in southern Arizona, so I don’t worry about vitamin D supplements. Sunscreen is more useful...
Over the years, the value and vital need
for sunlight has been marginalized. We
were told we had to stay out of the sun,
it was so dangerous, we’re all sheathed
in sunscreen, live and work indoors behind
tinted windows, drive cars with tinted windows
.. less and less sunlight hit naked skin, which
is how Vit D gets synthesized into our body.
Hence, the need for supplementation.
If you’re in the tropics and get 10-15 mins
a day of sunlight on un-suncreened skin,
you’re getting what you need.
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