Holy false information, Batman!

Holy false information and skewed statistics!

A new study, released last November, claims that vitamin supplements are useless when it comes to preventing heart disease and cancer.

Well, guess what? Now the focus is on vitamin D, specifically. Claims are being made that there is no useful purpose for the average person to take vitamin D. In fact, the claim is that it may cause more harm than good.

This is from the Dr. Mercola web page —

According to the authors of the study:

"Available evidence does not lend support to vitamin D supplementation and it is very unlikely that the results of a future single randomized clinical trial will materially alter the results from current meta-analyses."

"Without stringent indications -- i.e. supplementing those without true vitamin D insufficiency -- there is a legitimate fear that vitamin D supplementation might actually cause net harm."

Additionally, they were able to ascertain that women in this study had increased fracture rates. I'd like to point out that these women were given 500,000 IU all in one dose. The body cannot process this amount all at once due to the of level of toxicity. So, no surprise there was a problem.

I gathered some additional information from Dr. Mercola's web page —

Published in the journal Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology :

vitamin D supplements do not reduce the risk of heart attacks, strokes, cancers, or bone fractures.

And get this, researches also claim that vitamin supplementation is below a "futility threshold". Well duh! The average dose used in the study was 400-800 IU a day. This amount was already deemed ineffective in previous studies.

Bogus, Bogus, and  Bogus again!

Since 2000, the research surrounding the benefits of vitamin D supplementation resulted in nearly 34,000 published studies on the benefits of vitamin D with 800 of these explaining the effectiveness against cancer.

We have to take vitamin D

It is almost impossible for us to synthesize it on our own by just being in the sun. Most of us have regular jobs that keep us inside 8-10 hours a day. Plus, we live in the northern hemisphere. It's been proven that vitamin D synthesis during the winter months is almost nil. In order for us to get what we need, we would have to live in a perpetual June-through-August-sunlight type of climate.

I've said this before and I'll say it again, "Cold and flu season directly correlates to the lack of vitamin D we get during the colder months." (November thru March)

In 2007, a published follow-up study showed that after four years of vitamin D supplementation there was a 77% reduced risk of cancer in women taking 1100 IUs of vitamin D and 1450mg of calcium per day. For protection against heart disease, 4000 - 8000 IUs of vitamin D per day.

Look it up

Here's the deal: Do your own research before you accept what you hear through the media as we know it.  Check out Dr. Mercola's webpage — there is some good information there. He's really good at getting the facts to the general public.

Take control of your own health. My Grand Pa once told me‚ "Just because a group of people say so, it don't always make it so."

peace and 1 love,
Chuck