New Vitamin D Recommendations

A recent report from the Institute of Medicine claims that only 600IU/day are needed to maintain adequate levels. An adequate level, in their opinion, is 20ng/ml. These recommendations are pretty much crazy when you take into account the facts about how vitamin D is made in the body. I invite you to think this through with me.

If you expose your skin to about 15 to 20 minutes of sunlight, your body produces around 10,000IU of vitamin D. That's right, 10,000IU. Can you imagine if you were able to have exposure to 15 - 20 minutes of unfiltered peak sunlight a day? Your level would be FAR beyond their adequate amount. You blood level of vitamin D after the above exposure would easily be 60ng/ml, not a mere 20.

The Institute of Medicine also wants us to believe that Vitamin D is only utilized for bone health. That is insanely stupid. Vitamin D acts like a hormone in the body, impacting tissues throughout the body, not just bone. It even regulates pathways involved with immune function and cancer. Just as Vitamin B6 and B12 have varying roles in the body, so does vitamin D.

The Institute of Medicine based their recommendations on many scientific studies, apparently ignoring all the recent reports of low vitamin D being linked to a large number of health issues and also forgetting to use common sense in their decisions.

Ignore the new recommendations. Have your vitamin D levels checked and make sure it is above 50ng/ml. If it's not, begin to supplement, and supplement with far more than 600IU/day.