It’s D-lovely
In light of all the news of late about the benefits of Vitamin D I’ve been wondering if I should start supplementing with it or mainlining it or not worrying about it at all. . .Health Canada has just updated their recommendations around Vitamin D and Health and they’ll be participating in a conference in September of 2007 to review the efficacy and safety of Vitamin D – in the meantime, they recommend that for now “all Canadians over the age of two consume 500 mL (two cups) of milk every day for adequate vitamin D and in addition encourages everyone over the age of 50 to take a daily supplement of 400 IU of vitamin D. ”
Remember – too much Vitamin D can be as bad for you as too little – I’ve made a mental note to update this in September once they’re newer recommendations are out.
June 24th, 2007 at 8:09 am
“Remember – too much Vitamin D can be as bad for you as too little”
The problem is How much is Too Much.
Your body actually uses 4000iu daily.
“Risk Assessment For Vitamin D” lists all the research on Vitamin D safety and concludes that the safe limit should be 10,000iu daily. This is a sensible safe amount as it represents about the most vitamin D your body could possibly make if you were sensible and lay in the sun, nearly naked,turning over every 5 mins. If you do this for about 20 mins then go in for an hour, then repeat a couple more times making sure your skin NEVER gets red or gets anywhere near starting to burn.
The actual level that has been shown to cause harm is 40,000iu daily but you’d have to take this for a while for the damage to show, and of course if you stopped overdosing the damage would be repairable.
You can read what Dr Rienhold Vieth answering “Questions about Vitamin D” here http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070607.wvitaminDdiscussion0607/BNStory/specialComment/home