Posted March 20, 2015: by Bill Sardi
You could almost hear the vitamin D advocates sigh in disappointment just like you hear the crowd at a baseball game groan in unison when a fly ball drops two inches into foul territory with the bases loaded. That was 2011 when the Food & Nutrition Board set the Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) for vitamin D at 600 international units (IU), equal to about 4 minutes of midday sunshine/skin exposure. Many criticisms of that decision followed.
The RDA is defined as the amount of a nutrient needed to meet the requirements of 97.5% of the population. Two leading vitamin D researchers claim the Food & Nutrition Board’s RDA of 600 IU achieves a blood concentration of 26.8 nanomoles per liter of blood rather than the optimal goal of achieving a 50.0+ nanomole/liter blood concentration, which is the goal for optimal health.
Instead of 600 IU of vitamin D from all sources (diet, sunshine and dietary supplements) researchers re-calculated and found the Food & Nutrition Board made a whopping error by an order of magnitude. Using the same data pool that the Food & Nutrition Board used vitamin D researchers indicate 7000 IU would be needed to reach vitamin D adequacy for 97.5% of the population. [Nutrients March 10, 2015]
The Food & Nutrition Board established 4000 IU as the safe tolerable upper limit which is also flawed since an hour of total body mid-day sun produces ~10,000 IU of vitamin D without side effects or excessive vitamin D blood levels.
The suggested 7000 IU intake level (just 175 micrograms by weight, or less than 1-5th of a milligram) is below the point where side effects have been observed (called the no observed tolerable upper intake level) of 10,000 IU. The new calculations make a farce out of the Food & Nutrition Board standard. One study shows that dietary intake of 632 IU and 400 IU supplementation per day still results in 10% of the population with a vitamin D blood level below 50. Bottom line, the current public health target isn’t being reached. [Nutrients March 10, 2015; Nutraingredients Dec 4, 2014]
Shame on the Food & Nutrition Board for establishment of a daily requirement for vitamin D that is 10 times less than adequate. [Science Daily March 17, 2015] When will the public catch on? The medical industry is, via establishment of nutrient adequacy standards, ensuring there is a certain level of disease to treat — ©2015 Bill Sardi, Knowledge of Health, Inc.
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