Jessica Apple, whose blog ASweetLife at asweetlife.org for people with diabetes is well worth reading, just told me about a great article on the subject of vitamin D that her brother, Sam Apple, recently wrote for the Financial Times site. His article is at http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/11180df8-beaa-11de-b4ab-00144feab49a.html
David
If you Google 'vitamin D deficiency Canada' you will get over 600,000 hits. Ninety-seven percent of Canadians are deficient in vitamin D.
It is well known by both medical professionals and Health Canada that this epidemic has been ongoing for years. As the interest in vitamin has increased several provinces have stopped testing for vitamin D. A few months ago my MD told me that doctors in my province had been issued a directive to not write any further requisitions for 25-OH-D blood tests. This is not a cost saving measure. The last time I had a 25-OH-D test done I had to pay the full $120.00. The consortium of vitamin D scientists operating under the GrassRoots Health/Vitamin D Action organization have estimated that optimizing blood levels of vitamin D to the 40 - 60 ng/ml range would cut health care costs by up to 50%. However, this would also devastate the sale of pharmaceuticals. Even a cost saving of 5% would have a signifcant impact.
Is this the reason why governments are selling vitamin D short?
I'm not that cynical. But the problem is money. As Sam Apple wrote (in the article that his sister Jessica told me about), "There are a number of obstacles to the research, but the simplest, and biggest, is money. Vitamin D is not a proprietary compound. It’s cheap and easy to produce. A bottle of 180 1,000-IU capsules can be purchased online for about £9. No pharmaceutical company is going to put up the many millions of dollars necessary to conduct the trials."
No clinical trials = no push to prescribe.
David
This is relevant.
Hi David,
There seems to be amazing evidence on the powers of Vit. D. I've been meaning to write about this for a while. Thank you for this.
Happy Thanksgiving,
AmyT
Dear Amy,
Please write about vitamin D too! While it may seem to not be so directly related to diabetes, it really is -- in several ways. I think that 50 years from now we will realize that low vitamin D levels are one of our most pervasive health problems.
Wishing you a grateful Thanksgiving!
David
Greetings,
I was recently (3 weeks ago) diagnosed with Diabetes and after researching the topic online came across your blog. I have really enjoyed catching up on your entries for the past year.
Given I am a newbie, could you advise, if over-the-counter Vitamin D supplements available in the grocery store are OK or should I do research online for recommended vendors?
Thanks again for the awesome work!
rpa
I appreciate you comments and your question. My guess is that essentially all OTC brands of vitamin D are fine -- unlike for many supplements. That's because it is already so inexpensive, that they don't have as much reason to cheat. In fact, prescription vitamin D is usually vitamin D2, a less bioavailable form than the vitamin D3 that most (but not all) authorities recommend. The brand that I prefer and have been using for years is NOW. I prefer it for two reasons: one is that you can get it in in a single little softgel of 5,000 IU and the other (much less important) is that NOW is the brand that is clearly the packaging leader with its vitamin D and most other supplements in making the packages less aggrevating to open. And I know that I get the IU I pay for with NOW softgels because I have been tested several times for my vitamin D level and it has always been high. One more thing: iherb.com is the best place I have found for buying essentially all supplements -- best prices, widest selection, and prompt shipping.
Best regards,
David
I agree totally with these comments. I started taking Vitamin D3, the NOW brand from IHerb.com. I feel so much better since I have been taking it. I recently increased my dosage from 2,000 units to 5,000, and as soon as I feel comfortable, will increase it to 5,000 twice a day. As an obese senior lady, I have to really be careful of my health, but so far, I am doing better than ever, and so far, my endocrinologist has not seen fit to even give me a prescription for any diabetic medication as my blood sugar levels and cholesterol levels have been fine.
Hi David:
I have just started taking Vitamin D and was questioning which would be the better form , capsules or tablets.
I was wondering too, about the non-medicinal ingredients that they contain. Often they contain oil stabilizers that carry the vitamin D. Many of these are in the form of oils that are either simply not good for your health, such as: Cottonseed Oil , Soybean Oil, Corn Oil, Canola Oil and either these fats have been turned into the heart clogging trans fats OR they could turn rancid unless they are fresh.
But even with a date on the bottle, you have no idea how long that oil was sitting on the shelf before it was made into vitamin D.
So maybe the only safe bets are to have them made either without an oil stabilizer or in Coconut Oil - which does not go rancid.
Joan Mercantini
Dear Joan,
You ask an interesting question about the non-medical ingredients in vitamin D that I hadn't considered before. So, for the first time, I checked what's in the vitamin D that I take. I was relieved to read that besides the vitamin itself the only ingredients are olive oil and the softgel capsule.
This is the NOW brand of vitamin D-3 that I get from a huge Web retailer, iHerb.com, which must have very fast turnover. I noticed that the expiration date of their current stock is October 2012 and that the bottle I have on hand has an expiration date of August 2012.
Best regards,
David
David,
You mentioned not getting colds since you've been taking Vitamin D.
I've been taking Vitamin D (15,000 IU per day) for a little more than a month, so maybe that wasn't long enough to build up the Vitamin D in my blood (starting point was 18 ng/ml) very much. I got a cold about a week ago and am just now getting over it.
I continue to take Vitamin D and recommend that others get tested.
I only wanted to point out that people might still get colds. I probably got exposed to the virus when I was doing volunteer IT work at a middle school. I understand that having diabetes results in having a compromised immune system. I try to keep my distance from the school children to avoid getting anything they might be carrying, but when you are working on a computer in a lab and the kid next to you sneezes, there's not much you can do.
Thank you for your informative article. I too was sceptical when all the news began turning to Vitamin D. I have concluded that I don't want to wait or have my family wait for the requirments to be raised. In my house we are supplementing and we found we like the Liquid D3 from Wellesse because it tastes great and our kids will take it too. Much easier than pills and I can buy one supplement for all of us. I found it at Costco but I think Walgreens and other drug stores have it too.
There is so much scientific evidence emerging on the benefits of vitamin D that I could not begin to cite even a small fraction of the studies without rambling on for pages.
First off, one of the best site for information is www.grassrootshealth.net
Grassroots is about to release the presentations that were made at the vitamin D conference held at the University of Toronto on November 3, 2009. Mercola has just mentioned these presentations to day on his site where the links are available.
With regard to supplement levels, the consensus of the vitamin D experts seems to be that we need a total amount per day in the order of 10,000 IUs. So if you live North of the 40th paralell like I do I average about 8,000 IU's of D3 per day.
Vitamin D supplementation, 25-hydroxyvitamin D concentrations, and safety
Vieth R., Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathobiology, University of Toronto, Mount Sinai Hospital, Ontario, Canada. - Am J Clin Nutr. 1999 May;69(5):842-56.
"Except in those with conditions causing hypersensitivity, there is no evidence of adverse effects with serum 25(OH)D concentrations <140 nmol/L, which require a total vitamin D supply of 250 microg (10,000 IU)/d to attain."
The gold standard for confirming vitamin D requirements is the 25-OH-D blood test. RDAs and recommended supplement levels are irrelevant unless confirmed by serum levels. 97% of Canadians are deficient (i.e, < 40 nmol/L). Mainstream considers 80nmol/L sufficient. Vitamin scientists recommend 100 to 150 nmol/L (40 - 60 ng/ml).
Several recent double blind studies employing serum level tests have shown that vitamin D enhances insulin sensitivity. The authors suggest that vitamin D deficiency may be a major contributor to the incidence of type II diabetes. Earlier studies that used supplements only (i.e. 400 IUs per day) did not show improvement in insulin sensitivity leading to the erroneous conclusion that raising vitamin D levels did not help. There were two huge problems with such studies:
1. Serum testing was not used. So the reserachers had no clue as to the actual blood levels and how much the supplement increased them.
2. The effect of vitamin D appears to be linear - i.e. more is better. So the studies did not raise blood levels enough to have an effect.
Badly done research like this has probably done enourmous damage by discouraging people, in particular diabetics, from optimizing their serum levels of vitamin D.
I will post more research later. I believe achieving and maintaining optimal blood levels of vitamin D is so important to diabetics that it deserves an ongoing blog dedicated to this subject.
I get my serum levels tested every 6 months. My last test was 51 ng/ml. It has now become apparent that I have been deficient in vitamin D most of my life. Before I started supplementing with D3 I had all the subtle but often devastating symptoms that became severe in the late winter. I now feel better that I have ever felt in my life despite having type II diabetes which I am managing extremely well on a low carb, high fat diet without medication.
Costco recently started providing their store brand (Kirkland) Vitamin D in 2000 IU strength oil-based capsules. Great quality at a bargain price. I have been taking 6000 IU daily for the last year. I have not been able to find warnings of any negative side effects, or any mention of what would be considered "overdose" amounts of Vitamin D. The TV news media is currently suggesting that low Vitamin D increases your chance of developing any type of cancer by 40%, and that an adequate amount of this vitamin in your system actually keeps cancer cells from developing.
I am a type II diabetic, and have struggled with depression for the last two years. My therapist had my doctor do a battery a tests, and interestingly enough it was discovered I had a vitamin D deficiency. I was placed on 1000 UI a day for 3 months, which did not bring my Vitamin D into the normal range, although it did improve it. I was then placed on 50,000 ui weekly for 10 weeks, I am now barely in the normal range, but the amazing thing is that I have had a marked improvement in my depression, as well as energy levels. I continue to take 1000 ui a day and we are still monitoring my Vitamin D levels, but I have to say for me this has not been a snake oil scene.
Fifty thousand IUs a week is only a little over 7,000 IUs per day. It takes a total intake of about 5,000 IUs per day just to maintain current levels. So if one is deficient it typically takes much more than 5,000 IUs per day to elevate blood levels. Studies have been done with doses of 500,000 IUs with no apparent ill effects. After several months without additional supplementation blood levels return to their pre supplement level.
Study just released today on the Science Daily web site
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/08/090821211007.htm
"They (the researchers) have found that diabetics deficient in vitamin D can't process cholesterol normally, so it builds up in their blood vessels, increasing the risk of heart attack and stroke."
Correcting a vitamin D deficiency which is rampant in diabetics probably is far more beneficial than making the LDL number look better with statins whch does little to correct the underlying problem.
I've been reading all the rave reviews in the press about the benefits of Vit D supplementation and began taking 2,000 about 3 months ago as I am a diabetic with other health problems and need all the help I can get. 5 weeks ago I began to wake up between midnight and 2 am with tremendous stomach pains and horrible gas and bloating. This happened about 3 times a week but not every night. I suspected gallbladder problems even though I 've never had a problem like this before and do not eat fried or fatty foods. After adjusting several of my supplements and cutting my Vit D level down to 1,000 iu, I was still getting the pains. I finally stopped the Vit D and the pains have ceased, but it has not been long enough to draw a direct connection. I was wondering of anyone else had experienced similar problems that might be related to Vit D.
In a previous post I cited a statement by Dr. Vieth that indicated some people may have conditions that make them sensitive to vitamin D supplements. I have not heard of the problem you describe. But it could be sensitivity to D3 or one of the ingredients in the tablet. You did not mention whether you are taking a tablet or oil-based form of D3. It could be that a different form or brand might not cause the problem you experienced.
The above aside it would be helpful if you knew your blood level of vitamin D by having a 25-OH-D test done. You could then try safe sun or safe artificial UV exposure to see how this affects your blood levels with follow up 25-Oh-D tests. This seems to be the preferred option of vitamin D scientists.
Diana
Interestingly, I also have problems with Vit D3 derived from fish oil caps and have to limit it to only one 400 IU cap per day. If I take more than that, it will cause a very unpleasant sensation in the upper region of the nose. This also happens whenever I take Omega products derived from deep sea fish. In oriental medicine, deep sea fish oil is regarded as very 'heaty' (= pyrogenic in western terms). Do you experience the same symptom? I find that if I replace fish-based Vit D3 with the lanolin-derived Vit D3, I am fine and do not experience the problem even the dosage of 2,500 IU per cap. I am referring here to Country Life which I bought from Swanson.
I do not know whether or not the flaxseed caps have the same kind of formula as the lanolin-derived ones. Perhaps it is good to let the readers know that Vit A, Vit D & Vit K are the only oil-soluble vitamins (the rest are water soluble) and that it's best that the respective formulas be oil-based for optimal absorption.
Cjuan
Diana, thanks for the note. Most of the Vit D3 supplements are derived from the liver of deep sea fish and therefore non-vegetarian. Only a few are derived from lanolin - there are two brands at iherb.com one namely Bluebonnet Nutrition and Country Life. Cholecalciferol is the alternative name for Vit D3 and this can be derived from either fish or lanolin. Also, D3 can be formulated in either pill (less desirable) or in capsule form. The latter contains the carrier oil (Vit E, flax oil, etc) necessary for proper absorption. Vit D does not dissolve in water but in oil so to ensure full bioavailability, it is normally formulated in capsule form. The D3 from fish can generate a lot of heat in the upper part of the body and this is probably why some people find that they do not get 'colds' after supplementation. I read that too much fish oil can thin the blood, and cause bleeding esp in the nasal region which is probably explains the nasal discomfort I mentioned in the previous post.
Cjuan
“Vitamin D fights common seasonal influenza and H1N1 in several ways,” says William Grant, founder of the Sunlight, Nutrition And Health Research Center in California. Primarily, research in the past few years has found that vitamin D helps you fight off the flu by supporting your immune system’s response to viruses.
A 2007 study on post-menopausal African-American women (who are naturally deficient in vitamin D) found that those who took 2,000 IU per day of vitamin D had a 90% reduced risk of contracting the seasonal flu over those who took a placebo.
Though there haven’t been any randomized tests conducted on H1N1, Grant says research shows vitamin D will also work in preventing the virus. “H1N1 is largely seasonal,” he says, adding that “the five groups that are shown as having more adverse effects from H1N1 are known to be vitamin-D deficient: pregnant women, Aboriginal people, obese people, people with type-2 diabetes and children with neurological diseases.”
The results of a new study on vitamin D published last summer found that those taking 800 IU of D3 per day had much less colds and flu than those taking a placebo while those taking 2000 IU of D3 per day had zero incidence of colds and flus in winter, spring and autumn and the same incidence as the 800 IU group in summer when vitamin levels are highest due to sun exposure. In the winter those taking a placebo had about 12 times as much flu as those taking 800 IUs of D3 and 23 times more than those taking 2,000 IU of D3 (who had zero viral infections)
Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 14 Number 2 Summer 2009
A double blind placebo study has yet to be done with any vaccine.
The reason why I increased my vitamin D dose from 10,000 IU/day to 15,000 was because of H1N1 (swine) flu. We have a little evidence that it might be protective, and since I'm over 65, I am at the bottom of the list to get the vaccine, which is already in short supply. When the epidemic passes, I will cut back my dose.
Best regards,
David
Ditto higher amounts of D3. But I am becoming less and less convinced that the H1N1 vaccine is 1) effective and, 2) safe.
I became especially suspicious after obtaining a copy of US patent application 12/199, 977 initially filed by Baxter International as a provisional US application on August 28, 2007 for an H1N1 vaccine. That is not a typo. The year 2007 is correct.
As an inventor who has written and filed numerous patent applications I can attest to the fact that weeks or even months of preparation typically precede the filing of an application. So that while WHO declared back in April 2009 that a new, never before seen virus called the H1N1 had been discovered in Mexico this was not in fact true. When WHO declared a pandemic several governments used the urgency of the situation to justify waiving all liability for vaccine makers because there was insufficient time to conduct long term safety tests. Really? My maths says there had been at least 19 months probably a lot more in which to do this.
When a patent application is filed the USPTO issues an application number. When the application is published the USPTO issues a publication number. When a patent is granted the USPTO issues a patent number. I don't believe the application number is made public. So at this point you need the publication number to search the USPTO records with.
I was and still am uncomfortable with the claims being made for the safety of vaccines by public health officials because they are not supported by the maker's technical literature and further it has been conclusively established that there is no safety margin for mecury or aluminum. There are also legitimate concerns about Squalene. So when I saw references to a patent application for an H1N1 vaccine that predated the WHO declaration I started looking for a reference number for it. I found a link to the application a few days ago here
http://www.davidicke.com/content/view/25191
I have not searched the USPTO files yet. But I have no reason to suspect the cited application is not genuine.
I suspect someone with knowledge of the matter found the application and brought it to Icke's attention. But either David icke or someone who advised him did not appear to have read the patent application correctly. Icke states that the application was made on August 28, 2008. This is true. But if you look at the upper right hand portion of application you will note it is tied to a provisional application of the same patent application filed one year previous (i.e. August 28, 2007). Big difference.
A provisional application establishes what is called a 'priority date' for the non-provisional application of the same patent that must be filed no later than one year later (see US Patent Office below). Hence the Baxter H1N1 application was actually filed on August 28, 2007, some 19 months before WHO declared that a new virus never known before had been discovered in Mexico. This strongly suggests that Baxter had been working with the H1N1 virus for perhaps several years as a lot of preparation is required prior to the filing of a patent application (weeks or even many months). Here is what the USPTO says about provisional applications.
Provisional Application for Patent
Since June 8, 1995, the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has offered inventors the option of filing a provisional application for patent which was designed to provide a lower-cost first patent filing in the United States. Applicants are entitled to claim the benefit of a provisional application in a corresponding non-provisional application filed not later than 12 months after the provisional application filing date. Under the provisions of 35 U.S.C. § 119(e) , the corresponding non-provisional application would benefit in three ways: (1) patentability would be evaluated as though filed on the earlier provisional application filing date, (2) the resulting publication or patent would be treated as a reference under 35 U.S.C. § 102(e) as of the earlier provisional application filing date, and (3) the twenty-year patent term would be measured from the later non-provisional application filing date.
See page 4, paragraphs [0056 - H1N1] and [0057 - host toxicity of adjuvants]. Note that it is stated that the toxicity of adjuvants are dependent on the intended use of the vaccine - i.e if the intent is to cause bodily harm or even death of the host.
This does not inspire me to get the jab.
Hi,Gary from Scotland here.
i read with interest last month the article on high levels of vitamin D plus?(sorry i've forgotten the type)
The benifits obtained by David seemed incredible,it's not often something catches my eye like that.After doing some checking the general opinion seems to be that these levels of 10k are all right,more even.
Like David i have had for the past 8 years or so a continual cold at the very least sniffles,cannot get rid of it.i am type 1 on a pump /pork insulin(24 years)
I started a couple of weeks ago on 5k for a couple of days then 10k and have stayed on 10k since.
Unfortunetly,however i do believe coincidently,i have been really quite ill the last week or two ,up till the end of last week
If any of the other benifits come to anything,then great.But if the vit D helps to clear up these colds i am getting then fantastic,that alone will make a big difference to my life,no more living on a continuous roller coaster of colds,i'll then just have to deal with the usual probs.
will write in if i notice anything interesting
Dear David,
Please see the link below urgently. It says that we must not take Vit D until we have had our genes tested for mutation, and it says that High doses of Vit D will cause calcium to be deposited in the arteries and cause heart attacks and strokes.
http://genecarehealth.com/?p=114
The research article is dated Dec 3, 2009 by a team of researchers at the Michigan State University.
Please check it out as it has created panic amongst many folk -- including me-- who were happily taking 50,000 IU per week along with 1200 Calcium. I am on th everge of stopping this dose. They say that calcium should not be more than 700 mg or it will calcify the arteries. And the more the Vit D the greater will the calcification be!!
Please let us know this is a wrong research and a wrong conclusion, so that our minds can be set at rest! You are the only expert who has so much knowledge.
Yours,
Priya Nath Mehta
(nathji)
Dear Nathhi,
I have written the corresponding author of the study in question and hope to add more later. Meanwhile, I would definitely recommend that you stop the calcium supplement, as Dr. Joe Prendergast wrote here earlier:
Calcium and Vitamin D, in combination, has been a standard medical recommendation to prevent osteoporosis and related fractures since the 1950’s. Many studies have proven its efficacy for this purpose. However, Vitamin D alone in the doses recommended at the time seemed to be of no help in preventing fractures. The earlier research focused only on bone disease.1
Since the late 1990’s, research has demonstrated that high level of Vitamin D is very important in the prevention and treatment of many other chronic illnesses, including certain cancers, autoimmune diseases, infectious diseases and cardiovascular disease.2 Now, the use of Vitamin D in larger doses has become more commonplace.
Scientists knew that calcium, when taken alone by mouth, is absorbed at only 10 – 15%. The combination with Vitamin D increased the calcium absorption to 30 – 40%. This was the basis of the recommendation to combine the two. Now that we are accustomed to far higher “stoss”, or loading doses of Vitamin D, the combination with calcium will dramatically increase the percentage of calcium absorbed. It will also create high levels of blood calcium. The body must then eliminate calcium into the urine and kidney stones can result.
Today the best recommendation is to take increased levels of Vitamin D for its effect on osteoporosis and other diseases, but omit all calcium supplements. You will absorb all calcium you need from the food you eat.3
Lancet 1998; 351:805-6
Cancer Res 1941; 1:191-5
N Engl Med 2007; 357: 266-81
Best regards,
David
Dear David,
Many thanks again for your enlightening reply.
The question that I have paramount in my mind is --can Vitamin D help clear out the calcium clogged in arteries of the heart and body? There are some doctors who claim to have treated people with calcified valves with 8000 IU Vit D and obtained good results.
IS VITAMIN D A SCAVENGING AGENT THAT TAKES OUT CALCIUM FROM UNWANTED ARTERY AREAS AND PLACES IT IN THE BONES? OR IS THAT ASKING FOR TOO MUCH?
Best wishes and thanks,
Yours,
priya
My thought is that recommending or advocating too much of any nutrient is snake oil. It is my understanding that consuming more vitamin D means one must also consume more vitamin K since the two are protagonists. Am I incorrect in saying that strong bones, strong teeth and a strong heart (among other organs) is related to eating an adaquate amount of fruits, vegetables and whole grains?
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