Reasons That Vitamin D May Matter
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/03/12/reasons-to-place-a-bet-on-vitamin-d/
I started to become a believer in the ‘power’ of vitamin D a couple of winters ago. Through a somewhat unusual confluence of events I pretty much spent no time outside exposed to the sun and in the late winter/early spring I started to get sick over and over again. I found an article like this and started to take supplements. I also started to make it a point to get some sun during the winter as I have read several places that it appears that ‘naturally’ produced vitamin D (meaning that produced through UV exposure of your skin) was somehow more beneficial than the material supplied through diet. Since my outdoor activity started to increase (hence my UV exposure) subsequent to my supplementing my diet with vitamin D I couldn’t feel sure that that was the only issue. However, in the two winters since then I have continued with my efforts to expose myself to the sun and have had dramatically fewer bouts of illness. Previous to the sick winter mentioned above, I had pretty routinely been getting sick in the late winter and even got pneumonia once. Anecdotal, of course, but my personal experiences make me feel that vitamin D is something important and with the effort being so minimal (just show your face and arms (more if you can manage it) in some sheltered place out of the wind in the full sun; I have been comfortably down to my shorts in below-freezing weather under such circumstances (and I am by no means any sort of ‘polar bear’ club member!)), it seems silly to take supplements.
