Another huge vitamin D story in the press

The Vancouver Sun on Saturday made a strong statement in favor of sunlight as the best source of vitamin D, with a major story showing that “Vitamin D from sunshine can reduce the risks of breast, colon and endometrial cancers as well as heart attacks.”

Vitamin D from sunshine has been everywhere in the press in January — from all the major broadcast networks to most major newspapers. “For the first time, the reporters are getting it: That vitamin D, at the new higher levels they’re talking about, comes naturally only from the sun,” Smart Tan Vice President Joseph Levy said. “This story has huge momentum now.”

“For years medical researchers didn’t see the picture this way. Since the 1950s they’ve known that sunshine causes skin cancer,” the Sun reported. “But in the past year, a second picture has emerged in mainstream medical conferences and journals. The vitamin D from sunshine helps prevent some cancers that are generally seen as more dangerous – among them breast, colon and endometrial cancers. It appears to have a role in fighting infection and in preventing such immune-system diseases as multiple sclerosis. Most recently, evidence suggests it prevents heart attacks.”

The story is another major step in teaching the media that sunlight’s positive effects are enormous, and that the negative effects are most likely linked to sunburn and overexposure — not to regular, moderate exposure.

“Food, the source of most vitamins, is a lousy source of vitamin D,” the Sun reported. “Fatty fish has a little, and there’s some added to milk.”

Click here to read the Sun’s story.