Vitamins
Vitamin D: A Summary for You
Vitamin D is not just a vitamin but a hormone regulating over 1,000 genes—crucial for immune function. Winter supplementation is essential for optimal health.
Vitamins
Vitamin D is not just a vitamin but a hormone regulating over 1,000 genes—crucial for immune function. Winter supplementation is essential for optimal health.
Line items
Every year, we emphasize anew that adequate vitamin D supply from this point onward—that is, from autumn—can only be assured through supplementation. This is something everyone who values their health should keep in mind.
The reason is quite simple:
Surely no more justification is needed, right? Yet year after year, articles appear in the "professional press" arguing the opposite. For instance, journalist Filipa Lessing from ZEIT ONLINE confidently states that "most people don't have a deficiency anyway"—hence her clever advice: "When in doubt, don't supplement."
Fortunately, the editorial team noted that "some of the cited studies were not adequately contextualized or were misinterpreted" and corrections were made accordingly. Yet the overall tone remains unchanged. It's puzzling, given that vitamin D is perhaps the safest vitamin of all—the body produces far larger amounts in summer than most of us would ever take from a standard supplement dose.
We—or rather, journalists—continue to miss the point. Meanwhile, medical science proceeds methodically, publishing findings from measurements and calculations in respected peer-reviewed journals (including Nature) with summaries of results from numerous gold-standard studies, concluding:
"To achieve adequate vitamin D concentrations (75 nmol/L) in the blood, the recommended vitamin D intake is 1,340 to 2,250 IU/day for children and pregnant women, and 2,519 to 797 IU/day for European adults aged 18–64 and 65–85 years (…)"
So they recommend 75 nmol/L directly—not 50, as some regulatory authorities suggest. And here, in plain language, is something you'll never read in the media: adults need over 2,000 IU of vitamin D daily. A "shocking" amount that official agencies dismiss as "dangerous" and "unnecessary for the general population."
Here we see the glaring discrepancy—one might call it cognitive dissonance. For surely even regulatory authorities should understand that virtually everyone develops a vitamin D deficiency in winter, and that normal levels (50 nmol/L = 20 ng/ml), or better yet optimal levels (75 nmol/L = 30 ng/ml), can only be achieved with daily intakes significantly above the currently "permitted" 800 IU.
This leads us to another point—a societal one. Throughout the world, including in more northern regions, chronic sunlight deprivation marks the dark months. Scandinavians at least have their vitamin D-rich fish—what do we have as a natural source of vitamin D?
In any case, the well-known Dr. Rhonda Patrick published with Bruce Ames, arguably the most influential biochemist of our time, in 2014 and 2015. These papers demonstrate that calcitriol (active vitamin D) activates TPH2, the enzyme that produces serotonin in the brain. Sufficient vitamin D in the body means sufficient serotonin in the brain. As a reminder: serotonin is the neurotransmitter popularly called the "happiness hormone"—the one that runs a bit low in winter.
So the circle closes.
