Details

Details

Vitamin D - The Information

"The government has taken the unprecedented move of recommending supplementation of vitamin D for everybody"!

Unfortunately, in recent years we have seen an increase in the number of cases of rickets amongst children in the UK and similarly of osteomalacia (or soft bones) in adults. It is this change that prompted the government to investigate the need for supplementation and to make these latest recommendations.

The primary source of vitamin D is bright sunshine on the skin (face, arms and neck), but in the UK it is not possible to get the required amount of sunshine in the autumn and winter months for the skin to be able to make adequate vitamin D to maintain sufficient levels in the body. Whilst some vitamin D is available through diet, the amounts are limited, with one egg containing around 40IU and the recommended dose of 10μg being equivalent to 400IU – we would need to eat 10-12 eggs per day to achieve the vitamin D intake the government is now recommending! Other food sources include oily fish, such as salmon, liver and fortified foods, such as breakfast cereals.

Following the government's recommendations, Aliment Nutrition is working to spread the word about the need for vitamin D to support healthy bones, teeth and muscles and to contribute to more general areas of health, such as energy and immunity.

To understand more about how much the general public knows regarding the new recommendations, we worked with a company who commissioned a UK-wide study and found that 80% of adults have not heard about the latest vitamin D recommendations. As a result, 80% of adults don’t take a vitamin D supplement and 90% of parents do not give supplements to their children. Three quarters of all adults believe that they get enough vitamin D through their food and there is no need to do anything else. This is not the case, so we have launched a cost-effective range of vitamin D supplements for the whole family to help people to easily achieve their 10μg every day.