As some of you may know, my father Dr John Cannell is a big proponent of adequate levels of vitamin D for all. As we move into cold season this year and as winter sets in, it is a great time to get some Vitamin D supplements to protect yourself from diseases ranging from cancer to autoimmune illnesses. It is absolutely amazing how important this vitamin is for human body function and how few people really know its benefits.

So I decided to put together a top five list of reasons why to supplement with Vitamin D.

1- It decreases the risk of developing cancer by 50% in a recently released study. 50%! If you develop cancer after reading this, just remember you could probably (yea, probably because its %50) have avoided the entire illness with vitamin D. Read the press release from UCSD about the meta-study and learn about the powerful anti-cancerous effects of Vitamin D.

2- Vitamin D lowers mortality across the board by %7. While that doesn’t seem like much, that highlights the fact that Vitamin D really does fight off many different types of diseases. Don’t believe me? Go read the study, then get back to me.

3- Our modern environment has totally decimated our natural ability to produce Vitamin D. Working indoors, behind glass (glass blocks the spectrums of the sun’s rays that produce Vitamin D when they hit skin) and with clothing on, modern man gets little to no Vitamin D naturally. Even with fortified foods, we are woefully deficient because the foods are not nearly fortified enough, which brings me to my next bullet point.

4- If you walk into the sun with a significant portion of your skin exposed to summer sun, your body manufactures around 10,000 units maximum in 20 minutes if your fair skinned (it takes longer the darker your skin). That is before your burned. So with enough sun to not even burn you, your body will naturally make 10,000 units of the stuff which is so much that the FDA believes it to be toxic and it is 50X more than the Daily Recommended allowance for an adult of 200 units/day. Is the government wrong? Or did our bodies evolve to be toxic if they are exposed to natural sunlight? I will let you decide.

5- And finally- Its cheap as hell! Goodness people, it costs about 5 bucks for a bottle. Yes- FIVE BUCKS for bottle of 250 1,000 IU tabs from Swansons Vitamins Online. If you get it anywhere else, just make sure that it is cholecalciferol or Vitamin D3.

My dad has a complete website with great information at the Vitamin D Council. If you look on the bottom of the homepage you can see he recommends around 4,000 units a day. Most of those studies used less, around 1,000 units a day, but people please take your Vitamin D. And tell your relatives (especially older ones you know). Getting sick is not fun for anyone.