Vitamin D Among Top Immune Boosters

As cold and flu season approaches, vitamin D’s benefits as one of the most effective immune boosters are more important than ever.

Medical research shows that maintaining high levels of vitamin D is one of the best immune boosters to help fight off colds and flu. It plays a major role in supporting immune function and is known to be an effective agent against inflammation, which is typically caused by flu and other respiratory viruses. By helping modulate the body’s response to respiratory viruses, it helps prevent dangerous and even fatal buildup of fluid in the lungs.

Though as yet there is no clinical evidence that supplemental D vitamin can be considered a flu preventative or treatment, there is ample evidence that it is among top immune boosters. Low levels of the vitamin are associated with higher incidence of a wide range of serious illnesses, including respiratory infections. In addition, numerous studies have shown that people with high levels of the vitamin appear to be less likely to contract flu and other respiratory viruses.

Long recognized as important to bone health and strength, vitamin D has recently been identified as key to immune support and crucial to almost all aspects of health. Deficiency has been recognized as a global health problem, and has been implicated as a factor in a host of illnesses and disorders including cancer, heart disease, hypertension, diabetes, osteoarthritis and osteoporosis. In addition, low levels of the vitamin have been associated with depression, chronic pain, birth defects, and periodontal disease.

Because sun exposure is necessary to stimulate the body’s production of the vitamin, some researchers speculate that the indoor lifestyle and weaker UV rays of winter weather make the traditional cold and flu season even more of challenge. There are relatively few dietary sources of the vitamin, so without adequate sun exposure deficiency is very common.

The Food and Nutrition Board at the Institute of Medicine of The National Academies, responsible for establishing Recommended Dietary Allowances of various nutrients, set an RDA of 200 mgs of vitamin D per day. That recommendation has been questioned as being insufficient, and in 2008 the American Association of Pediatrics announced a new recommendation that literally doubled the existing RDA to 400 IU per day. The AAP recommends that supplementation begin in the first two days after birth.