Vitamin D is a hormone which activates your immune system, corrects cancer cells, parents strokes and cardiovascular disease, and people mislead you about it non-stop. Here’s the truth.
If you want to be healthy, vitamin D3 is your number one supplement, unless you plan to spend several hours every day in the sun.(This article comes from the forthcoming seventh edition of ‘Everything you need to know to help you beat cancer’, by Chris Woollamd)
With cancer, having healthy blood levels of vitamin D is essential to increasing your personal odds of survival and building a strong immune system. Immune system cells and cancer cells have receptor sites for vitamin D.
Vitamin D doesn’t clash with any drugs. There’s little evidence you can take too much, but you certainly can have too little. (There’s some talk about extra-high levels of vitamin D increasing levels of calcium, but we have never seen this).
What blood level of vitamin D should you have?
First, deficiency. We know that some 80 per cent of people have ‘seriously deficient’ levels the day they are diagnosed with cancer; with another 8-10 per cent ‘somewhat deficient’.
Just to confuse everybody, there are two measurement systems. – nmol/L, which is two and a half times higher than ng/ml.
The American Government has stated that anything below 80 nmol/L is deficiency. Harvard Medical School, agree this and say that approximately 88 per cent of people have vitamin D levels below this, which classes them as deficient, increasing their risk of almost all chronic illnesses.
80 nmol/L is 32 ng/ml in the other measurement system. Whichever system your hospital uses, be above this figure!
The problem in the UK is that we have no similar scientifically-based Government approved levels. As a result, most UK hospital doctors and nurses have little idea whether a patient’s vitamin D blood level is too high or too low.
During the early stage of the Covid pandemic, even 57 per cent of the general population of sunny Spain were found to be deficient.
But what’s a Healthy level? The American Government recommendation for being healthy is that you should have plasma vitamin D levels of 40+ ng/ml to be in the healthy 'normal' zone. That means to be ‘healthy’, you should be above 100 nmol/L.
Using measurement system 1 (primarily the UK), deficiency is below 80 nmol/L; and healthy levels are 100+ nmol/L
Using measurement system 2 (primarily the USA), deficiency is below 32 ng/mL; and healthy levels are 40+ ng/ml.
These figures should not come as a surprise to anyone; in 2011, following a number of strong research studies, we covered a report from the highly respected Endocrine Society which stated -
"Based on all the evidence, at a minimum, we recommend vitamin D levels of 30 ng/mL, (75nmol/L) and because of the vagaries of some of the assays, to guarantee sufficiency, we recommend between 40 and 60 ng/mL for both children and adults." Again, this would mean to be healthy, you should have plasma levels of vitamin D above 100 nmol/L and up to 150 nmol/L. That’s 40-60 ng/ml.
Michael Holick is the Professor of breast cancer at Boston Medical School and has been involved in more than 25 years of research on vitamin D; his recent report registers the same levels for good health - between 100 nmol/L and 150 nmol/L.
For good health, for almost 20 years, I have advocated that adults and children should aim for a blood level of 50 ng/ml which is 125 nmol/L. I am right in the middle of that ‘Good Health’ range.
Vitamin D – what does it do?
i) Vitamin D is a hormone, not a vitamin.
Vitamin D is not a vitamin; it’s a hormone. Vitamin D receptors (VDR) have been found on immune T-cells, B-cells and antigen-presenting (dendritic) cells. There are even vitamin D receptors on macrophages (immune cells that attack and engulf cancer cells).
While research indicates that vitamin D does not improve white cell counts, several studies indicate that vitamin D can encourage an increase in immune function.
Not only does vitamin D ‘arm’ the attack cells of the immune system, but some of these cells can even synthesise metabolites from vitamin D, which then act within the entire immune system throughout the whole body!
Next, cancer cells themselves have receptors for ‘hormone’ D. As long ago as November 17, 2008, the Journal of Cell Biology contained a research study on vitamin D and cancer. There are vitamon D receptors on the surface of cancer cells and it concluded that ‘Vitamin D can adjust almost everything in the cancer cell, switch genes on and off, reduce cancer cell division and it can calm cells, so they settle rather than spread. It seems vitamin D can return cancer cells to a normal and healthy state.’
Vitamin D also has epigenetic and metabolic benefits. Several studies show that vitamin D can control methylation (the process by which homocysteine blocks your copying process using histones). 2021 research on coronary artery disease shows that, as you raise your plasma vitamin D levels, homocysteine levels fall.
ii) What does vitamin D co?
On the Chris Woollams Healthwatch site, higher vitamin D levels have been linked to lowered risk of cardiovascular disease, type-2 diabetes, dementia, osteoporosis, strokes and more. In a 2023 study in the BMJ, vitamin D was shown to support blood vessels and normal blood pressure. Deficiency was linked to elevated levels of fats in your blood, as well as vascular dysfunction and arterial stiffening. Research also linked lower vitamin D levels to an increased risk of heart attack, heart disease and ischemic stroke.
Having correct vitamin D levels has even been shown to be helpful in having better, deeper sleep.
Vitamin D can also protect your telomeres at the ends of your DNA increasing your longevity.
iii) Vitamin D and cancer
In a rework of the VITAL study, vitamin D supplementation reduced the risk of developing advanced cancer. This result was less evident in people who were overweight.
Research has shown that men with high levels of vitamin D develop half the prostate cancer of men with poor levels. Research from the Karolinska Institute has shown a figure of 40 per cent less risk for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma in people who have good levels of vitamin D.
Research even suggests that women with inherited genetic mutations also tend to have lowered circulating vitamin D levels, resulting in a higher risk of cancer. Was the problem the inherited mutation, or the low vitamin D? Or both?
Melanoma - the cancer that’s caused by the sun? Studies have found that up to 93 per cent of melanoma patients had deficient levels of vitamin D. 2021 research from the University of Leeds in the UK showed that vitamin D strongly influences the behaviour of a signalling pathway in melanoma cells, slowing down their growth and their ability to spread to the lungs. We already knew that vitamin D supplementation increased melanoma survival. Melanoma cancer cells even have the highest levels of vitamin D receptors on their surface. You need high levels of vitamin D to sit on them.
Other studies similarly showed that vitamin D levels were much lower in patients with thyroid cancer; in patients with GBM; and in gastric and oesophageal patients on diagnosis with cancer.
Worryingly, we have research showing that people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, and those diagnosed with lymphoma, who have low vitamin D levels on diagnosis have poorer survival rates.
In women with breast cancer, larger tumors at a more advanced stage and reduced survival levels were found in women with deficient vitamin D levels. There was also higher deficiency in premenopausal patients developing breast cancer.
Researchers at Harvard Medical School have shown that people with lung cancer survive longer after surgery if they have higher levels of vitamin D.
With both breast cancer and colorectal cancer there is research that shows supplementation after diagnosis significantly increases survival.
We have over 380 references on the CANCERactive site for vitamin D. Higher Vitamin D levels have been linked to lowered risk of almost every cancer.
Clearly, vitamin D is very powerful at the cellular level. Frankly, it is astounding that Vitamin D is almost ignored as a crucial illness preventer in the UK!
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Many people tell me that they simply do not understand why they developed cancer. Hardly any of them have been in the sun for a year or two, hardly any supplement with vitamin D.
Low vitamin D on diagnosis? It could be the main reason why you developed cancer. You did not have an ‘activated’ immune system, and so your cancer got through your defences.
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iv) Vitamin D ‘works’ throughout the body
There are also vitamin D receptors throughout the body. These (VDR) regulate the expression of numerous genes involved in cellular proliferation and differentiation.
Vitamin D is also involved in the calcium/phosphate balance in the body and the effects of vitamin D on osteoblast mineralisation of the bones are well documented. Bones have vitamin D receptors. There are also vitamin D receptors in skeletal muscle tissue.
As we have known for a long time, vitamin D deficiency is associated with bone density problems and Ricket’s.
Vitamin D can protect the gut wall. It can promote diversity in the microbiome (for example, levels of Akkermansia and Bifidobacterium increase as vitamin D increases), and regulate immune function in the gut. It is this crucial in preventing auto-immune diseases. Research in the last decade has also shown that vitamin D deficiency is associated with greater gut problems, more autoimmune disease, and greater infection rates. Vitamin D can reduce gut issues such as leaky gut and IBS.
Low vitamin D levels put people at a greater risk of death from Covid-19. 2021 research from South East Asia showed simply that if you developed Covid and your vitamin D levels were below 19 ng/ml you were in trouble, but if you had levels over 29 ng/ml it might cause a sniff and a cough but that was all. I was kicked-off Facebook for ‘misinformation’ when I covered this study. Bizarre really, when two other studies over the next month from different parts of the world showed exactly the same results.
For the past 20 years only Politics (and/or mischief) have prevented the importance of Vitamin D being accepted. The research was there for all to read. Worse, sometimes that research was even done with the wrong form of vitamin D (see below).
I wrote my first version of 'Vitamin D - are you getting enough?' in 2004. I haven't needed to alter my target levels (125 nmol/L) since that day, even with more research available.
v) How much vitamin D3 should you take?
The answer to this question is that it depends on your current levels and what you are trying to do.
Research shows vitamin D regulates phosphorus and calcium absorption and so helps build strong bones, muscles and teeth. For 60 years, the medical world has known only this and so 800 IUs a day or 45 minutes in the sun has been the official ‘dose’. That is all changing.
American Bone Health (now the Bone Health and Osteoporosis Foundation) suggests people over 60 take 2,500 IUs of D3 per day to prevent osteoporosis. (Along with magnesium, phosphorus and boron plus 1500 mg calcium per day). Many oncologists do not understand this. Strong bones do not result merely from taking calcium. The calcium needs to be ‘uploaded’ into the bones.
The US Endocrine Society suggest people with cancer take 5,000 IUs a day.
5,000 IUs is 125 micrograms. The symbol for a microgram is μg.
It is important to know the IU figure and the μg figure as some brands provide dosage in International Units (IUs), while others provide dosage in micrograms. One almost wonders if this confusion is deliberate!
Given how low in vitamin D most people in the low-sunshine UK are, it might be worth taking a double or even triple dose for 2-3 months if you are just starting your cancer fight and haven’t been in the sun for six months or more; after 3 months have a vitamin D blood test to check that you are over 100, and ideally 125 nmol/L. (Medichecks do an online test).
In France, oncologists will arrange an injection of 125,000 IUs for patients they think are deficient. 125,000 IUs is actually slight less than you get on summer holiday for two weeks.
In my personal view, it is worth everybody taking 1000 IUs a day, especially if we are going to seed the skies. In countries with poor sunshine records, I would take 2,000 IUs a day.
If you don’t go in the sun exposing your skin, and at a time of day when (according to Professor Holick) your shadow is SHORTER than you are, you must take a supplement.
vi) Active and inactive vitamin D
Just to complicate things even more, if you lie on a beach all day, just in shorts or a bikini, you would likely make 12,000 – 15,000 IUs.
But as a hormone, it might well throw other hormone levels in your body out of balance, so the liver deactivates most of it. This means that you have two forms of vitamin D in your blood stream. The active version and the inactive version, and the latter may be in the majority. Only the active version activates your immune system and other VDR s in your body.
Several times in recent years, research has ‘accidentally’ measured the wrong version.
In ‘the largest randomised clinical trial to date’, with over 25,000 adults, researchers concluded that taking vitamin D supplements had no effect on improving immunity, health outcomes and even bone health. Although this study is widely published, causing Health Organisations like the NHS and the FDA to dismiss vitamin D, the researchers had made a big mistake. They had done their experiment measuring the inactive form of vitamin D, not the active form. That is according to UC San Diego researchers, who reviewed the study.
Sadly, there are forces of darkness in the world that simply do not want you to understand the importance of vitamin D nor how high levels of vitamin D in your body can prevent and even correct illnesses.
vii) Your gut bacteria activate vitamin D
So how do you activate your inactive vitamin D? It must be active before it can go to arm your T-cells, B-cells and the rest of your immune system.
It has long been believed that the adrenals played the crucial role of activating vitamin D, but this may not be entirely correct. 2020 research from San Diego, University of California Medical and Microbiome Unit suggests that a small group of gut bacteria produce butyrate, a powerful short chain fatty acid, and it is butyrate that re-activates vitamin D, and in turn this activates your immune system cells. It’s a chain reaction.
Unfortunately, these 90 or so bacteria are fragile and easily damaged by antibiotics, drugs like Proton Pump Inhibitors and chemotherapy, poor diet and stress for example. These bacteria particularly love a diet of pectins and soluble fibre (oats, pulses/legumes, nuts and seeds and vegetables). You can also supplement with sodium or potassium butyrate.
As we will see, butyrate supplementation can make immunotherapy work better. Of course!! PD-1 immunotherapy drugs unblock your T-cells, so you need lots of ‘active’ T cells when they do!
viii) Is there a case for high dose vitamin D?
It would be churlish of me not to tell you that there is a view that several hundred years ago with clearer skies and more of us working outdoors, we might make up to 60,000 IUs a day. The excess was deactivated and stored in our cholesterol.
There is scientific evidence that you can have blood levels of 300 ng/ml (750 nmol/L) without toxicity. To be safe, the Vitamin D Council suggest the maximum blood level should not exceed 150 ng/ml (450 nmol/L). Research suggests that people with autoimmune disease might benefit from these much higher levels because they may have defective receptor sites.
Portuguese Professor, Dr. Manuel Pinto Coelho famously used a protocol involving high dose vitamin D to reverse his son’s ALS, a progressive neuro-degenerative disease, A 2013 NIH study showed there were possible links between ALS and cancer.
ix) Vitamin D - there is very, very little in foods
You will read that you can derive vitamin D from a healthy diet. This is complete and utter tosh. A huge lie.
Be clear - there is virtually no vitamin D in even a healthy diet, let alone the average UK diet.
Be clear - there’s very little in dairy, unless it has been fortified with vitamin D. But vitamin D in the dairy itself is poor.
There is a little in Cod liver oil. Some mushrooms grown in the sun contain a little vitamin D. That’s about it!
Perhaps I should briefly comment on reports that people like Bill Gates have plans to unilaterally spray nanoparticles into the sky to block Global Warming. What could possibly go wrong?
If you cut the sun from us, it will make us more ill. It’s asking for trouble. Only Big Pharma will benefit.
x) Vitamin K2 and vitamin D3
Your number 1 supplement should actually be vitamin D3 with K2 in it. 5,000 IUs of vitamin D pill usually contain 100 mg of K2. Many of K2’s functions are very similar to those of vitamin D3.
K2 is produced by certain gut bacteria from foods such as oily fish and beef from grass-fed cows.
Taken together, the two supplements D3 and K2 have a synergistic effect in heart health, bone health and liver health. K2 seems to help vitamin D3 lock into the immune system cells, it protects your organs and K2 also seems to make drugs more effective and work for longer.
The maximum dose for K2 in my opinion is 180 mg. There is some concern that vitamin K can cause blood clotting but that tends to be Vitamin K1.
In summary
Vitamin D is crucial to your anti-cancer fight. And to building a body conducive to health. We were meant to be outdoors and to have some sunshine on our skin most days.
Arguably, vitamin D3/K2 is your number 1 supplement, but nothing beats going in the sun.
If anybody comments on your vitamin D level, just shout very loudly ... ‘One-Two --------------- Five’.
At this level you really are doing your best to increase your personal odds of survival.