Study Links Low Levels of Vitamin D to Longevity

http://www.sci-news.com/othersciences/biochemistry/article00705.html
Any thoughts?

I recall Dr. Cannell’s sight at a reply to the study.

"Study links low vitamin D levels to longer lifespan: Did we hear that correctly? "

http://blog.vitamindcouncil.org/2012/11/08/study-links-low-vitamin-d-levels-to-longer-lifespan-did-we-hear-that-correctly/

excerpt from his aticle:

"…From here, we can?t infer much else, and it doesn?t squelch the idea that vitamin D reduces mortality and thus increases longevity. There is little in the study that suggests that low vitamin D levels are the key to offspring reaching their parent?s age. There is little in the study that suggests that the nonagenarians reached that age because they have lower vitamin D levels.

There is little to suggest that if you supplement with vitamin D, you reduce your chance of living ?til the age of 90. There is little to suggest that if you sunbathe, you reduce your chance of living ?til the age of 90.

There is little in the study that suggests that vitamin D levels are even central to longevity. It could well be the case that there is some other gene crucial to longevity that is merely associated with genes that disposes a person to have slightly lower vitamin D levels. In other words, if all offspring and all spouses supplemented with the same amount of vitamin D, there could still likely be a difference of 1-2 ng/ml between the two groups. And this study still very much leaves room for the possibility that both the offspring and spouse would be better off raising their vitamin D levels via supplementation or exposure.

In conclusion, if you took the study for face value, it is not offering much insight into vitamin D. Even if it had found the opposite, that offspring had slightly higher levels than their spouses, there still would be little to conclude with the same set of questions remaining. That being said, there are also a few flaws and assumptions in the study:

The assay they used to measure 25OHD is no longer on the market due to lack of accuracy.
If we did draw any conclusions, we are assuming that 25OHD status in offspring is closely correlated with their parents? 25OHD levels.
If we did draw any conclusions, we are assuming that genetics are more important in vitamin D than sun exposure, supplements and food, which we have reasonable evidence that this is not the case.
Again, this study does not contribute much to the literature on vitamin D and does not answer the question, what level is going to get me to the age of 90? And I don?t beleive the researchers are trying to answer that question either. The study is interesting, but not insightful.

The best evidence to date that looks at mortality (the opposite of longevity) and the use of vitamin D supplementation in an elderly population was a systematic review published in the distinguished Cochrane Database. Professor Goran Bjelakovic and colleagues analyzed fifty randomized controlled trials and found that vitamin D3 supplementation decreases mortality in elderly women who are mainly in institutions and dependent care. We blog on that study here."

every month there’s a new study on topics that have been beaten to death, all with different outcomes. when will all the studies reach one final conclusion.

/rant

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:
every month there’s a new study on topics that have been beaten to death, all with different outcomes. when will all the studies reach one final conclusion.

/rant[/quote]

when it supports Big Pharma… I guarantee if there were billions to be made on a D patent, recommended levels would be raised :wink:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:
every month there’s a new study on topics that have been beaten to death, all with different outcomes. when will all the studies reach one final conclusion.

/rant[/quote]

when it supports Big Pharma… I guarantee if there were billions to be made on a D patent, recommended levels would be raised ;)[/quote]

Yup, because all research is done by big pharma. There are over 2,500 phd programs in the biological and life sciences, over 1000 in healthcare and public health and close to 500 in chemical engineering. Some of those schools of hundreds of faculty doing research. In comparison there are about 12 companies that typically would get the “big pharma” label, give or take a few depending on who you ask.

As someone who has worked in labs with people in academia and from industry, I can tell you not everyone doing research for “big pharma” is some money hungry mad scientist manipulating data to make their company money. Most people have a genuine interest in science and helping others. The big pharma hate gets old fast, especially when most people would go running to their products in a second if they were sick

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:
every month there’s a new study on topics that have been beaten to death, all with different outcomes. when will all the studies reach one final conclusion.

/rant[/quote]

when it supports Big Pharma… I guarantee if there were billions to be made on a D patent, recommended levels would be raised ;)[/quote]

Yup, because all research is done by big pharma. There are over 2,500 phd programs in the biological and life sciences, over 1000 in healthcare and public health and close to 500 in chemical engineering. Some of those schools of hundreds of faculty doing research. In comparison there are about 12 companies that typically would get the “big pharma” label, give or take a few depending on who you ask.

As someone who has worked in labs with people in academia and from industry, I can tell you not everyone doing research for “big pharma” is some money hungry mad scientist manipulating data to make their company money. Most people have a genuine interest in science and helping others. The big pharma hate gets old fast, especially when most people would go running to their products in a second if they were sick[/quote]

You misunderstand. Big Pharma would be able to push their agenda and crowd out the others.

Explain to me out cholesterol recommendations keep getting lowered, when 8/9 people on the panel that decided it have ties to Pharma :wink:
thanks for playing.

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:

As someone who has worked in labs with people in academia and from industry, I can tell you not everyone doing research for “big pharma” is some money hungry mad scientist manipulating data to make their company money. Most people have a genuine interest in science and helping others. The big pharma hate gets old fast, especially when most people would go running to their products in a second if they were sick[/quote]

And most people are uneducated when it comes to health. Not many pills on the market actually fix the problem :wink:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:

As someone who has worked in labs with people in academia and from industry, I can tell you not everyone doing research for “big pharma” is some money hungry mad scientist manipulating data to make their company money. Most people have a genuine interest in science and helping others. The big pharma hate gets old fast, especially when most people would go running to their products in a second if they were sick[/quote]

And most people are uneducated when it comes to health. Not many pills on the market actually fix the problem :wink:

[/quote]

are you saying fix the problem, as in there being uneducated people, or fix the proble as in a cure for a disease?

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:

As someone who has worked in labs with people in academia and from industry, I can tell you not everyone doing research for “big pharma” is some money hungry mad scientist manipulating data to make their company money. Most people have a genuine interest in science and helping others. The big pharma hate gets old fast, especially when most people would go running to their products in a second if they were sick[/quote]

And most people are uneducated when it comes to health. Not many pills on the market actually fix the problem :wink:

[/quote]

are you saying fix the problem, as in there being uneducated people, or fix the proble as in a cure for a disease?[/quote]

LOL, i guess both :wink: meant cure the disease though.

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]relentless2120 wrote:

[quote]jehovasfitness wrote:

[quote]wannabebig250 wrote:

As someone who has worked in labs with people in academia and from industry, I can tell you not everyone doing research for “big pharma” is some money hungry mad scientist manipulating data to make their company money. Most people have a genuine interest in science and helping others. The big pharma hate gets old fast, especially when most people would go running to their products in a second if they were sick[/quote]

And most people are uneducated when it comes to health. Not many pills on the market actually fix the problem :wink:

[/quote]

are you saying fix the problem, as in there being uneducated people, or fix the proble as in a cure for a disease?[/quote]

LOL, i guess both :wink: meant cure the disease though.
[/quote]

lol i was wondering if you picked up on that pun when you made the post. It’s not like curing a disease is some easy task. The pathway I posted is insulin signaling, something most people on these forums think they understand. Look how complicated that is. That’s why it’s so hard to come up with cures for diseases. It’s incredibly difficult to effect 1 target without having consequences on off target molecules/pathways. Everyone would love to be the person to find the magic bullet. They’d have a nobel prize, tons of funding for their research and all the best researchers trying to work for their lab. It’s just not an easy thing to do.