Go out in the sun and get your Vitamin D — reduce your risk of cancer by 60%! Your mother (assuming you are of a certain age) was right! Going out and playing in the sun is good for you!

Vitamin D Reduces Cancer Risk, Study Finds:

Most Americans and others are not getting enough vitamin D, known as the “sunshine vitamin,” a fact that may put them at significant risk for developing cancer, according to a landmark study conducted by Creighton University School of Medicine.

The four-year, randomized study followed 1,179 healthy, postmenopausal women from rural eastern Nebraska. Participants taking calcium, as well as a quantity of vitamin D3 nearly three times the U.S. government’s Recommended Daily Amount (RDA) for middle-age adults, showed a dramatic 60 percent or greater reduction in cancer risk compared with women who did not get the vitamin.

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There is a growing body of evidence that a higher intake of vitamin D may be helpful in the prevention and treatment of cancer, high blood pressure, fibromyalgia, diabetes mellitus, multiple sclerosis, and rheumatoid arthritis and other diseases.

Humans make their own vitamin D3 when they are exposed to sunlight. In fact, only 10-15 minutes a day in a bright summer sun creates large amounts of the vitamin, Lappe said. However, people need to exercise caution since the sun’s ultraviolet B rays also can cause skin cancer; sunscreen blocks most vitamin D production.

Forget all that! Stay out of the sun! Cover up! Wear a hat — and wear SPF 45 sunscreen underneath it!

First, too much sun; now, any sun risky for kids:

Shade your kids. New evidence suggests overall sun exposure, not just burns, in childhood is a big factor for those who later develop deadly skin cancer.

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New research into how the sun and genetics interact points to a possibly more important step consumers can take now to shield their children and themselves: Check the weather forecast for the day’s “UV index” in your town to learn when to stay indoors or in the shade.

Why? Where you live, not the every-so-often beach vacation, determines most of your UV exposure - that lunchtime stroll, children’s school recess or ball practice. UVA can even penetrate window glass. UV levels vary from state to state, even day to day, because of things like altitude, cloud cover and ozone.

“Sunscreen is imperfect,” warns Nancy Thomas, a dermatologist at the University of North Carolina
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who led the UV research. “Schedule activities when UV irradiation is not quite so high.”

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SAFE SUNNING

Use enough sunscreen. An adult needs the equivalent of a full shot glass, and a young child a good tablespoon-full. Most people put on too thin a coat to get good UVB coverage, much less whatever UVA protection a brand might offer.

While official recommendations say wear at least an SPF-15 sunscreen daily, a super-high SPF will counter some of the thin-coat problem.

Apply sunscreen a half-hour before going outside. It takes that long to start working.

Limit exposure during the peak UV hours of 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The above are two news stories which came out on the very same day. Maybe where you come down on this depends on whether you think God (or Darwin) designed us to spend long periods out in the sunshine, or whether you think we were designed to hide in our caves and watch cable TV all the time. That one could take some pondering, I admit.

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