The sun was slow to appear this summer. The first to suffer from this whim of weather, morale and especially the elderly who need more than others to fill up with vitamin D. An essential vitamin for having good bones and good muscles. Underexposure to the sun can cause vitamin D deficiency because it is the sun’s rays that allow the body to synthesize it.
A vitamin D deficiency increases the risk ofosteoporosis and therefore fractures. Worse, the elderly deficient would increase their risk of death by 30% compared to the elderly with a good level of vitamin D, according to a new study from Oregon State University. A danger which would threaten especially the so-called “fragile” seniors with a risk of mortality doubly higher than that of people in good health. Researchers qualify as “fragile” a person with reduced physical ability, and who meets at least three of the following criteria: weakened muscles, slow walking, exhaustion, involuntary weight loss and reduced physical activity.
Vitamin D: 15 minutes of sun per day
US researchers looked at data from a national survey of more than 4,300 adults over the age of 60. This study is the first to measure the combined effect of a lack of vitamin D on frailty in the elderly. And raises the question of prevention with “pre-fragile” people, those fulfilling two of the five criteria set out above.
“We must develop interventions with vulnerable groups, who could live longer and more independently if they adopted a suitable diet and exercised”, explains the Times of India Ellen Smit, the study director.
Where to find vitamin D? Knowing that the sun meets 80 to 90% of our vitamin D needs, it is best to be in the sun for 10 to 15 minutes every day between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. It is sufficient for an adult. It can also be found in food, in butter, cow’s milk, whole dairy products, eggs, oily fish (salmon, tuna, trout).
Who needs it most? The elderly, considered to be the most at risk because they manufacture less vitamin D, degrade it more quickly and expose themselves to less sun. Obese people also often have vitamin D deficiency.
More broadly, many of us would need a vitamin D cure: a study by the Institute for Public Health Surveillance published last April revealed that more than four in ten French people (42%) have a moderate to severe vitamin D deficiency.
