by John Cannell MD

(NaturalNews) Dr. Anne Looker and colleagues at the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) recently made vitamin D legend, Professor Hector DeLuca of University of Wisconsin (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hector…), and certain folks at big pharma very happy with her widely-reported analysis of the vitamin D status of Americans. Using definitions of deficiency straight from the November 2010 Food and Nutrition Board (FNB) Vitamin D Report – definitions that no vitamin D scientist I know agrees with, except perhaps Professor DeLuca – Dr. Looker reassured Americans their vitamin D levels were sufficient. Instead of a lower limit of 40, 30, or even 20 ng/ml, Dr. Looker and her CDC colleagues actually said any American with vitamin D levels below 12 ng/ml were “at risk of vitamin D deficiency.” That’s right, she wouldn’t say “deficient” for a person less than 12 ng/ml, all she said is they are “at risk” of being deficient! Why?

Dr. Looker falsely reassured Americans that everything is pretty much OK because around 80% of white Americans have levels higher than 20 ng/ml (although only 30% of African Americans do). I carefully read her entire paper; why didn’t I see a “CDC Action Plan for African Americans” for the 70% of Blacks with levels less than 20 ng/ml? Probably for the same reason I didn’t see any “FNB action plan for African Americans” in their recent vitamin D report.

Where did Dr. Looker get the idea that 20 ng/ml was OK? From the FNB. Where did the FNB get that idea? Professor Hector DeLuca and the vitamin D analogue scientists, that’s where. What I am about to tell you is a failure of a system, not a person. The National Academy is responsible, as scientists to the USA, to see that the processes that occur in its name are fair, above the appearance of impropriety, and free from avoidable conflicts of interest.

I have been to enough vitamin D conferences to know that about half of the scientists who attend these conferences are looking for the new patent that will secure or extend their financial fortune. They do not need America alarmed right now about the fact more than 80% of Americans are actually vitamin D deficient; no, the government might need to do something now, an action that would threaten the value of something that I have just learned about: an imminent river of new vitamin D knockoff commercial patents.

Read the full article here: http://www.naturalnews.com/032202_vitamin_D_deficiency_disease.html