Each week we post an article or paper submitted by a member or "silent participant" of Guyana Caribbean Network. The featured article runs from Monday to Sunday each week. To submit an article for feature of the week contact us at admin@guyanacaribbeannetwork.com This week's feature is brought to you by "Mazz".

Sunshine, Health and Nutrition
by "Mazz"

Common sense teaches us that much about nature is as it is for a specific reason and we human beings are no exception to the rule. Case in point, the various hues of skin color that are found among people. Currently skin color has acquired political baggage and in many societies people either never knew or have forgotten the real and meaningful benefits of our differences on the color front. Darker skin people for example hardly appreciate that they do not need to put sun block on to prevent sunburn, in fact few have ever experienced sunburns even while living in countries with intense and constant sunlight like we experience in Guyana and the West Indies. And light skinned people, like Europeans, are only now beginning to appreciate the efficiency with which their skin uses sunlight to help keep them healthy in regions with weak sunlight.

Guyanese and West Indians get lessons in the above-mentioned reality when visiting the tropics from northern latitudes, especially during the depths of winter, we often experience a burst of energy and a feeling of general good health bordering on euphoria. Certainly a part of that is the psychological boost of knowing that we are away from the cold and pressures that we face in work and life, especially if we live in northern latitudes. But more and more scientists are beginning to realize that there is more, much more in fact, to the feeling of well being that so many of us experience in the tropics. It is about sunlight and our darker skin.

An essential, and important vitamin that our skin manufactures when it is exposed to sunlight, and especially tropical/summer sunlight, in part causes that difference. I am talking about Vitamin D. The skin of darker people was designed to prevent the harmful rays of intense sun from causing severe sunburns and skin cancer. Darker skin however does not efficiently manufacture Vitamin D in weak sunlight in contrast to lighter skinned people, whose skin color was designed for northern latitudes and for maximizing the use of weak sunlight. Darker skinned people who live in northern latitudes pay a significant penalty as they are often found to be severely lacking in the essential Vitamin D, and often get it solely from their diets in the winter months, mainly though fortified dairy products and oily fish, two sources that do not provide nearly enough of this essential vitamin, especially during the long winter months when skin gets little or no sunlight.

The USDA recommendation of 400IU of Vitamin D per day is now recognized by many experts as woefully inadequate, and many have been pushing for an increase to 1000 IU of vitamin D per day or even higher. Those experts also believe that consideration should be given to the time of year, how far north one lives, the individuals age, skin color and other factors that will influence the amount and intensity of sunlight that an individual needs to be exposed to in order that their skin can convert sunlight to adequate amounts of Vitamin D.

Why this push for an increased intake of vitamin D, especially for non-Caucasians living in the northern latitudes?

Answer: The recent discoveries that Vitamin D has wide and far-reaching impact on our health (and I am talking both physical and mental health). Examples of its impact on health include improvements in Learning, Memory, Motor control, Social behavior and the prevention of Cancer, High Blood pressure, Bone fractures, Rickets, Depression and more and no doubt still more to come.

Getting back to my first sentence where I talked about nature and its specific reasons for everything. We can easily surmise that a vitamin that is manufactured by the largest organ of the human body, the skin, would have to have an essential and very important role. And so it is with vitamin D and its manufacture by sun exposed skin; it fits the theory about nature having a significant role to play in life to a T, or should that be to a D?

This writer recommends that you pay close attention to your intake of essential vitamins and that you look for ways to increase intake of vitamin D, especially if you do not live in the tropics. Please consult your physician for assistance in accomplishing this goal, especially if you are on medication, have allergies or believe supplementing your diet with vitamins might negatively impact your health or any ongoing medical condition that you might have.

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