‘It’s come to nothing’: Whatever happened to vitamin D’s great promise?
UK doctor and broadcaster Dr Xand van Tulleken follows the story of a supplement that promised so much.
Low vitamin D levels was once hailed as a possible reason for numerous illnesses from cancer and diabetes to depression, dementia and respiratory infections.
In this book extract from Make Me Well, Dr Xand van Tulleken traces how the optimism surrounding vitamin D as a treatment unravelled as the results of major trials rolled in.
Despite what followed, he says the story does reveal the medical community’s willingness to embrace non-pharma remedies, at least when supported by evidence.
By the 1990s and 2000s, large observational studies were linking low vitamin D levels to almost every health problem imaginable.
