Fight the flu with vitamin D supplements

Fight the flu with vitamin D supplements
By Dr. Patrick Massey | Columnist

http://www.dailyherald.com/story/?id=332925
More from Dr. Patrick Massey
One of the most frequent concerns of my patients is what to do about
the flu, both seasonal and H1N1. Although the vaccines may be
effective in preventing or lessening flu infections, medical science
is showing that nature has provided us with some significant firepower
of our own.

H1N1 aside, the most active time for the flu is in the late fall,
winter and early spring. Researchers have wondered what happens to the
flu for the rest of the year. The answer may be related to sun
exposure and vitamin D - less in the winter and more in the summer.

Vitamin D is not a vitamin but a hormone. Starting in the skin, the
body is able to manufacture it from the combination of cholesterol and
sunshine. Research is demonstrating that vitamin D is needed for good
immune function. During the winter, sunshine fades, vitamin D levels
fall and the flu really kicks in. During the summer, with lots of sun,
vitamin D levels increase and the flu seems to disappear. Is there a
connection? The answer seems to be yes.

A 2007 study, published in the medical journal Epidemiology and
Infection, established that people who did not take vitamin D had 10
times greater risk of flu during the winter than in the summer.
Interestingly, the incidence of winter flu was not different from
summer flu for those who took vitamin D year round. In addition, those
who did not take vitamin D had a nine times greater risk of winter flu
than those who took vitamin D. It seems that vitamin D may be a good
way to prevent winter flu.

How can vitamin D reduce the incidence of flu? The answer may be that
vitamin D activates immune system-based proteins that kill the flu
virus. These are called antimicrobial peptides, or AMD. These proteins
kill a wide range of pathogens including bacteria, some viruses, fungi
and even some types of cancer cells. In the winter, low vitamin D
levels may result in meager AMD production - and an increased risk of
contracting the flu. In contrast, the summer sun results in more
robust vitamin D levels, encourages AMD production and may prevent the
flu. From my clinical perspective, though it's not definitive proof,
patients with high vitamin D levels seem to have fewer infections than
those with lower vitamin D levels.

The optimal level of vitamin D has not been determined. However,
current adult recommendations from the Institute of Medicine (400-800
IU per day) are probably too low for most people living in northern
Illinois. In the winter, the sun is not intense enough for the body to
generate any vitamin D and many people need at least 5,000 to 6,000 IU
of vitamin D per day. Usual dietary sources are inadequate and
supplementation is the only reasonable option. Vitamin D is generally
safe and toxicity is vanishingly rare. It is important to check blood
levels because it is the only way to know if you are taking enough
vitamin D.

There are many aspects to preventing the flu - vaccination, hand
washing, cleaning surfaces - and now, vitamin D.

• Patrick B. Massey, M.D., Ph.D is medical director for complementary
and alternative medicine for the Alexian Brothers Hospital Network.





AVOID FLU SHOTS, GET SOME SUN INSTEAD


http://wafreepress.org/article/091108health-miller.shtml
An MD explains why most doctors don’t get the seasonal vaccine

by Donald W. Miller, Jr, MD


We’re in the middle of another influenza season in the northern
temperate zone, and our government’s Center for Disease Control and
Prevention (CDC) has again strongly urged Americans to get a flu shot.
Health officials will say that every winter 5–20 percent of the
population catches the flu, 200,000 people are hospitalized, and
36,000 people will die from it.

The CDC’s 15-member Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices
(ACIP) makes recommendations each year on who should be vaccinated.
Ten years ago, for the 1999–2000 season, the committee recommended
that people over age 65 and children with medical conditions have a
flu shot. Seventy-four million people were vaccinated.

Next season (2000–01), the committee lowered the age for universal
vaccination from 65 to 50 years old, adding 41 million people to the
list. For the 2002–03 season, the ACIP added healthy children 6 months
to 23 months old, and for 2004–05, children up to 5 years old. For the
2008–09 season the committee has advised that healthy children 6
months to 18 years old have a flu shot each year.

Its recommendation for influenza vaccination now covers 256 million
Americans – 84 percent of the US population. Only healthy people ages
19–49 not involved in some aspect of health care remain exempt.
Pharmaceutical companies have made 146 million influenza vaccines for
the US market this flu season.

Almost all the ACIP members who make these recommendations have
financial ties to the vaccine industry. The CDC therefore must grant
each member a conflict-of-interest waiver.

The CDC mounts a well-orchestrated campaign each season to generate
interest and demand for flu shots. Along with posters for the public,
flyers, and health care provider materials, it encourages doctors to
“recommend/urge flu shots.” Medical groups, nonmedical organizations
(like the YMCA), and the media trumpet CDC-released messages on
influenza, notably: “Flu kills 36,000 per year,” “This could be a bad
/
serious flu year,” and “Flu vaccine is the best defense against flu.”

The government promotes National Vaccination Week, which this past
year was December 8–14. This time, however, rather than uniformly
following the government’s “Seven-Step Recipe” for generating demand
for flu shots, the mainstream media has questioned their benefits.

The New York Times had an article in the September 2, 2008 issue
titled “Doubts Grow Over Flu Vaccine in Elderly,” which says, “The
influenza vaccine, which has been strongly recommended for people over
65 for more than four decades, is losing its reputation as an
effective way to ward off the virus in the elderly.

A growing number of immunologists and epidemiologists say the vaccine
probably does not work very well for people over 70, the group that
accounts for three-fourths of all flu deaths.” The article refers to a
study done by the Group Health Center for Health Studies in Seattle on
3,500 people, age 65–94, to determine if flu vaccines are effective in
protecting older people against developing pneumonia (Lancet
2008;372:398–405).

The National Vital Statistics Reports compiled by the CDC show that
only 1,138 deaths a year occur due to influenza alone (257 in 2001,
727 in 2002, 1,792 in 2003, 1,100 in 2004, and 1,812 in 2005).
Bacterial pneumonia causes some 60,000 deaths each year, mainly in the
winter, when surveillance data show increased prevalence of the flu
virus. Using a mathematical (Poisson) regression model, officials
estimate that the flu virus triggers some of the wintertime deaths
from pneumonia, along with deaths in people with cardiovascular
disease and other chronic illnesses. More than 34,000 of those
“36,000” flu deaths are what officials estimate are “influenza-
associated” pneumonic and cardiovascular deaths, not deaths from the
flu.

The Group Health study reported in the New York Times and other
newspapers around the country found that flu shots do not protect
elderly people against developing pneumonia. Pneumonia occurs with
equal frequency in people over age 65 with or without a flu shot.
Earlier studies, biased by the “healthy-user effect,” over-estimated
the vaccine’s effect on pneumonia because they did not adjust for the
presence and severity of other diseases in unvaccinated people.

Group Health authors explain the health-user bias: “The study found
that people who were healthy and conscientious about staying well were
the most likely to get an annual flu shot. Those who are frail may
have trouble bathing or dressing on their own and are less likely to
get to their doctor’s office or a clinic to receive the vaccine. They
are also more likely to be closer to death.”

Other investigators question that there is a mortality benefit with
influenza vaccination. Vaccination coverage among the elderly
increased from 15% in 1980 to 65% now, but there has been no decrease
in deaths from influenza and pneumonia (Am J Respir Crit Care Med
2008;178:527–33). As one vaccine researcher puts it, “I think the
evidence base [for mortality benefits from flu shots] we have leaned
on is not valid” (Lancet Infect Dis 2007;7:658–66).

There is also a lack of evidence that young children benefit from flu
shots. A systematic review of 51 studies involving 260,000 children
age 6 to 23 months found no evidence that the flu vaccine is any more
effective than a placebo (Cochrane Database Syst Rev.
2006;1:CD004879).

Randomized controlled trials are the most reliable way to determine
the efficacy and safety of a given treatment. No randomized trials
show that flu shots reduce mortality from influenza or flu-related
pneumonia. Some do show that the flu vaccine is somewhat effective in
preventing influenza. In one widely quoted study, 1838 volunteers age
60 and over were randomized to receive a flu shot or placebo (a shot
of saline).

The flu shot reduced the relative risk of contracting (serologically
confirmed, clinical) influenza by a seemingly impressive 50%. But the
incidence of influenza in the unvaccinated people in this study was
only 3%, compared to 2% in the vaccinated group (JAMA 1994;272:1661–
5). Flu shots reduced the absolute risk of contracting influenza by a
meager 1%. In other words, this study showed that for every 100 people
that have a flu shot only one will benefit from it – and all 100 risk
being harmed by the vaccine.

Another randomized trial by Zaman and coworkers published recently
(NEJM 2008;359: published online September 17, 2008, in print October
9) found that the incidence of influenza in infants whose mothers had
a flu shot during their pregnancy was 4% (6/159). The incidence of flu
in infants whose mothers did not have a flu shot was 10% (16/157).

In this study (done in Bangladesh and funded by the Bill and Melinda
Gates Foundation, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, and others) flu shots reduced
the relative risk of influenza illness in infants by a seemingly
impressive 63%. But only 6 out of 100 infants benefited from the shot.
The other 94 received no benefit – 4 got influenza anyway – and all
are at risk from being harmed by the vaccine, particularly from the
mercury, aluminum, and formaldehyde in it.

After officials select the three strains of flu virus that they think
are most likely to be circulating during the next winter season (they
picked the wrong ones last year, as is often the case), vaccine makers
grow the viruses in fertilized chicken eggs, with 500,000 eggs per day
(each examined by hand) for up to eight months. Formaldehyde is used
to inactivate the virus. It is a known cancer-causing agent. Aluminum
is added to promote an antibody response. It is a neurotoxin that may
play a role in Alzheimer’s disease. Other additives and adjuvants in
the flu vaccine include Triton X-100 (a detergent), Polysorbate 80,
carbolic acid, ethylene glycol (antifreeze), gelatin, and various
antibiotics – neomycin, streptomycin, and gentamicin – that can cause
allergic reactions in some people.

Two-thirds of the vaccines made for the 2008–09 flu season, 100
million of them, contain full-dose thimerosal, an organomercury
compound, which is 49% mercury by weight. (The remaining 50 million
vaccines contain either “no” or “trace” amounts of thimerosal.) It
is
used to disinfect the vaccine. Each one of these 100 million flu shots
contain 25 micrograms of mercury, a mercury content that is 50,000
part per billion, 250 times more than the Environmental Protection
Agency’s safety limit. Mercury is a neurotoxin, which has a toxicity
level 1,000 times that of lead.

There is some evidence that flu shots cause Alzheimer’s disease. This
most likely is a result of combining mercury with aluminum and
formaldehyde, which renders them much more toxic together through a
synergistic effect. One investigator has reported that people who
received the flu vaccine each year for three to five years had a ten-
fold greater chance of developing Alzheimer’s disease than people who
did not have any flu shots (Int J Clin Invest 2005;1:1–4).

The brains of people with Alzheimer’s disease display three pathologic
hallmarks characteristic of nanomolar doses of mercury: neurofibillary
tangles, amyloid plaques, and phosphorylation of tau protein.

Mercury in vaccines has also been implicated as a cause of autism.
Vaccine makers have now removed thimerosal from all childhood
vaccines, except flu shots. For more on this subject see my article
“Mercury on the Mind,” (www.wafreepress.org/72/mercuryOnTheMind.htm)
with its recommended reading list, and Evidence of Harm: Mercury in
Vaccines and the Autism Epidemic: A Medical Controversy by David
Kirby.

Three serious, acknowledged adverse reactions to the flu vaccine are
joint inflammation and arthritis, anaphylactic shock (and other life-
threatening allergic reactions), and Guillain-Barré syndrome. Guillain-
Barré syndrome (GBS) is a paralytic autoimmune disease that fells
people several weeks after their flu shot. One woman with post-
vaccination GBS writes:

“I had a flu shot in November, and by December I became weak and
continued to get weaker until I collapsed and was taken to the
hospital… I was helpless, totally paralyzed with Guillain-Barré
syndrome… I was in ICU for three weeks and then transferred to a
rehabilitation center. Three months later I was released to come home
because I could ambulate approximately 100 feet with a walker. I
continued rehabilitation as an outpatient for the next three months
until I could walk with hand crutches. Today, I need a cane. I was not
forewarned of any possible hazard when they gave me the flu shot.”

Another woman, diagnosed with GBS after a flu shot, spent 16 months in
the hospital paralyzed on a ventilator and life support. After several
subsequent multi-month hospitalizations she writes:

“On my last visit to my neurologist I was able to walk about 6 feet
holding his hand, not much but it took years to be able to do that. I
scratch my head when I hear them promoting flu shots… Most people that
I come into contact with – in the hospital and out (nurses, doctors,
and regular people) – after hearing my story, feel that it is better
to chance the flu and not get the shot.” (from Vaccine Safety Manual
for Concerned Families and Health Practitioners: Guide to
Immunizations Risks and Protection by Neil Miller [no relation to this
author], pages 84–86.)

The package inserts that come with the flu vaccine note that GBS is a
potential complication, and that there are one to two cases of GBS per
million vaccinated persons. But there were ten times that many cases
of GBS in 1976 with the flu vaccine used that year. Taking a flu shot
is essentially the same as buying a lottery ticket for acquiring GBS.

Perhaps that’s why seventy percent of doctors do not get a flu shot.


Not the temperature, but the sun

Flu virus exists in people year-round, and new strains seed a
population during the “off-season.” In the northern and southern
temperate zones, flu epidemics occur in the cold part of the year,
October–March and April–September respectively. Flu epidemics occur in
the tropics during the rainy season.

Explanations for why flu epidemics occur in the winter when it is cold
– people being indoors in close contact, drier air dehydrating mucus
and preventing the body from expelling virus particles, the virus
lingering longer on exposed surfaces, like doorknobs, with colder
temperatures – do not explain why flu epidemics occur in the tropics.

Something that can explain why flu epidemics also occur both in warm
and cold climates is this: During a flu epidemic, wherever it may be,
the atmosphere blocks ultraviolet B (UVB) radiation from the Sun. In
the temperate zones above latitude 35 degrees North and South, the sun
is at a low enough angle in the winter that the ozone layer in the
atmosphere absorbs and blocks the short-wavelength (280–315
nanometers) UVB rays. In the tropics during the wet season, thick rain
clouds block UVB rays.

Skin contains a cholesterol derivative, 7-dehydrocholesterol. UVB
radiation on skin breaks open one of the carbon rings in this molecule
to form vitamin D. Vitamin D regulates the expression of more than
1,000 genes throughout the body, including genes in macrophages, cells
in the immune system that attack and destroy viruses. Vitamin D
switches on genes in macrophages to produce peptides, which are both
antibiotic and antiviral: they destroy both bacteria and viruses.

Vitamin D also expresses genes that stop macrophages from overreacting
to an infection and releasing too many inflammatory agents – cytokines
– that can damage infected tissue. Cytokines were a factor in the 1918–
19 Spanish flu pandemic that killed 500,000 Americans. Young healthy
adults would wake up in the morning feeling well, then start drowning
in their own inflammation as the day wore on. They would be dead by
midnight, as happened to my 22-year-old grandmother and my wife’s 24-
year-old grandmother.

Autopsies showed complete destruction of the epithelial cells lining
the respiratory tract resulting, researchers now know, from a
macrophage-induced severe inflammatory reaction to the virus. In a
terribly misguided way, these victims’ own immune system attacked and
killed them, not the virus, something in future pandemics vitamin D,
in appropriate doses, can prevent.

A creditable hypothesis that explains the seasonal nature of flu is
that influenza is a vitamin D deficiency disease. Cannell and
colleagues offer this hypothesis in “Epidemic Influenza and Vitamin
D” (Epidemiol Infect 2006;134:1129–40). They quote Hippocrates (circa
400 B.C.), who said, “Whoever wishes to investigate medicine properly
should proceed thus: in the first place to consider the seasons of the
year.”

Vitamin D levels in the blood fall to their lowest point during flu
seasons. Unable to be protected by the body’s own antibiotics
(antimicrobial peptides) that this gene-expresser engineers, a person
with a low vitamin D blood level is more vulnerable to contracting
colds, influenza, and other respiratory infections.

Studies show that children with rickets, a vitamin D-deficient
skeletal disorder, suffer from frequent respiratory infections; and
children exposed to sunlight are less likely to get a cold. Given
vitamin D’s wide-ranging effects on gene expression, other studies
show that people diagnosed with cancer in the summer have an improved
survival compared with those diagnosed in the winter (Int J Cancer
2006;119:1530–36).

A growing body of evidence indicates that rickets in children and
osteomalacia in adults (both a softening of bones due to defective
bone mineralization) are just the tip of a vitamin-deficiency
iceberg.

Tuberculosis and various autoimmune diseases, such as multiple
sclerosis, lupus, and type I diabetes have a causal association with
low vitamin D blood levels. Vitamin D deficiency plays a causal role
in hypertension, coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure,
peripheral vascular disease, and stroke. It is also a risk factor for
metabolic syndrome and type II diabetes, chronic fatigue, seasonal
affective disorder, depression, cataracts, infertility, and
osteoporosis.

At the bottom of the vitamin D iceberg lies cancer. There is good
evidence that vitamin D deficiency is a causal factor in some 15
different common cancers. (NEJM 2007;357:266–81.)

The increased number of deaths that occur in winter, largely from
pneumonia and cardiovascular diseases, are much more likely due to
vitamin D deficiency than to an increased prevalence of serologically-
positive influenza virus (which also results from vitamin D
deficiency).

Experts reckon that an optimum blood level of vitamin D is 4,000 to
5,000 IU (international units) a day, about ten times the US
government’s recommended daily allowance.

A light-skinned person will synthesize 20,000 IU of vitamin D in 20
minutes sunbathing on a tropical beach, at which point vitamin D
synthesis shuts down for the day (it takes a dark-skinned person 6 to
10 times longer to make this amount).

Human breast milk does not contain vitamin D, since, from an
evolutionary standpoint, our African ancestors’ infants, reared near
the equator, could readily synthesize the nutrient from sunlight on
their skin. Food contains very little vitamin D. The highest natural
concentrations are in wild salmon, mackerel, sardines, and cod liver
oil, but even a typical daily dose of cod liver oil supplement
contains only about 400 IU. Federal regulations now require that some
foods, like milk, be fortified with vitamin D. But one would have to
drink 200 glasses of milk to obtain the amount of vitamin D a light-
skinned person can make in 20 minutes sunbathing.

The majority of Americans are vitamin D deficient. Cheap vitamin D
supplements (D3 is regarded by many nutritionists as better than D2)
provide the only way most of us can maintain a good year-round vitamin
D blood level. That requires taking 4–5,000 IU of vitamin D a day.

Taking vitamin D in these doses is safe, far safer than a flu shot
with all the bad chemicals it contains. Concerns about vitamin D
toxicity are overblown. One can take a 10,000 IU vitamin D supplement
on a daily basis without any adverse effects. In healthy persons,
toxicity is only reached with long-term consumption of more than
40,000 IU a day (Am J Clin Nutr 2006;84:694–97).

If you’re interested, check your vitamin D (25-hydroxy D) blood level.
People with granulomatous diseases like sarcoidosis should also check
their blood level of 1,25-dihydroxyvitamin D, the active form.

Doctors in India and Canada give people a once-yearly injection of
600,000 IU of vitamin D (MJA 2005;183:10–12). That would be better,
and safer, than having a flu shot. Daily, weekly, or monthly vitamin D
tablets work just as well. For more on this subject see my article
“Vitamin D in a New Light” (www.lewrockwell.com/miller/miller25.html)
and visit Dr. Cannell’s Vitamin D Council website
(www.vitamindcouncil.org).

Investigators have completed one double-blind, randomized, placebo-
controlled trial that shows vitamin D prevents colds and influenza
significantly better than a placebo pill (Epidemiol Infection
2007;135:1095–6). A large multi-center randomized trial conducted over
multiple flu seasons comparing vitamin D to a flu shot can show
conclusively which is better, and safer. But given the financial
stakes underpinning flu shots, and the unpatentable nature of vitamin
D, who will fund it?

In the meantime, considering what is most likely to be the outcome of
such a trial, if it is ever conducted, I avoid flu shots and take
vitamin D instead.


Other things you can do to prevent the flu

Avoid sugar. It suppresses immunity. Avoid Omega-6 vegetable oils
(corn, safflower, sunflower, peanut, canola, and soybean oil).
Americans consume 50 times more of these oils than are necessary for
good health. In this amount they are powerful immune suppressants.
Take a well-balanced multivitamin/mineral capsule on a daily basis.
Eat garlic. Manage stress. Exercise. Get enough rest. And wash your
hands. Viruses spread most often from touching contaminated objects,
like doorknobs, phones, shared computer keyboards, and shaking hands.

One caveat: what doctors diagnose as “influenza” is often an influenza-
like illness caused by a respiratory virus other than the flu.
Serologic tests are necessary to prove that one’s respiratory illness
is actually caused by the flu virus.
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