The Sun Can Prevent Cancer

I recently posted an article about how the sun's natural cycle is keeping global warming more at bay than we realize. But one thing in that article deserved its own post as I feel it flips most of what we thought we knew the last few decades on its head: Exposure to the sun may prevent cancer more than cause it.

The tid-bit in that article spoke of how the vitamin D that we need to live is also very important in cancer prevention. And as we have moved inside as a society our exposure to the sun is limited - thus limiting our production of vitamin D.

...10-15 minutes of sunbathing will provide us with the same amount of vitamin D as 200 glasses of milk. And this vitamin is one of our most potent anti-cancer agents ... 

Unlike past generations, children today spend a lot more time indoors than they do playing around in the sun. Testing shows that our vitamin D levels are now a small fraction of what we think they were 100 years ago.

So often we hear about putting on sunscreen and the dangers of sun exposure beyond sun burns. Skin cancer is a real threat, and we need to do all we can to eliminate it as a risk... but in doing so, have we unwittingly put ourselves at risk for other cancers due to a lower level of vitamin D in our blood? This article from Lifehacker talks about this interesting twist on the cancer causing sun.

Everyone should use solar power wisely and not go totally bonkers. There's no need to fry. But whatever extra skin cancer risk we might assume certainly seems to me to be a reasonable price to pay, considering the benefits. It now appears that adequate sunlight- mediated vitamin D might prevent as many as 150,000 cancer deaths a year in the United States alone and also reduce infections, bone problems, and perhaps, though more science is needed, even autism and asthma rates. Of course, on the other side of the balance beam, melanoma causes 8,500 US deaths a year. Every activity from bicycle riding to barroom brawling involves some balancing of risks, and the decision of what trade- offs to make is, of course, yours alone.