<story><title>Exposure to the Sun&apos;s UV radiation may be good for you</title><url>https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/08/12/exposure-to-the-suns-uv-radiation-may-be-good-for-you</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>klipt</author><text>But some people think that just popping a vitamin D pill gives you all the benefits of sun exposure without the downsides.&lt;p&gt;Research on all cause mortality disagrees. Some sun exposure reduces all cause mortality even if you already take vitamin D.</text></item><item><author>Aurornis</author><text>&amp;gt; But I don&amp;#x27;t understand why people seem so resistant to the idea that some sun is probably beneficial.&lt;p&gt;There are some people who believe this, but Vitamin D and sun exposure have been a popular topic for a very long time now. It’s getting harder to find people who think that avoiding all sun exposure is a good idea.&lt;p&gt;The most confusing part appears to be the idea that wearing sunscreen is equivalent to avoiding UV exposure. Sunscreen reduces UV exposure, but does not completely eliminate it. This misconception has produced a lot of people who think “sunscreen bad” because “UV good”. You can get moderate UV exposure while wearing sunscreen.</text></item><item><author>taeric</author><text>This always strikes me as a tough discussion.  With the odd hostility between the two extremes of &amp;quot;all sun is bad exposure&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;you should get more sun.&amp;quot; With the later taken to be &amp;quot;all sun is good exposure.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Just observing a typical yard, it is easy to see that grass can both have too much and too little sun.  Indeed, cover it up and it will die.  Expose it to direct sun all day for several days with no water and it will similarly die.  (Well, not similarly, it will die in a different way.)&lt;p&gt;I realize we don&amp;#x27;t photosynthesize, and burning is clearly bad for us.  But I don&amp;#x27;t understand why people seem so resistant to the idea that some sun is probably beneficial.&lt;p&gt;I also realize that literally &amp;quot;basking in the sun&amp;quot; is almost certainly taking it too far.  :(</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>Aerroon</author><text>But what doses did they take in the research? Vitamin D RDA has been increased by like 5-10x recently in some countries (others are still lagging behind), because the RDA that we&amp;#x27;ve used for decades had a calculation error.&lt;p&gt;If the studies dosed vitamin D based on recommendations then it shouldn&amp;#x27;t be surprising that supplementing vitamin D didn&amp;#x27;t work. Considering that only a few countries have updated their vitamin D RDA in the past few years, and most haven&amp;#x27;t, then I think it&amp;#x27;s likely that most studies on the topic will have too low of a dose of vitamin D supplementation.&lt;p&gt;The vitamin D error: &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&amp;#x2F;pmc&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;PMC4210929&amp;#x2F;&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov&amp;#x2F;pmc&amp;#x2F;articles&amp;#x2F;PMC4210929&amp;#x2F;&lt;/a&gt;&lt;p&gt;---&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s also possible that some of the health benefits don&amp;#x27;t come from vitamin D or UV exposure, but instead from something like red light exposure or some other wavelength. (Red) light therapy is a popular topic for example. It&amp;#x27;s mostly touted to improve skin aging and it&amp;#x27;s being studied as a help with myopia in children. Does it work? No idea.</text></comment>
<story><title>Exposure to the Sun&apos;s UV radiation may be good for you</title><url>https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2024/08/12/exposure-to-the-suns-uv-radiation-may-be-good-for-you</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>klipt</author><text>But some people think that just popping a vitamin D pill gives you all the benefits of sun exposure without the downsides.&lt;p&gt;Research on all cause mortality disagrees. Some sun exposure reduces all cause mortality even if you already take vitamin D.</text></item><item><author>Aurornis</author><text>&amp;gt; But I don&amp;#x27;t understand why people seem so resistant to the idea that some sun is probably beneficial.&lt;p&gt;There are some people who believe this, but Vitamin D and sun exposure have been a popular topic for a very long time now. It’s getting harder to find people who think that avoiding all sun exposure is a good idea.&lt;p&gt;The most confusing part appears to be the idea that wearing sunscreen is equivalent to avoiding UV exposure. Sunscreen reduces UV exposure, but does not completely eliminate it. This misconception has produced a lot of people who think “sunscreen bad” because “UV good”. You can get moderate UV exposure while wearing sunscreen.</text></item><item><author>taeric</author><text>This always strikes me as a tough discussion.  With the odd hostility between the two extremes of &amp;quot;all sun is bad exposure&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;you should get more sun.&amp;quot; With the later taken to be &amp;quot;all sun is good exposure.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;Just observing a typical yard, it is easy to see that grass can both have too much and too little sun.  Indeed, cover it up and it will die.  Expose it to direct sun all day for several days with no water and it will similarly die.  (Well, not similarly, it will die in a different way.)&lt;p&gt;I realize we don&amp;#x27;t photosynthesize, and burning is clearly bad for us.  But I don&amp;#x27;t understand why people seem so resistant to the idea that some sun is probably beneficial.&lt;p&gt;I also realize that literally &amp;quot;basking in the sun&amp;quot; is almost certainly taking it too far.  :(</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cube2222</author><text>I wonder if it’s just correlation, with the actual cause of both being physical activity. Physical activity likely makes you go out into the sun more, and it also likely reduces mortality.&lt;p&gt;Would be great if you provided a source so we could check whether they controlled for physical activity.</text></comment>