Sunshine and Vitamin D in Britain

Scientists have uncovered `alarmingly' high rates of Vitamin D deficiency among Britons during winter and spring. Nine in 10 middle-aged men and women in Britain suffer from low levels of vitamin D, according to a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition. During the winter and spring, 15 per cent of people had dangerously low levels, which lead to softening of bone tissue. Even in the summer and autumn, some 60 per cent of Britons still do not have vitamin D levels high enough for optimal bone health; while three per cent had dangerously low levels. The study also showed that people who are obese are twice as likely to have low levels of vitamin D.
http://www.ich.ucl.ac.uk/pressoffice/pressrelease_00510

Thirty years ago, the vitamin D levels reported in this study were thought to be healthy by medical experts. However, `healthy' meant just enough to to prevent rickets in children or osteomalacia in adults. Three decades later, there is belated recognition that vitamin D is pivotal to many other aspects of health, and that much higher concentrations of vitamin D are needed to prevent adverse outcomes than those British population currently enjoy.
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/content/full/85/3/649