Vitamin D Deficiency Among Children Not As Widespread Under New Guidelines

Thanks to revised Institute of Medicine guidelines on vitamin D deficiency, far fewer children in the U.S. are considered to have insufficient or deficient levels of vitamin D, a U.S. study has found. According to the new guidelines, most people get sufficient vitamin D when their blood levels are at or above 20 nanograms per milliliter (ng/mL). (Other guidelines recommend vitamin D levels above 30 ng/mL). The study looked at vitamin D data from 2,877 U.S. children and adolescents ages 6 to 18, finding that under the Institute of Medicine guidelines, 10.3 percent of children ages 6 to 18, or 5.5 million, are at risk. Under previous guidelines, millions more children who had vitamin D levels between 20 and 30 ng/mL would have needed supplementation.