Vitamin D supplement for senior citizens TehranTimes
TEHRAN – Director of Health Ministry’s Department for the Improvement of Nutrition said on Saturday that senior citizens will receive vitamin D supplements in the next Iranian calendar year which starts on March 21, IRNA reported.
Zahra Abdollahi was making the remarks in a workshop on salt in Semnan province which was attended by nutrition and drug experts from 14 universities.
She said that the elderly and the middle age group will receive 5,000 units of vitamin D per month through healthcare centers across the country.
The dose of 5,000 units of vitamin D is sufficient for body and prevents major deficiencies [usually caused due to lack of exposure to sun], she explained.
Since the beginning of the current academic year, which started on September 23, providing supplements for some female high school students went into effect with a budget of seven billion rials (nearly $205,000), she added.
The plan will be extended to all female high school students across the country and is scheduled to be implemented in the high schools for boys as well.
The National Nutrition and Food Technology Institute ran a trial of adding vitamin D to enriched flour (with folic acid and iron) successfully, she added.
Abdollahi further explained that the process of adding vitamin D to enriched flour will be conducted throughout the country in the coming year.
167 IU = 5,000 IU / 30 days
800 IU US recommended minimum for seniors
4,000 IU: Many scientists recommendated minimum for seniors
See also VitaminDWiki
- Overview Middle East and vitamin D
- Overview Seniors and Vitamin D
- Rickets reduced 60X - lessons learned by Turkey 2011 they gave 400 IU to every child
which would be about 1,600 IU if adjusted for the increased weight of a senior - 200 IU needed to increase vitamin D levels by 1 ng (not 100 IU) – summary of 25 studies – Feb 2014
- thus the proposed 167 IU should raise blood levels by less than 1 nanogram - No, do not need 9,000 IU of vitamin D to get most people above 20 ng – Oct 2014
- 4700 IU of vitamin D needed by most seniors – an equation -July 2014