I'M THINKING OF TAKING UP SMOKING

Scientists Say Sunshine May Prevent Cancer (Marilynn Marchione, AP, 5/21/05)

Scientists are excited about a vitamin again. But unlike fads that sizzled and fizzled, the evidence this time is strong and keeps growing. If it bears out, it will challenge one of medicine's most fundamental beliefs: that people need to coat themselves with sunscreen whenever they're in the sun. Doing that may actually contribute to far more cancer deaths than it prevents, some researchers think.

The vitamin is D, nicknamed the "sunshine vitamin" because the skin makes it from ultraviolet rays. Sunscreen blocks its production, but dermatologists and health agencies have long preached that such lotions are needed to prevent skin cancer. Now some scientists are questioning that advice. The reason is that vitamin D increasingly seems important for preventing and even treating many types of cancer.

In the last three months alone, four separate studies found it helped protect against lymphoma and cancers of the prostate, lung and, ironically, the skin. The strongest evidence is for colon cancer.

The great thing about science, we're told, is the way it corrects it's errors. And corects them. And correct's them. And corrects tem. and corrects them. And currects them. And corrects hem. And corrects them And korrects them. And correts them. Amd corrects them. And collects them.

Posted by David Cohen at May 22, 2005 12:11 AM