By this point, people familiar with the Marshall pathogenesis realize that the Vitamin D Receptor plays an extremely important role in activating immune function and keeping the chronic, intraphagocytic bacteria that cause inflammatory disease under control.

But when the vitamin D feedback pathways fleshed out by Marshall in a recent BioEssays paper are examined, another important receptor enters the picture. It goes by the name of the Pregane X Receptor (PXR), and like the VDR, the PXR is also a nuclear receptor. Mainstream researchers generally understand that the PXR plays an important role in regulating the metabolism, transport, and excretion of exogenous compounds, steroid hormones, vitamins, bile salts, and xenobiotics (chemicals that are foreign to the body). However, they are only recently beginning to understand that the receptor is also intricately connected to VDR function, vitamin D metabolism, and proper regulation of the vitamin D metabolites.

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For several years now, studies have emerged showing that breastfed babies often perform better on standardized tests and display higher overall levels of intelligence than their formula-fed counterparts. And since baby formula possesses, at least according to a number of mainstream researchers, many of the same basic characteristics as breast milk, the reality that breastfed babies tend to display higher levels of intelligence currently presents a conundrum for the medical community.

Of course, theories have been proposed. One such theory is that women who breastfeed their babies possess different personality traits than those women who chose to feed their infants formula. It’s been postulated that women who take the time to feed their babies from their own breasts are smarter. Perhaps the fact that such women harbor the desire to breastfeed also indicates that they are more invested in the future of their infant. And if they are more invested their baby, then it could be proposed that they interact more closely with the baby and initiate a greater number of activities to foster its intelligence.

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The Indian sub-continent is situated between 8.4 degree N and 37.6 degree N latitude and has adequate sunshine throughout the year. So say researchers at the Apollo Hospital in New Delhi India. In fact, in their introduction to a recent study on vitamin D, the team postulated further, stating that “it has been presumed that Indians have ’sufficient’ levels of vitamin D.”

And who wouldn’t presume such a thing? Considering that the average temperature in India is quite high, it’s doubtful that natives would be deficient in a substance that is easily obtained from the sun. Nevertheless, with growing concerns of what mainstream medicine calls vitamin D “deficiency” at hand, the team set out to confirm that the staff from a hospital in north India did indeed possess levels of vitamin D (25-D) that the medical community has deemed healthy - specifically 25-D level between 35-50 ng/ml. Using a machine called dual energy X-ray absorptiometer, the Apollo Hospital team were able to measure the staff’s serum 25-D and 1, 25-D levels.

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This month, researchers from several institutions including the University of Oulu in Finland and the Imperial College in London reported the results of a study which found an association between high-dose vitamin D supplementation in infancy and an increased risk of atopy, allergic rhinitis, and asthma later in life. Atopy, or atopic syndrome, is an allergic hypersensitivity affecting parts of the body not in direct contact with an allergen. It may involve eczema (inflammation of the upper skin layers), allergic conjunctivitis, allergic rhinitis and asthma.

The team started collecting data in 1967. That year, every mother in the two most northern provinces of Finland - a group of mothers referred to as the Northern Finland Birth Cohort (NFBC) - who had given birth to a child during the previous year was required to report the level of vitamin D they were giving their infant. At the time, Finnish government recommendations stated that mothers should supplement their infants with 50 ug of vitamin D. Mothers were asked to report if they were giving their infant the recommended dose of vitamin D, no vitamin D, or an irregular dose of vitamin D. An irregular dose of vitamin D usually reflected the fact that the infant was given high levels of vitamin D rich cod liver oil.

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Need proof that consuming high levels of vitamin D can curb your lifespan? Look no farther then a study published this month in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition which found that middle-aged men who ate seven or more eggs a week had a higher risk of earlier death from diabetes.

More specifically, Dr. Luc Djousse and Dr. J. Michael Gaziano of Brigham and Women’s Hospital at Harvard Medical School found that men with diabetes who ate any eggs at all doubled their risk of death during a 20-year study period. The team studied 21,327 men taking part in the much larger Physicians’ Health Study, which has been watching doctors since 1981 who have agreed to report regularly on their health and lifestyle habits.

“More egg on our faces? It’s really hard to say at this point, but it still seems, if you’re a middle-aged male physician and enjoy eggs more than once a day, then having some of the egg left on your face may be better than having it go down your gullet,” said Dr. Robert Eckel of the University of Colorado and a former president of the American Heart Association.

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Maybe vitamin D isn’t the answer after all.

Not only does the above statement ring true, it’s also the title of a recent post on “Dr. Len’s Cancer Blog” - a website written by Dr. Len Lichtenfeld, Deputy Chief Medical Officer for the national office of the American Cancer Society, in order to facilitate communication with the public on important issues related to cancer.

Dr. Lichtenfeld, as described by his website, is a frequent spokesperson on a variety of cancer-related subjects, and serves as a liaison for the Society with many professional and public organizations. He’s also a board certified medical oncologist and internist who was a practicing physician for nearly 20 years and serves on several national committees focused on physician payment, the quality of medical care, and the role of health information technology in healthcare delivery.

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A week ago, yet another study was published that casts serious doubt on a long-standing consensus among mainstream doctors and researchers - namely the idea if people are given extra vitamin D they will absorb more calcium, thus strengthening their bones.

In a paper published in the Journal of Bone Mineral Research titled “Disease or No Disease?” researchers tested the effects of extra vitamin D on calcium absorption in a group of postmenopausal women. The women had been diagnosed with “vitamin D insufficiency” – a label given to those people mainstream medicine contends to have a “low” level of the secosteroid 25-D.

The researchers put the consensus to the test by tracking the amount of calcium absorbed (called fractional calcium absorption) after subjects were administered 50,000 IU of vitamin D daily (a ridiculously high amount!) for 15 days. During the study, subjects also consumed their typical diet along with (44)Ca– the number 44 refers to the isotope of Calcium being consumed– orally with breakfast and (42)Ca administered intravenously each day.

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All across the country researchers such as Dr. Reinhold Vieth are telling people to supplement with levels of vitamin D up to four times as high as the current RDA, or 2000 IUs a day. A friend attending medical school at UCLA told me yesterday that he and his fellow students have been taught to ignore the RDA requirement for vitamin D and tell their future patients to take at least 1000 IUs of the secosteroid. The Canadian Cancer Society (CCS) announced its recommendation that Canadians consider taking 1000 mg of vitamin D daily in the fall and winter, and have refused to suspend the recommendation pending a review. Why is the substance being promoted in this manner at such high levels? Largely because vitamin D proponents are confident that the substance decreases the incidence of cardiovascular disease.

In fact, in the health section of yesterday’s Chicago Tribune, Nova Scotia epidemiologist Dr. Louise Parker touted vitamin D as the “new aspirin” because of its perceived ability to benefit people with heart conditions.

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Due to the hormonal changes that take place during recovery, many patients on the Marshall Protocol become sensitive to bright lights and sunlight. They are soon informed that dousing themselves with sunscreen does nothing to affect the production of vitamin D in their skin - hence the need to cover up with thick, dark layers when outside in the sun. “The majority of sunscreens are ineffective in blocking vitamin D production or blocking sun flare symptoms in Th1 patients,” states J.C. Waterhouse of Autoimmunity Research Foundation.

Yet, proponents of high-dose vitamin D continue to blame what they interpret as vitamin D “deficiency” on the fact that the American public wears too much sunscreen. Because they mistakenly believe that sunscreen fully blocks vitamin D production, organizations such as the Vitamin D Council - an organization dedicated to promoting high levels of vitamin D - make a firm point of informing the public that, “The only way to be sure you have adequate levels of vitamin D in your blood is to regularly go into the sun, or use a sun bed (avoiding sunburn).”

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Is biomedical researcher Trevor Marshall PhD the only person implicating vitamin D in disease? No. A recent study by researchers at Duke University found that elderly men and women who consumed higher levels of calcium and, in particular, vitamin D are significantly more likely to have greater volumes of brain lesions, indicating regions of damage that can increase risk of cognitive impairment, dementia, depression and death. The team found that vitamin D intake, (mean 341 IU and maximum intake 1014 IU), was the only variable that retained a significant correlation with the brain lesions when analyzed by a multivariate analysis.

Payne found that subjects who consumed vitamin D were markedly more likely to have a higher total volume of brain lesions.

The research team was led by Dr. Martha E. Payne, an assistant professor in the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences with the Neuropsychiatric Imaging Research Laboratory at Duke. Payne reported her findings at the 2007 Experimental Biology Conference in Washington D.C. Her presentation, which took place on May 1, is part of the scientific program of the American Society for Nutrition.

“This is one of the first studies to examine the relationship between diet and brain lesions,” said Payne. “Our finding of a relationship between brain lesions and consumption of both calcium and vitamin D raises the question about a possible downside to high intakes of these nutrients.”

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During the 1960s, a large number of studies began to point to the idea that estrogen therapy might ease the pangs of menopause. In a best selling book called Feminine Forever, a Brooklyn gynecologist named Robert Wilson argued that menopause was an illness rather than a natural state associated with aging. Soon, an increasing number of older women began to take supplemental estrogen in an effort to replace the hormones that their own bodies had stopped secreting. The treatment, known as hormone replacement therapy or HRT, became one of the most popular medical treatments in America.

The American Heart Association, the American College of Physicians, and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists all agreed that a sufficient number of studies had been done to prove that HRT was unequivocally helpful in helping older women ward off heart disease and osteoporosis. By 2001, 15 million women were taking HRT, including 5 million elderly women.

Then, in 1998, a clinical trial concluded that estrogen therapy actually increases the likelihood that women with heart disease will suffer a second heart attack. It was followed by a trial in 2002 which concluded that HRT puts postmenopausal women at a greater risk for heart disease, stroke, blood clots, breast cancer and even dementia. Suddenly, It became painfully clear that HRT may offer a benefit to women who begin to use it early in life, but for those who start the treatment in their later years, it can be very dangerous.

Gary Taubes writes in The New York Times Magazine, “The question of how many women may have died prematurely or suffered strokes or breast cancer because they were taking a pill that their physicians had prescribed to protect them against heart disease lingers unanswered. A reasonable estimate would be tens of thousands.”

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