Vitamin D is formed in the skin when UVB radiation from the sun reacts with cholesterol within the skins capillary bed. This conversion takes place and reduces the cholesterol level of the body. In the absence of this exposure cholesterol builds up in the body and causes coronary heart disease instead of creating the disease preventative hormone vitamin D. Taking vitamin D orally will not provide this benefit.
The exchange and turnover of vitamin D for cholesterol in the skins capillary bed will be the determining factor in reducing blood plasma cholesterol levels. If the rate of the livers production of cholesterol always exceeds this, then no reduction will occur. If insufficient vitamin D is synthesized in the skin, then no reduction will occur.
If the blood flow is good enough to improve on this ratio, then of course cholesterol levels should be reduced. Recent research is also indicating that sunshine dilates capillaries.
Capillary blood flow is often times limited by the tiny diameter of the capillaries themselves, often only large enough to allow passage of one blood cell at a time to squeeze through. They are also regulated and at any time three quarters of them are closed. I can suggest the use of a nicotinic acid flush which increases capillary size two and three fold, which translates into a four to nine fold increase in the blood flow potential. Many people suffer from an insufficient capillary blood flow. Vitamin B3 rivals, and often produces much better results than modern Staton drugs designed to combat high cholesterol levels in the blood. The reason for this now seems apparent since it enhances the vitamin D pathway that nature intended for our bodies to utilize.
Muscle contractions are triggered by the flood of calcium ions into the muscle cells, and muscle relaxation is triggered by the flood of magnesium ions into the muscle cells. When the heart fails to contract and relax rythmically from these alternating ionic signals, this is called a heart attack. Calcium adsorption into the body is very poor without vitamin D, as is magnesium adsorption. If you lack vitamin D then you also lack these two minerals so essential for routine heart function.
So, in these ways sunlight combats heart disease by completing the metabolic pathway for vitamin D synthesis in the skin. The vitamin D created in this way reduces the cholesterol level of the body and also greatly enhances the adsorption of calcium and magnesium into the body ensuring a strong healthy heart, enhancing the relaxation response, and avoiding coronary artery disease.
velis et remis
“We investigated the relationship between geography and incidence of coronary heart disease, looking at deficiency of sunlight and thus of vitamin D as a factor that might influence susceptibility and thus disease incidence. Sunlight deficiency could increase blood cholesterol by allowing squalene metabolism to progress to cholesterol synthesis rather than to vitamin D synthesis as would occur with greater amounts of sunlight exposure, and the increased concentration of blood cholesterol during the winter months, confirmed in this study, may well be due to reduced sunlight exposure. We show evidence that outdoor activity (gardening) is associated with a lower concentration of blood cholesterol in the summer but not in the winter. We suggest that the geographical variation of coronary heart disease is not specific, but is seen in other diseases and sunlight influences susceptibility to a number of chronic diseases, of which coronary heart disease is one.”