{"id":214417,"date":"2010-01-22T17:23:24","date_gmt":"2010-01-22T22:23:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/discoblog\/?p=6105"},"modified":"2010-01-22T17:23:24","modified_gmt":"2010-01-22T22:23:24","slug":"public-health-authorities-couch-potato-syndrome-leads-to-rickets-discoblog","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/214417","title":{"rendered":"Public Health Authorities: Couch Potato Syndrome Leads to Rickets | Discoblog"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-6109\" title=\"video-game-controller\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/discoblog\/files\/2010\/01\/video-game-controller.jpg\" alt=\"video-game-controller\" width=\"220\" height=\"149\" align=\"left\"\/>Is your child practically a vampire? Avoiding the sun, holed up at home, and playing video games non-stop? Two scientists in Britain now suggest there might be link between such inactivity and rickets&#8211;a painful bone condition caused by lack of vitamin D, and which is much more common in malnourished children of the developing world.<\/p>\n<p>Researchers <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/www.ncl.ac.uk\/biomedicine\/research\/groups\/profile\/s.h.s.pearce\">Simon Pearce<\/a> and <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/www.ncl.ac.uk\/biomedicine\/research\/groups\/profile\/t.d.cheetham\">Tim Cheetham<\/a> of Newcastle University have published a <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/www.bmj.com\/cgi\/content\/extract\/340\/jan11_1\/b5664?maxtoshow=&amp;HITS=10&amp;hits=10&amp;RESULTFORMAT=&amp;fulltext=Rickets&amp;searchid=1&amp;FIRSTINDEX=0&amp;sortspec=date&amp;resourcetype=HWCIT\">clinical review<\/a> in the latest issue of the<em> British Medical Journal<\/em> blaming the rickets resurgence on our more interior lifestyle. According to <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/society\/2010\/jan\/22\/sharp-rise-vitamin-a-deficiency\"><em>The Guardian<\/em><\/a>, Pearce said:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;Vitamin D levels in parts of the population are precarious. The average worker nowadays is in a call center, not out in the field. People tend to stay at home rather than going outside to kick a ball around. They stay at home on computer games.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><span id=\"more-6105\"><\/span>The consequent lack of vitamin D (which is produced in skin that&#8217;s exposed to moderately strong sunlight) could be the chief cause for the return of rickets in England, with 20 new cases reported each year from Newcastle alone.<\/p>\n<p>But we might not have to unplug the game consoles and toss kids out into the sun. Researchers say that outdoor time could be topped up with a change in diet or vitamin D supplements. They even suggested to the <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/www.dh.gov.uk\/en\/index.htm\">British Department of Health<\/a> that vitamin D be added to milk to get past picky eaters. (Currently, unlike the U.S., the UK does not add vitamin D to milk.)<\/p>\n<p>Related Content:<br \/>\nDISCOVER: <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/discovermagazine.com\/2008\/jan\/can-vitamin-d-save-your-life\/?searchterm=vitamin%20d\">Can Vitamin D Save Your Life?<\/a><br \/>\n80beats: <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/80beats\/2008\/06\/03\/many-toddlers-lack-the-sunshine-vitamin-study-shows\/\">Many Toddlers Lack the \u201cSunshine Vitamin\u201d<\/a><br \/>\n80beats: <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/blogs.discovermagazine.com\/80beats\/2010\/01\/20\/generation-ipod-younguns-spend-53-hours-a-week-consuming-media\/\">Generation iPod: Young\u2019Uns Spend 53 Hours a Week Consuming Media<\/a><br \/>\nDISCOVER: <a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/discovermagazine.com\/2006\/aug\/tanningbeds\/?searchterm=vitamin%20d\">Tanning Beds and Cancer<\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>Image: iStockphoto<\/em><\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/iw5OguT5WveZ0h3ZKevvCBVwlZw\/0\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/iw5OguT5WveZ0h3ZKevvCBVwlZw\/0\/di\" border=\"0\" ismap><\/a><br \/>\n<a rel=\"nofollow\"  href=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/iw5OguT5WveZ0h3ZKevvCBVwlZw\/1\/da\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feedads.g.doubleclick.net\/~a\/iw5OguT5WveZ0h3ZKevvCBVwlZw\/1\/di\" border=\"0\" ismap><\/a><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/feeds.feedburner.com\/~r\/DiscoverMag\/~4\/iN7-SanXqEY\" height=\"1\" width=\"1\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Is your child practically a vampire? Avoiding the sun, holed up at home, and playing video games non-stop? Two scientists in Britain now suggest there might be link between such inactivity and rickets&#8211;a painful bone condition caused by lack of vitamin D, and which is much more common in malnourished children of the developing world. [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":641,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-214417","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214417","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/641"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=214417"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214417\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=214417"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=214417"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=214417"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}