Nursery World - Call for children to be given vitamin D as cases of rickets triple

Experts are urging parents to give their children daily doses of Vitamin D, as research shows a lack of awareness of its benefits.

The call by the Vitamin D Mission, an industry-sponsored public health awareness campaign to eradicate vitamin D deficiency in children under five, comes after an analysis of Hospital Episode Statistics (HES) shows the number of children diagnosed with Vitamin D deficiency and rickets has tripled in the last five years.

In 2009/10 1,398 children from birth to 16 in England were diagnosed as being deficient of the vitamin. This rose to 4,638 in 2013/14, says the campaign, which has released the figures during National Vitamin D Awareness Week (20-26 October).

A survey of more than 1,000 parents of children aged five and under, also commissioned by the campaign, shows that half know little or nothing about the role of vitamin D in their child’s health, and more than a third have never received information about the importance of the vitamin for their child’s health.

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