• DavidGarcia
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    10 months ago

    Ideally our LEDs should emit a safe dose of UV-B and infrared too, because they are vital for vit D and melatonin production, both of which are extremely important for general health. As more and more of us become basement dwellers and winter depression enjoyers, this would help out a lot with public health.

      • DavidGarcia
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        10 months ago

        That’s not true. We’ve evolved while being irradiated by the sun for literally billions of years. Your body has mechanisms to repair damaged DNA and kill+replace cells that are too damaged. Issues arise when the damage grows fast enough for your body to keep up repairs. E.g. you get a sun burn because you don’t have an adequate tan or you hug a reactor meltdown.

        Supplements are an inadequate solution for many reasons.

        1. Vit D supplements barely get absorbed by the stommach. The only way to get adequate vitamin D levels with supplements is to take huge doses for like a month while testing your blood to see if levels are adequate.
        2. Most available Vit D supplements take a week to be metabolized into the active form.
        3. Vit D supplements can give you an overdose of Vitamin D and have severe negative health consequences.

        Meanwhile half an hour of sunlight gives you healthy levels of Vit D without risk of overdose.

        I’m not advocating for 1000W/m^2 UVB radiation blasting you 24/7, I’m talking about levels that are low enough that you can constantly be exposed to without a increase in risk.

        And btw a lack of vitamin D causes severely bad health outcomes, even if it would cause a minor increase in skin cancer (which it doesn’t), the benefits of adequate vitamin D levels would vastly outweigh that risk.

        Same with melatonin, supplements can’t replace the effect of exposure to infrared light. But at least with infrared people won’t spread misinformation about how there’s no safe levels.

        • bioemerl@kbin.social
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          10 months ago

          We’ve evolved while being irradiated by the sun for literally billions of years. Your body has mechanisms to repair damaged DNA and kill+replace cells that are too damaged

          We evolved for lots of things that are harmful overall. Unless there is evidence that sun exposure gives some non vitamin d advantage the fact it literally causes cancer means you should avoid it in general.

          I like how your rebuttals both say that supplements are both not able to give you vitamin D but also simultaneously a risk of overdose.

          Avoid the cancer causing radiation. Just take a pill every day and get your blood work done to see how much you should take.

          But at least with infrared people won’t spread misinformation about how there’s no safe levels.

          That’s because infrared light doesn’t cause cancer. Although your support for infrared light exposure does identify you as a bit of a quack.

          • Amju Wolf@pawb.social
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            10 months ago

            I like how your rebuttals both say that supplements are both not able to give you vitamin D but also simultaneously a risk of overdose.

            You do realize that you can be both chronically deficient of something while also acutely overdosing on it, right?

            • bioemerl@kbin.social
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              10 months ago

              Yeah, if you take like 15 pills on one day or something stupid like that.

              But unlike the risk of taking 15 vitamin d pills, literally all the potential of giving you skin cancer.

              This doesn’t mean you have to be stupid and never go outside at all because “oh my goodness it’s going to give me cancer”. It just means that installing UVB emitters in our fucking light bulbs is a bad idea, and if you have vitamin d deficiency you can take a pill every day.

      • qyron@sopuli.xyz
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        10 months ago

        A pill is not a desirable solution for every and anything.

        And if zero was the safe dose, no one would walk outside; we’d be cave dwellers.

    • AProfessional@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      It’s an interesting idea, but it’s also solved by being added to many foods or 2 cents a day of supplements.

    • gibmiser@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      It’s a funny thought. Would that fall under an FDA regulation or department of energy?

      Cue breakfast cereal style commercial advertising light bulbs giving 100% of your daily vitamin D

      • DavidGarcia
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        10 months ago

        the CDC would have to slap the FDA and DoE until they comply I guess

    • query@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      You can make specific lamps for specific uses. Putting it in all lamps would just make it very difficult to regulate exposure.

      • DavidGarcia
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        10 months ago

        that’s why you’d make the level of UVB radiation low enough that people could safely spend 24/7 under it, but high enough that it provides a health benefit

        You might not get 100% of your vit D levels this way, but perhaps just a fraction of it. Depends on how the risk benefit calculation works out.

        and of course infrared is generally harmless as long as it’s not strong enough to cook you.

      • Murvel@lemm.ee
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        10 months ago

        Hi, I’m a winter depression enjoyer and I’m fucking miserable