A Danish-Australian academic collaboration has found evidence linking vitamin D deficiency in newborns to the likelihood of developing conditions such as autism and attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
According to Australia’s University of Queensland psychiatrist Professor Dr John McGrath, infants found to lack the so-called sunshine vitamin were at risk of several neurodevelopmental disorders, including anorexia nervosa and depression.
“Vitamin D is important for a baby’s brain development, and low vitamin D levels are common in pregnant women across the globe,” he warned.
The vitamin is typically generated by the body through exposure to sunlight, meaning that people who live in cooler climates or spend most of their days indoors often have to look for alternatives, either from food such as cheese, eggs and fish, or by taking supplements.
“Similar to how folate supplements are recommended during pregnancy to prevent spina bifida, our research suggest [sic] that optimising vitamin D levels in early life may reduce the risk of several neurodevelopmental disorders,” he explained.
Based at the National Centre for Register-Based Research at Aarhus University and the State Serum Institute in Denmark, the researchers looked at medical records for almost 72,000 people born between 1981 and 2005, cross-checking mental health status and vitamin D intake.
Published in The Lancet Psychiatry journal, the findings covered “individuals diagnosed with major depressive disorder, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, ADHD, ASD (autism spectrum disorder) and anorexia nervosa,” the team said.
A Hungarian study published last month in the journal Nutrients also suggested that vitamin D could help prevent colon cancer.
Several items of research carried out during the Covid-19 pandemic found links between the vitamin and reduced likelihood of symptomatic infection.
These findings were echoed in a paper published in The Lancet medical journal in April (2025) showing that vitamin D may be helpful against several respiratory diseases. – dpa
