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Prolonged Gaming Blamed For Rickets Rise
superapecommando writes "Too many hours spent playing videogames indoors is contributing to a rise in rickets, according to a new study by doctors. Professor Simon Pearce and Dr Tim Cheetham of Newcastle University have written a paper in the British Medical Journal which warns of the rickets uptake – a disease which sufferers get when deficient in Vitamin D. The study boils down to the fact that as more people play videogames indoors they don't get enough sunlight and this has meant the hospitals are now having to combat a disease that was last in the papers around the time Queen Victoria was on the throne." At least the kids are eating enough snacks with iodized salt that we don't have to worry about goiters.
Wouldn't drinking milk resolved the Vitamin D deficiency. I do not know much about the Richet illness but what does sunlight have to do with Calcium.
I'm going to take this with a large grain of salt here. Does the publication in the British Medical Journal actually blame the rise on gaming, or is TFA simply adding the gaming aspect to it to generate a sensational article to post on a tech site with a large demographic who plays games. TFA only has a link to the BMJ homepage.
Oh, and obligatory: correlation does not imply causation
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Bullshit.
More likely the result of fear-tactic news scaring people into keeping their kids indoors 24 hours a day except for school. Playgrounds are where perverts lurk, remember? Gotta keep little Billy safe!
Of course, indoors there are videogames - but there's also books, and television. Gaming is just one possible indoor activity - if you don't let your kids outside, don't be surprised if they end up fucked up.
A Trip to the doctor recently found that my blood work was great, except for a SERIOUS vitamin D shortage. Now I have to take 2000Mg of Vitamin D a day. Considering my free time consists of "World of Warcraft" this isn't too surprising. But I'm 45 years old. When I was a kid I had an actual life and a decent diet. If my vitamin D levels had been this low at 12, my bones would have been like soft cheese. How hard is it to force some vitamins into your kid? We were raised by a single parent, and somehow she still managed to make us take a multi-vitamin. I can't get over the fact that there are people who would never dream of missing an oil change on their car who can't see to it that their kid gets a vitamin supplement every day.