John Cannell, MD

John Jacob Cannell, MD’s life-long dedication to public welfare began in 1979 when he founded a family medical clinic in the coal fields of Southern Appalachia. Almost immediately he embarked on a widely publicized anti-smoking campaign among miners but later switched to trying to reform American public education where, in 1987, he discovered that all 50 states were claiming they were above the national average on elementary, so-called “standardized,” achievement tests. His “Lake Woebegone” discovery was later detailed in a 1991 Sixty Minutes (Teacher is a Cheater) segment, dedicated to Cannell’s education reform work.

In 1991 he switched from general practice to psychiatry. Almost immediately, he confronted “Recovered Memory Therapy,” which was destroying tens of thousand of innocent American families. After spending ten years helping end this damaging psychotherapy, he turned his attention to public health, where, in 2002, he became convinced vitamin D will change the face of medical care and founded the non-profit Vitamin D Council.

Academically, Cannell is best known for his discovery that influenza’s multiple mysteries are best explained by vitamin D. In fact, his first influenza and vitamin D paper is the most cited review paper in the history of the journal, Epidemiology and Infection, while his second influenza paper is the most downloaded paper in the history of Virology Journal. However, Cannell is now firmly dedicated to stopping the autism epidemic, which, as several of his academic papers detail, is triggered by gestational and/or early childhood vitamin D deficiency.

The book Athlete's Edge: FASTER, QUICKER, STRONGER with vitamin D" is an expansion for the lay audience of a peer-reviewed scientific paper Dr. Cannell published in Medicine & Science in Sports and Exercise, the flagship journal of the American College of Sports Medicine.