The Recommended Daily Allowance (RDA) for vitamin D should be more than 10 times greater than the current value of 600 IU/day, a team of vitamin D researchers wrote in a letter published in the journal Nutrient last year.

“The error has broad implications for public health regarding disease prevention and achieving the stated goal of ensuring that the whole population has enough vitamin D to maintain bone health,” says Dr. Cedric Garland, an adjunct professor at University of California, San Diego in a press release.

According to Garland and his colleagues Robert Heaney, Carole Baggerly, Christine French and Edward Gorham, approximately 7000 IU/day will safely achieve and maintain a vitamin D serum level of 20 ng/ml, the low end of the IOM’s designation of adequacy. They also note that the higher optimum levels recommended by groups like The Endocrine Society and GrassrootsHealth would likely require even higher daily intake to achieve.

In the letter, the researchers specifically address the groups responsible for the RDI, the Institute of Medicine and National Academy of Sciences.

“We call for the NAS-IOM and all public health authorities concerned with transmitting accurate nutritional information to the public to designate, as the RDA, a value of approximately 7,000 IU/day from all sources,” wrote Dr. Garland and his colleagues.