London(Reuters) - Making sure that babies and young children get enough vitamin D can reduce their risk of developing diabetes, scientists said on Friday.

Type 1 diabetes, which starts at an early age, has been associated with a deficiency of vitamin D, the so-called susnshinevitamin, which is also found in fortified milk and dairy products, cod liver oil and some fatty fish. When Dr. Elina Hypponene, of the Institue of Child Health in London, and her colleages in Finland compared the health of more that 12,000 children they found that the youngsters who had been given vitamin D supplements were 80 percent less likely to develop diabetes than children not given the vitamin.

"we found a very strong association for an overall intke of vitamin D, as well as for the dose of vitamin D (and reduced risk)," Hypponen said in a telephone interview.

"The risk of type 1 diabetes was also increased threefold if the child had been suspected of having had a vitamin D deficiency during the first year of life," she added.

All of the children in the survey were born in northern Finland in 1966. Researchers followed up their medical history until 1997 to see how many developed the disease.

"Our results suggest that development of type 1 diabetes is associated with low intake of vitamin D," Hypponen explained in a report in the Lancet medical journal.

She said the findings were not surprising beceause vitamin D acts as an immunosuppressive agent and diabetes is considered an autoimmune disease, caused by antibodies produced against substances naturally present in the body. HIGH DOSES CAN BE TOXIC.

"We suggest that... health officials ensure that all infants are receiving at leat the amount of vitamin D indicated in the current recommendations," Hypponen added.

The recommended daily dose of vitamin D for children is 400 international units (i.u.'s), or 10 micrograms, per day. But the researchers warned that high doses could be toxic and, in the most severe cases, deadly.

Type 1 diabetes can develop in children as early as a few weeks old of up to young adulthood. Sufferers produce little of no insulin because thier bodies destroy the insulin-secreting beta cells in the pancreas. About 10 percent of diabetics have type 1, which is treated with insulin injections Dr. Jill Norris, of the University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver, described the potential role of vitamin D in development of type 1 diabetes as intiguing and said it should be investigated further. "It is possible that several public-health initaitives may be coming together to reduce vitamin D exposure in children," she said in a commentary in the magazine.

She added thaat the ephasis on breast feeding, ckeeping babies out of the sun and use of sunscreens could be decreasing the intake and systhesis of vitamin D.

. Although medical research has shown that breastfeeding is best for babies, breast milk does not contain enough vitamin D to cover infant needs.