There’s another reason to drink your milk. According to a new study, individuals with insufficient levels of vitamin D have an increased risk of stroke, heart disease and even death.

Researchers at the Intermountain Medical Center in Utah followed 27.686 individuals over the age of 50 with no prior cardiovascular disease for more than a year. Participants had levels of vitamin D in their blood tested and were followed to see if they developed some sort of heart disease.

They found that patients with very low levels of vitamin D were 77 percent more likely to die, 45 percent more likely to develop coronary artery disease, and 78 percent more likely to have a stroke than patients with normal levels of the vitamin.

In addition, individuals with very low levels of vitamin D were also twice as likely to develop heart failure than those with normal vitamin D levels.

"We concluded that among patients 50 years of age or older, even a moderate deficiency of vitamin D levels was associated with developing coronary artery disease, heart failure, stroke, and death," said study author Dr Heidi May. "This is important because vitamin D deficiency is easily treated. If increasing levels of vitamin D can decrease some risk associated with these cardiovascular diseases, it could have a significant public health impact. When you consider that cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in America, you understand how this research can help improve the length and quality of people’s lives," she added.

Vitamin D can be found in food sources like milk, tuna, eggs and fortified breakfast cereals as well as in nutritional supplement form.