Ann Brown greeted with delight yesterday's revelation that vitamin D supplements could prevent multiple sclerosis in future generations. “It's brilliant news - and the best thing of all is that it's so simple and straightforward. Taking vitamins can do no harm, unlike some nasty drug with side-effects,” she said.

The advance in the fight against MS may have come too late for Mrs Brown, 51, who has had the disease for ten years, but she said she would encourage her grown-up daughters to take supplements of the “sunshine vitamin”. Her own aunt suffered from MS and she acknowledged the possiblities of genetic links.

Between 10,000 and 15,000 people in Scotland are believed to suffer from MS, with high prevalence in Tayside, Orkney and Shetland. Mrs Brown, from Falkirk, first had an attack when she was 41 and working as the manager of a health food shop.

“At work I noticed I was tripping over things that weren't there. I started to get double vision. Then I woke up one morning and I was bouncing off the walls and my speech was slurred,” she said.

Tests were inconclusive and it was not until five years later, after a second similar attack, that her condition was finally diagnosed.

She suffers from the relapsing-remitting form of the illness, and said each attack has left its mark on her. “I'm still what I regard as the walking wounded. I use elbow crutches,” she said. “I have a friend, Linda, who has been in a wheelchair for 18 years with MS, and she called me Staggering Bob. I don't mind the staggering but I'm not so sure about the Bob!”

Mrs Brown and her friend now help others manage their illness on behalf of the MS Society. “I don't let it get me down. It affects your life, of course it does. You have to consider it when you are arranging things, just like you would have to if you had a dog or you had children. But it hasn't stopped me.”

She and her husband, who has taken early retirement, enjoy getting out and walking their dog. Mrs Brown uses a motorised scooter.

There was a time, after diagnosis, when she was not so positive. “I spent a lot of time fretting about a cure. I went to the extent of asking for second opinions.” She added: “What is so good about this news is the fact that taking vitamin D is not going to do you any harm. I would like to see the Scottish government as soon as possible recommend that everyone, and especially pregnant women, should take a daily supplement.”

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