New research further corroborates the vital role played by Vitamin D in reducing the severity of coronavirus.
The study, published in the journal PLOS ONE , stated that Covid-19 hospitalised patients who had sufficient Vitamin D level, with a blood level of 25-hydroxyvitamin D of at least 30 ng/mL (a measure of vitamin D status), had a significant risk for adverse clinical outcomes and death.
The study further mentioned that these patients also had lower blood levels of an inflammatory marker (C-reactive protein) and higher blood levels of lymphocytes (a type of immune cell to help fight infection).
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Study author Michael F Holick, from Boston University in the US, said in an official statement: “This study provides direct evidence that vitamin D sufficiency can reduce the complications, including the cytokine storm (release of too many proteins into the blood too quickly) and ultimately death from Covid-19.”
For the study, researchers took a blood sample from 235 patients to measure the vitamin D levels (measured serum level of 25-hydroxyvitamin D).
The researchers then followed these patients to examine the clinical outcomes, including clinical severity of the infection, becoming unconscious, having difficulty in breathing resulting in hypoxia (low oxygen level) and death.
They also tested the blood for an inflammatory marker (C-reactive protein) and for numbers of lymphocytes.
The researchers then made two cohorts: patients with sufficient vitamin D and patients with vitamin D deficiency.
Researchers observed that patients who were older than 40 years and had a sufficient level of the vitamin were 51.5 per cent less likely to die from the infection compared to patients who were vitamin D deficient.
Holic also stated that vitamin D sufficiency helps to fight not only coronavirus but also other viruses causing upper respiratory tract illnesses, including influenza.
“There is great concern that the combination of influenza infection and a coronal viral infection could substantially increase hospitalisations and death due to complications from these viral infections,” Holick noted.