Does Vitamin D Protect Against the Coronavirus?
Fact-checking circulating advice
Former CDC Director Tom Frieden, MD, published an opinion piece on Fox News this week that suggested taking vitamin D supplements could help boost the immune system, an essential piece of the puzzle in terms of how serious Covid-19 can be.
Vitamins are critical to keeping the body, especially the immune system, healthy. If you are vitamin deficient, it is a good idea to take a supplement; however, very few people in the United States actually are deficient. The one notable exception may be vitamin D.
By some estimates, nearly half of Americans are low in vitamin D, which humans synthesize from UV light. Now that most of us are sheltering in place, we’re probably getting even less vitamin D from sun exposure than before, so in theory taking a vitamin D supplement makes sense. In his article, Frieden cites a 2017 meta-analysis that reported people who took daily or weekly vitamin D reduced their risk of developing a respiratory tract infection. However, the benefit was only found in people who were vitamin D deficient; if people were not deficient, there was no effect. It’s also important to note that there has been no research on vitamin D and Covid-19, specifically.
