Published in JAMA Network Open, the study includes an analysis of data for 489 University of Chicago Medicine patients whose vitamin D levels were measured in the year before being tested for COVID-19. Of the 489 patients studied, 124 had vitamin D deficiency (less than 20ng/ml). Overall, 71 participants (15 percent) tested positive for COVID-19.
Patients who had an untreated vitamin D deficiency were almost twice as likely to test positive for the COVID-19 as compared to patients who had sufficient Vitamin D levels.
“Understanding whether treating Vitamin D deficiency changes COVID-19 risk could be of great importance locally, nationally and globally,” said David Meltzer, MD, PhD, chief of hospital medicine at UChicago Medicine and lead author of the study. “Vitamin D is inexpensive, generally very safe to take, and can be widely scaled.”
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