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Observations on vitamin D supplementation and COVID-19 risk, a Mendelian randomized study.

Wednesday, September 15, 2021

COVID-19

An Observational and Mendelian Randomized Study of Vitamin D and COVID-19 Risk in a UK Biobank

Li, X., van Geffen, J., van Weele, M., et al. An observational and Mendelian randomization study of vitamin D and COVID-19 risk in a UK biobank. SCI Rep 11, 18262 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-97679-5

Commentary

This study provides further evidence that vitamin D deficiency is associated with increased susceptibility to viral and bacterial respiratory infections.

The study was designed to investigate the association between vitamin D and COVID-19 risk and outcomes.

Using logistic regression, 417,342 participants from the UK Biobank were included to identify associations between vitamin D variables and COVID-19 (risk of infection, hospitalization, and death).

A Mendelian randomized (MR) study was then conducted to look for evidence of a causal effect.

A total of 1746 COVID-19 cases (399 deaths) were enrolled between March and June 2020, and after adjusting for covariates, no significant association was found between the risk of COVID-19 infection and measured 25-OHD levels.

However, this finding is limited by the fact that vitamin D levels were measured an average of 11 years before the pandemic.

And ambient UVB was overall and consistently strongly inversely associated with hospitalization and death in COVID-19 after stratification by BMI and ethnicity.

We also observed an interaction suggesting that stronger ambient UVB radiation is more protective of genetically predicted vitamin D levels.

Furthermore, MR analysis did not show that genetically predicted vitamin D levels were causally related to COVID-19 risk, but MR sensitivity analysis showed a potential causal relationship. In addition, MR-PRESSO analysis did not detect any outliers in the operating variables, suggesting a potential causal effect.

The researchers concluded that the effect of vitamin D levels on the risk or severity of COVID-19 is controversial, and further validation is needed regarding vitamin D supplementation as a means of protection against worsening COVID-19.

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