– A study in Indonesia found that out of the patients that died from COVID-19, 98.9% of them were deficient in vitamin D, while only 4% of the patients with sufficient vitamin D died.
-A study of patients in New Orleans found that 84.6% of the COVID-19 patients in the ICU were deficient in Vitamin D while only 4% of the patients in the ICU had sufficient levels of Vitamin D.
-A study in the Philippines found that for every standard deviation increase in vitamin D people were 7.94 times more likely to have a mild rather than severe COVID-19 outcome and 19.61 times more likely to have a mild rather than critical outcome.
I would be highly skeptical of this since it came from a facebook post and I have not been able to verify the content. If someone else can do the leg work to independently verify what had been said?
I was doing some further research, though, and it seems that the specific correlational studies called out (the LessWrong quoted ones) may actually be fraudulent:
Authors of the Indonesia study have no other history of papers, are claimed to now be deceased (… of COVID)
New Orleans study has n=20
Philippines study was authored by a single doctor in his 20s with a radiology background
This was a bit concerning to me; the first and third are very widely cited, e.g. by Joe Rogan on his podcast.
The further balance of evidence once again convinced me, such as this meta-analysis (which specifically does call out the first and third as possible frauds).
I think it’s best addressed by noting this in the future when it comes up—can’t be going back and editing weekly news posts. I’d be more worried if I didn’t still firmly believe the same conclusion anyway.
Another interesting piece of evidence is a study on homeless people in Boston (who would likely not be vitamin D deficient because more outdoor time):
“100% of 147 COVID-19 positive subjects were asymptomatic.”
Source, which doesn’t really make the connection: Baggett, T. P., Keyes, H., Sporn, N. & Gaeta, J. M. COVID-19 outbreak at a large homeless shelter in Boston: Implications for universal testing. medRxiv 2020.04.12.20059618 (2020) doi:10.1101/2020.04.12.20059618.
A more-studied effect on Vitamin D is that of skin color. This is especially seductive since it’s well-established e.g. Black Americans suffer Covid disproportionately, and also are deficient in Vitamin D disproportionately. But the effect seems to disappear after adjusting for confounders:
The skin color study confirms that vitamin D doesn’t protect against infection. But I don’t see it saying anything clear about how much harm a person suffers if they’re infected.
I would be highly skeptical of this since it came from a facebook post and I have not been able to verify the content. If someone else can do the leg work to independently verify what had been said?
I don’t have much time, so I’ve only checked the first study. The numbers come from this one: https://ultrasuninternational.com/wp-content/uploads/raharusun-et-al-2020_patterns_of_covid-19_mortality_and_vitamin_d_an_indonesian_study.pdf
I looked a bit more and found this: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/british-journal-of-nutrition/article/covid19-and-misinformation-how-an-infodemic-fueled-the-prominence-of-vitamin-d/8AC1297F0D6F4196938FB13A85A817A3
It seems to be misinformation.
I couldn’t find the second study, though I haven’t looked that hard tbh.
Third study: Vitamin D Supplementation Could Possibly Improve Clinical Outcomes of Patients Infected with Coronavirus-2019 (COVID-2019) from Mark Alipio
Just found the New Orleans study: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.04.24.20075838v1 , I believe. This was posted early on (April 28th) with a very small sample size (n=20), so I’m discounting this rather heavily now.
I was doing some further research, though, and it seems that the specific correlational studies called out (the LessWrong quoted ones) may actually be fraudulent:
Authors of the Indonesia study have no other history of papers, are claimed to now be deceased (… of COVID)
New Orleans study has n=20
Philippines study was authored by a single doctor in his 20s with a radiology background
This was a bit concerning to me; the first and third are very widely cited, e.g. by Joe Rogan on his podcast.
The further balance of evidence once again convinced me, such as this meta-analysis (which specifically does call out the first and third as possible frauds).
I think it’s best addressed by noting this in the future when it comes up—can’t be going back and editing weekly news posts. I’d be more worried if I didn’t still firmly believe the same conclusion anyway.
Another interesting piece of evidence is a study on homeless people in Boston (who would likely not be vitamin D deficient because more outdoor time):
“100% of 147 COVID-19 positive subjects were asymptomatic.”
Source, which doesn’t really make the connection:
Baggett, T. P., Keyes, H., Sporn, N. & Gaeta, J. M. COVID-19 outbreak at a large homeless shelter in
Boston: Implications for universal testing. medRxiv 2020.04.12.20059618 (2020)
doi:10.1101/2020.04.12.20059618.
That’s intriguing. Another news article on Covid/Homeless, I’d love to see more evidence: https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-08-21/why-has-covid-spared-l-a-homeless-people
A more-studied effect on Vitamin D is that of skin color. This is especially seductive since it’s well-established e.g. Black Americans suffer Covid disproportionately, and also are deficient in Vitamin D disproportionately. But the effect seems to disappear after adjusting for confounders:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1871402120301156?via%3Dihub#tbl3
The skin color study confirms that vitamin D doesn’t protect against infection. But I don’t see it saying anything clear about how much harm a person suffers if they’re infected.