Vitamin D: The “Sunshine” Vitamin & Its Connection to COVID-19

I had some routine blood work done earlier this month, and even though I have been taking a Vitamin D supplement (link to supplement I take) for a couple months, I am still slightly deficient in this important micronutrient. Our bodies synthesize Vitamin D once the skin is exposed to UVB rays.  The precursor to the active form is dormant in the skin until UVB energy converts it to the active form, Cholecalciferol (Vitamin D3).

Why is Vitamin D important? Why should we be paying attention to our serum (blood) Vitamin D levels? My colleague Kayla Martin, a nutrition educator based in Montana, wrote a piece answering these exact questions.

The short, incredibly relevant answer to why you should care about Vitamin D and its effect on your body is that there is significant, accumulating research regarding Vitamin D status and its connection to COVID-19. Kayla discusses some of this emerging research below.

It is difficult to get enough sunlight exposure above the 37-degree latitude line (the imaginary line between Philadelphia and San Francisco) due to winter conditions, so it is important to focus on proper supplementation (after blood work to determine if you are deficient or not) and incorporating foods that contain Vitamin D into your daily intake.

Keep reading for Kayla’s perspective on this topic:

Vitamin D and COVID-19

Vitamin D is often referred to as the “sunshine” vitamin. And for good reason! Our bodies can synthesize vitamin D from the sun when it hits our skin, which is pretty miraculous if you think about it. Vitamin D can also be consumed in small amounts by eating fatty fish like salmon, sardines, herring, and mackerel. Small amounts can be found in egg yolks, liver, and some fortified products (O’Mahony et al, 2011). However, nearly 40% of Americans are deficient, indicating that as a society, we are not meeting our vitamin D needs (Nair & Maseeh, 2012). 

Now you may be wondering, why should I care about vitamin D? I’m here to tell you that you absolutely should! Vitamin D impacts the bones, intestines, immune system, cardiovascular system, pancreas, muscles, brain, and cell functioning, just to name a few (Nair & Maseeh, 2012). Without enough vitamin D, osteoporosis becomes a major concern. Studies show that people who are vitamin D deficient are at a greater risk of developing type 1 and type 2 diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and several types of cancer (Parva et al, 2018).  

Vitamin D has come into the spotlight lately because of its connection to the COVID19 virus. Vitamin D has been discovered as a factor that could affect the severity of the virus. In fact, researchers have found that a vitamin D deficiency is much more common in those who develop severe COVID19 cases requiring ICU care (Jain et al, 2020). Furthermore, people with low vitamin D status also have much higher inflammation markers and risk of morbidity and mortality (Jain et al, 2020). 

Although vitamin D will not prevent you from contracting COVID19, nor will any food for that matter, it can help alleviate some of the burden it places on your body and speed up recovery. In an effort to keep this article from being entirely doom and gloom, let’s talk about some of the steps we can take to improve our vitamin D status! 

First off, it’s important to know what inhibits vitamin D. We now know that vitamin D comes primarily from the sun, so factors like pollution, time of year, time of day, and location can all alter our exposure to the sun. Unfortunately this means that those of us living in the Rocky Mountains in January are at a bit of a disadvantage. Other factors affecting vitamin D are skin color, sunscreen use, and age. Although these factors can contribute to a lower vitamin D status, there are ways to work around them. For instance, increasing your consumption of foods high in vitamin D like fatty fish and egg yolks is a great place to start. Another step you could take is to safely expose your skin to the sun at peak hours of the day, typically around noon. 

These first two steps can help jumpstart your vitamin D journey, but for many of us, supplementation may be necessary. Choosing the right supplement can be a really overwhelming task, especially when you’re standing in a grocery store aisle, peering over your mask at 42 different types of vitamin D. 

So what are you looking for? The recommended intake of vitamin D is between 400-800 IU/day for anyone over the age of 1, but many people tolerate and feel better on doses of 1000-400 IU (NIH, 2020). It’s important to talk to your doctor and run labs before beginning any supplementation regimen because they can have side effects. Once you’ve determined your vitamin D status, two well known and trusted brands of supplements are NOW Foods and Pure Encapsulations. Supplements are not regulated by the FDA, so relying on trusted brands in essential. Look for vitamin D3, without nano-particle nutrients, hidden steroids, or unlabeled allergens. It’s very important to continue to test your vitamin D status and adjust your supplementation as necessary. 

Takeaway: 

Vitamin D is an essential nutrient our bodies need for a variety of functions, including our immune systems. Low vitamin D status has been linked to a greater severity of COVID19 and thus finding the right supplement can be essential for our overall health and wellbeing during this time.  

Sources:

1. Jain, A., Chaurasia, R., Sengar, N.S. et al. Analysis of vitamin D level among asymptomatic and critically ill COVID-19 patients and its correlation with inflammatory markers. Sci Rep 10, 20191 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-77093-z

2. O'Mahony, L., Stepien, M., Gibney, M. J., Nugent, A. P., & Brennan, L. (2011). The potential role of vitamin D enhanced foods in improving vitamin D status. Nutrients, 3(12), 1023–1041. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu3121023

3. Parva, N. R., Tadepalli, S., Singh, P., Qian, A., Joshi, R., Kandala, H., Nookala, V. K., & Cheriyath, P. (2018). Prevalence of Vitamin D Deficiency and Associated Risk Factors in the US Population (2011-2012). Cureus, 10(6), e2741. https://doi.org/10.7759/cureus.2741

4. Nair, R., & Maseeh, A. (2012). Vitamin D: The "sunshine" vitamin. Journal of pharmacology & pharmacotherapeutics, 3(2), 118–126. https://doi.org/10.4103/0976-500X.95506

5. National Institutes of Health. (2020). Vitamin D. Retrieved from https://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/VitaminD-HealthProfessional/ 

I am including some examples of foods I eat when I’m taking Vitamin D. You’ll probably notice they are pictures of mostly breakfast foods. Breakfast is my favorite meal of the day.