@article{Li_X-2021_45109,
title = {An observational and Mendelian randomisation study on vitamin D and COVID-19 risk in UK Biobank},
author = {Li, X. and van Geffen, J. and van Weele, M. and Zhang, X. and He, Y. and Meng, X. and Timofeeva, M. and Campbell, H. and Dunlop, M. and Zgaga, L. and Theodoratou, E.},
month = {sep},
year = {2021},
abstract = {A growing body of evidence suggests that vitamin D deficiency has been associated with an increased susceptibility to viral and bacterial respiratory infections. In this study, we aimed to examine the association between vitamin D and COVID-19 risk and outcomes. We used logistic regression to identify associations between vitamin D variables and COVID-19 (risk of infection, hospitalisation and death) in 417,342 participants from UK Biobank. We subsequently performed a Mendelian Randomisation (MR) study to look for evidence of a causal effect. In total, 1746 COVID-19 cases (399 deaths) were registered between March and June 2020. We found no significant associations between COVID-19 infection risk and measured 25-OHD levels after adjusted for covariates, but this finding is limited by the fact that the vitamin D levels were measured on average 11 years before the pandemic. Ambient UVB was strongly and inversely associated with COVID-19 hospitalization and death overall and consistently after stratification by BMI and ethnicity. We also observed an interaction that suggested greater protective effect of genetically-predicted vitamin D levels when ambient UVB radiation is stronger. The main MR analysis did not show that genetically-predicted vitamin D levels are causally associated with COVID-19 risk (OR = 0.77, 95% CI 0.55-1.11, P = 0.160), but MR sensitivity analyses indicated a potential causal effect (weighted mode MR: OR = 0.72, 95% CI 0.55-0.95, P = 0.021; weighted median MR: OR = 0.61, 95% CI 0.42-0.92, P = 0.016). Analysis of MR-PRESSO did not find outliers for any instrumental variables and suggested a potential causal effect (OR = 0.80, 95% CI 0.66-0.98, p-val = 0.030). In conclusion, the effect of vitamin D levels on the risk or severity of COVID-19 remains controversial, further studies are needed to validate vitamin D supplementation as a means of protecting against worsened COVID-19.},
journal = {Li , X , van Geffen , J , van Weele , M , Zhang , X , He , Y , Meng , X , Timofeeva , M , Campbell , H , Dunlop , M , Zgaga , L & Theodoratou , E 2021 , ' An observational and Mendelian randomisation study on vitamin D and COVID-19 risk in UK Biobank ' , Scientific Reports , vol. 11 , no. 1 , pp. 18262 . https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-021-97679-5},
publisher = {},
url = {https://publichealthscotland.scot/id/45109},
}
