dtoce wrote:
Do African American people really have more Vit D deficiency or does it simply identify a subset of people more likely to live with lower levels of it? Just because you have low levels of Vit D, are you at higher covid risk-or is it the genetic predisposition, or some other co-morbidity like DM/HTN/obesity? Hmmmm. Inquiring minds want to know...so studies should be done to determine the answer. But, it's cheap/effective as a supplement and MAY have a benefit, so keep on taking it Dan...but more importantly, make sure your DW (dear wife) is taking it.
i think it's tempting to assume that vitamin D deficiency is a byproduct of some other bad habit. but if that was so, there's an awful lot of fat white people. is vitamin D deficiency a known thing among them? my wife swims, bikes, runs, looks pretty darned terrific for 61, has always been athletic, never overweight, and has had a vitamin D deficiency her whole life. it's a kind of known thing. in fact, go to google, type in "black people vitamin..." and see how far you get before it's autofilled with "D".
here's an abstract from the first thing that pops up in pubmed: "Vitamin D insufficiency is more prevalent among African Americans (blacks) than other Americans and, in North America, most young, healthy blacks do not achieve optimal 25-hydroxyvitamin D [25(OH)D] concentrations at any time of year. This is primarily due to the fact that pigmentation reduces vitamin D production in the skin."
as to causation. what my wife did NOT say is that she thinks this is the reason why black people suffer from COVID at rates so much higher. she just bypassed the other big thing (lacks the gene for lactase persistence), and went right to, "we're all low in D." neither she nor i have any idea whether a lack of D makes one suffer more with COVID. but we're not taking any chances! we're popping Ds!
Dan Empfield
aka Slowman