A clinical trial was conducted in Brazil with 240 patients who were given 200,000 IU of vitamin D3 on admission to hospital. The supplementation did not reduce length of stay or affect the proportion requiring intensive, according to the study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA).
In vitro studies or trials with animals had previously shown that in certain situations vitamin D and its metabolites can have anti-inflammatory and anti-microbial effects, as well as modulating the immune response.
"We decided to investigate whether a high dose of the substance could have a protective effect in the context of an acute viral infection, reducing either the inflammation or the viral load," said Rosa Pereira, principal investigator for the project at the University of Sao Paulo's Medical School…