CHILD OBESITY EPIDEMIC DURING THE CORONA VIRUS PANDEMIC – WHAT DOES IT HAVE TO DO WITH VITAMIN D?
Keywords:
obesity, COVID19, vitamin D, children, pandemicAbstract
This review paper summarizes current knowledge and understanding of the associations between corona virus epidemics and obesity with the role of vitamin D. As the whole world is in the midst of the coronavirus epidemics, other conditions/diseases are currently not in focus. It has been observed that the tendency towards obesity is increasing, and is perhaps significantly higher than expected, where one can define it as an epidemics as well. Vitamin D has been shown to play multiple roles in both epidemics. The most significant connection could be seen in the role of vitamin D as an immunomodulator, and suppressor of the oxidative stress and cytokine production. These correlations, and many others, have been discussed in this paper, since all of them could be related to both obesity and covid-19 infection. There is well known correlation between obesity and vitamin D deficiency, since in certain cases the treatment of obesity includes the supplementation with this vitamin. Through this treatment regiment one might also increase the prognosis of covid infection, since both vitamin D deficiency and obesity are known to be associated with poor covid infection prognosis.
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