Greetings!
A very exciting on vitamin C and COVID. It looked at COVID patients who were admitted to the ICU, and found that almost 95% of them had undetectable levels of vitamin C. Whether these people had low levels that predisposed them to getting a more serious case or whether fighting COVID depletes vitamin C, it's a good argument for taking vitamin C during this time. Coupled with the previous study on vitamin D, Magnesium and B12, I am continuing to be comfortable with what we are suggesting.
Plasma vitamin C levels in a population of adult ICU patients COVID-19 who met ARDS criteria according to the Berlin definition [2] were prospectively measured...None of the patients included presented shock or sepsis on admission. Equally, no bacterial co-infection during their ICU course was documented. All patients survived...Vitamin C reference values in general population used to be above 5 mg/L. Seventeen patients (94.4%) had undetectable vitamin C levels and 1 patient had low levels (2.4 mg/L)...
Our study revealed that vitamin C levels are undetectable in more than 90% of the patients included. The mechanisms of this significant reduction in vitamin C are uncertain. We hypothesized that several mechanisms, such as increased metabolic consumption due to the enhanced inflammatory response, glomerular hyperfiltration, dialysis, decreased gastrointestinal absorption, or decreased recycling of dehydroascorbate to ascorbic acid, may be involved.
Moreover, vitamin C may have implications for treatment of COVID-19-associated ARDS [3]. Indeed, one preclinical study showed that vitamin C increased resistance to infection caused by coronavirus [4]. Moreover, other clinical studies that included surgical patients and patients with pneumonia showed encouraging results in terms of decreased incidence and severity of lung injury and mortality [5]...
In conclusion, in our cohort of patients with COVID-19-associated ARDS, the levels of vitamin C are extremely low. Despite the limited generalization of these results, we think these findings might stimulate clinicians to measure vitamin C levels in COVID-19 patients to describe the real impact of this alteration.
