TY - JOUR
T1 - Seasonal UV exposure and vitamin D
T2 - association with the dynamics of COVID-19 transmission in Europe
AU - Mukherjee, Sunanda Biswas
AU - Gorohovski, Alessandro
AU - Merzon, Eugene
AU - Levy, Eliad
AU - Mukherjee, Sumit
AU - Frenkel-Morgenstern, Milana
N1 - Funding Information:
EL has volunteered in the Frenkel-Morgenstern laboratory since March 2019 on COVID-19-related projects. The authors thank members of the Cancer Genomics and Biocomputing of Complex Diseases Lab for their participation in multiple discussions at different stages of this project. MF-M was supported by the Israel Innovation Authority (Kamin Grant #66824, 2019-2021) and a COVID-19 Data Science Institute (DSI) Grant, Bar-Ilan University (#247017, 2020). SM was supported by the Israeli Council for Higher Education through the PBC fellowship program for outstanding postdoctoral researchers from China and India (2019–2021).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 The Authors. FEBS Open Bio published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Federation of European Biochemical Societies
PY - 2022/1/1
Y1 - 2022/1/1
N2 - Several recent studies have demonstrated that low plasma 25(OH) vitamin D levels are associated with the risk of COVID-19 infection. The primary source of vitamin D production in humans is environmental UV radiation. In many viral respiratory diseases, peak infection rates are observed during winter due to reduced UV exposure and low temperatures. In Europe, the second wave of COVID-19 began early in the winter of 2020. Investigating the impact of seasonal temperature and UV exposure on COVID-19 transmission could thus aid in prevention and intervention. As such, we first performed a comprehensive meta-analysis of all related published literature based on the association between vitamin D and COVID-19, which supported the hypothesis that the low vitamin D level is a critical risk factor for COVID-19 infection. Next, to understand the potential impact of seasonal UV and temperature levels on COVID-19 cases, we analyzed meteorological data and daily COVID-19 cases per million in the populations of 26 European countries. We observed that low temperature, UV index, and cloud-free vitamin D UV dose (UVDVF) levels are negatively correlated with COVID-19 prevalence in Europe. Furthermore, a distributed lag nonlinear model was used to assess the nonlinear delayed effects of individual seasonal factors on COVID-19 cases. Such analysis highlighted the significantly delayed impact of UVDVF on the cumulative relative risk of COVID-19 infection. The findings of this study suggest that low UV exposure can affect the required production of vitamin D in the body, which substantially influences the dynamics of COVID-19 transmission and severity.
AB - Several recent studies have demonstrated that low plasma 25(OH) vitamin D levels are associated with the risk of COVID-19 infection. The primary source of vitamin D production in humans is environmental UV radiation. In many viral respiratory diseases, peak infection rates are observed during winter due to reduced UV exposure and low temperatures. In Europe, the second wave of COVID-19 began early in the winter of 2020. Investigating the impact of seasonal temperature and UV exposure on COVID-19 transmission could thus aid in prevention and intervention. As such, we first performed a comprehensive meta-analysis of all related published literature based on the association between vitamin D and COVID-19, which supported the hypothesis that the low vitamin D level is a critical risk factor for COVID-19 infection. Next, to understand the potential impact of seasonal UV and temperature levels on COVID-19 cases, we analyzed meteorological data and daily COVID-19 cases per million in the populations of 26 European countries. We observed that low temperature, UV index, and cloud-free vitamin D UV dose (UVDVF) levels are negatively correlated with COVID-19 prevalence in Europe. Furthermore, a distributed lag nonlinear model was used to assess the nonlinear delayed effects of individual seasonal factors on COVID-19 cases. Such analysis highlighted the significantly delayed impact of UVDVF on the cumulative relative risk of COVID-19 infection. The findings of this study suggest that low UV exposure can affect the required production of vitamin D in the body, which substantially influences the dynamics of COVID-19 transmission and severity.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85118500020&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1002/2211-5463.13309
DO - 10.1002/2211-5463.13309
M3 - Article
C2 - 34608759
AN - SCOPUS:85118500020
VL - 12
SP - 106
EP - 117
JO - FEBS Open Bio
JF - FEBS Open Bio
SN - 2211-5463
IS - 1
ER -