Always good to have a healthy debate so people can see both sides of an argument. The video I linked to is discussing why vitamin-D is so easily ignored.
I finally watched it. I'm not too keen of videos. Not a bad one this one (at times it seemed like the men didn't let the woman speak, despite she sounding more expert than them), but I'd still have to read the papers.
I didn't get whether they're only saying to test everyone and supplement those deficient or they're also saying that the accepted vitamin-D levels are wrong and should be updated.
At some moments it seems like they're saying like you can give some dose to absolutely everyone and not even do a blood test because the safe level is much higher than thought.
Well, if that's so, then yes, prescribing vitamin-D supplements to everyone would be great. But if you need to have a doctor making sure it's not contraindicated or people tested for
whether they need it or how much, we're not having enough antigen tests, let alone drawing blood and checking vitamin-D to everyone.
All results are showing that people with pre-existing conditions are impact way more then healthy people. But in the past 2 years the media isn't pushing the narrative that people should live more healthy, they are pushing a single solution: a vaccine.
That's because healthy lifestyles have more or less being promoted for some time and people aren't doing it any better (ok, some are, I think, but not many).
It's a very first class thing. Lots of people have social reasons they don't have healthy lives. Yet almost anybody could do better, yes, but then there are psicological factors.
You want people taking care of their vitamin-D levels ? what about they not starting to smoke ? Or leaving it ?
Having healthier lifestyles means changing everything in our societies. It's worth it and should be done, but it's not easy and it's not even what all politicians want at all.
Shooting vaccines to everybody is relatively easier (still a lot of work, coordination, ultrafrezzers and what not, but it's kind of the kind of things government can imagine themselves doing).
You hire people, pay for products, schedule visits and get it done. The government invest money and the people invest 10 minutes or 100 but can forget about it. You can even certify and
use it as a way to control people. Fire and forget. Good luck certifying people is taking their daily or weekly pills.
Mostly people aren't debating that the vaccine isn't effective against covid*. It's that all other things we can do are so easily ignored because this single solution is pushed as the only real possible solution to the covid problem.
Healthy lifestyles are much more advisable than vaccine or medication, and they would save not only pain and death but also money in health care. But it's not something the
authorities trust themselves to achieve. In theory they've been trying forever. They're cheap, they want to outsource (to pharma). They don't even care if it works, they care they
were told it would work. And maybe it's not even their job. I mean one should have a doctor available to treat them when one's sick. But maybe a healthy lifestyle is a more personal
responsability. It's like calling the fire brigade to clean the snow in your front yard, because it might cause an accident. Clean your house yourself and call the fire brigade if you
need them in an accident.
The people in the video are like, they've found out something big and relevant, with big potential, and nobody listens, so it's natural that they're frustrated and start thinking conspiracies
and incompetence, and would want to ask for responsabilities, but maybe if the same people were in government would be even more frustrated and even less effective. That's specially for the host,
the guests are more normal. And it looks like they're already doing the most useful they can, gathering evidence, organising it and sharing it.
I mean doctors are already supplementing people with vitamin-D deficit. But few people know they're deficient because they don't check themselves often.
In some countries authorities were already recommending vitamin-D supplements generally. I don't know whether people do it, though.
Maybe the problem is the doses or the recommended levels are wrong ?
The original research: "Is vitamin D an effective and safe treatment for COVID-19?". Link:
https://www.cochrane.org/CD015043/HAEMATOL_vitamin-d-effective-and-safe-treatment-covid-19
The title already gives away the result, as I assume anyone with some imagination could guess. What would the result be of this imaginary research: "Is the covid vaccine an effective and safe treatment for COVID-19?". (spoiler: no, the vaccine doesn't help when you are already sick with covid)
Reason why vitamins don't work during illness (which is a few days/weeks) is that it's to late already, just like you need vaccines before you get sick. It's like growing a healthy cell, you already have cells. These need to be replaced by 'healthier' ones, which takes time as cell replacement isn't instant (cells replace in different rates, usually within a few days to few months, some years).
Good, still it seems they tried. Both you, the people in the video you sent and the author of the newspiece I sent know more about this than me.
I was only refering to the sentence
Keine Empfehlung zur routinemäßigen Verwendung von Vitamin D zur Prophylaxe oder adjuvanten Therapie von Sars-CoV-2-Infektionen.
Therapy is not what the video is proposing, but Profilaxis is, isnt' it?
This is meant to be taken from
Nice, not cochrane. It says fix the deficits but don't take Vitamin-D specifically to prevent COVID-19.
They may be wrong, of course. I can't tell.
So does vitamin-D work? The video raises research results that show it does. If anyone has research that proves having low levels of vitamin-D is healthy or doesn't impact covid patients in any way, I like to see them.
I don't say that. I said if you have any vitamin low, fix it.
As the linked research already raises: having a low level of vitamin-D could just be pointing at being unhealthy in general, and not that the low levels of vitamin-D itself is the cause.
You would hope things like these would then be researched to prove right or wrong, that's what science is about. Not having the question be ignored as it could be a reason for people to not get vaccinated.
We are all in the same fight against covid, and as we appear to be losing the fight, you would hope that anything that works would be supported and not just a single (commercial) solution.
I'm a little lost if what we should be doing (or researching whether worth doing) is:
- taking the accepted doses and levels of vitamin-D in the body and putting more effort in ensuring that everyone has them right
- updating the accepted levels in the body or the dosage
- forgetting about levels and simply blindly giving everyone some dosage of vitamin-D to prevent COVID-19 because the risk/benefit is going to be much better than not doing it because there's this pandemic here.
- forgetting about governments, doctors and dosages and just putting more personal effort in healthier, outdoor lifestyles.
Another opportunity for research nobody seems to be talking about is UVB transparent clothes. I think they're used for islamic women who cover all their skin outdoors, but maybe could be adapted to winter clothes that
keep you warm but increase you vitamin-D production. According to the video it would only work in some places at some hours, but still.
I've only taken Vitamin-D when my doctor told me, after a blood test. Then he told me to stop after other blood tests. He never told me I should make a habit of taking it in any dose.
And I'm quite against selfprescribing myself stuff. So I'd love for researchers to research and or authorities to issue recommendations.