b12 and covid

[Lurcher-lady]

I found this a little worrying. Has anyone else heard of a relation between high B12 levels and covid morbidity?

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

[Technoid]

I think the difficulty here, as with other previous studies on high B12 and poor health outcomes is correlation vs causation. High B12 in the absence of supplementation IS an indicator of possible serious underlying health problems, covered by this paper: academic.oup.com/qjmed/arti.... I suspect this is something many doctors miss, thinking the person has a great B12 level when actually it may reflect a deeper problem.

Those with high B12 and poorer outcomes in this study may have had those poorer outcomes because they had serious underlying health conditions that were causing the high B12, but that doesn't mean their high levels of B12 were a causative or contributory factor to their poorer health outcomes versus COVID-19.

On the flipside, this research found that health outcomes versus COVID-19 improve with B12/Magnesium/D supplementation: pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/330...

[jade_s]

Oh FFS i mean for goodness sake. These are probably all people in the category of 'high b12 levels due to underlying disease' as Technoid posts. If you look at the b12 ranges (ng/mL):

No icu/death: 583 ± 295

With icu/death: 1315 ± 1087

First, i've yet to see anyone get such high b12 levels from food. I would bet they are in the above category. They don't give us any additional health history.

Second, that b12 range in icu/death is crazy large. It covers people between 231 and 2399... (and third) for only 9, i repeat, NINE people. I bet their statistics were all over the place and they had to squint really hard to find any statistical significance. Those p values are technically stastically significant, sure, but p=0.02 already tells us that the overlap between the two groups is high.

This is a 'letter to the editor' so i wonder how much peer review it went through. Their claims are extremely tenuous. If i was an editor I would never have accepted such a paper. I could probably dig into the paper further but it's not even worth it.

I would not worry if i were you!!

I'm just waiting to be vindicated that long covid is related to low b12 ... or perhaps, including the findings of this paper, abnormal b12 metabolism.

Edit: sorry Lurcher-lady, i was not cursing at you! Thank you for posting! Always good to know what research is out there.

[EiCa in reply to jade_s]

Agreed!!!

[Marymary7]

I agree with the other comments. Get your vitamin D levels up seems to be the best advice. See Doctor Campbell for very sensible advice on YouTube. Good luck 😎

[Narwhal10]

Hi Lurcher-lady,

I feel this is not cause for concern. I believe they have tried to link COVID-19 (a potentially fatal illness) with vitamin B12 levels.

They is absolutely no mention of chemokines, interferons, interleukins or lymphokines. All specialised cells that are involved and respond to the human body being under attack from a bacteria, virus or illness I.e. In cases of COVID-19 where the cytokine storm can occur.

Best wishes

[pitney]

Thank you for that interesting read

[Technoid]

Another relevant paper which I stole from a Sleepbunny post a few months back:

bmcmedicine.biomedcentral.c...

Part of conclusion:

"High intake of vitamin B12 in the form of supplements was not associated with increased all-cause mortality, supporting its safe use. Vitamin B12 deficiency is prevalent, particularly among the elderly, and is associated with serious morbidity. The diagnosis of such deficiency is often elusive so that the use of B12 supplements has become widespread, because of its low cost and presumed safety. Recent reports based on associations have raised the specter that high B12 levels may be harmful and have discouraged B12 supplement use with potentially harmful consequences. The overall public health impact of our findings is to provide reassurance that high B12 levels per se are not a cause of higher mortality risk."

[Technoid in reply to Technoid]

The severity of my condition is due to incredibly poor medical advice to reduce my B12 supplementation, so I feel strongly about this one 😁

[jade_s in reply to Technoid]

Took a quick look... looks like a good paper... then I noticed, first author is Wolffenbuttel, same as in the famous "Many Faces of B12 deficiency" paper! This group know what's up! I must now go find what other papers they've produced! I see they have an interesting paper on thyroid linking "low normal thyroid" levels to worsening outcomes. I hadn't realized he was an endocrinologist. Lots of other interesting papers from them.

[jade_s in reply to jade_s]

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/?cm...

[jade_s in reply to jade_s]

Here's their latest paper. I've only read the abstract so far but looks fascinating!

casereports.bmj.com/content...

In clinical practice, the finding of an elevated serum B12 concentration is often the consequence of supplementation with B12 in either oral form or injections. Also, elevated serum B12 may be associated with underlying disorders, like liver diseases or a (haematologic) malignancy. Only a few studies have shown that it may also be the consequence of complex formation of B12-vitamin binding proteins with immunoglobulins, the so-called macro-B12. We describe a young woman who previously was diagnosed with B12 deficiency, and in whom, after cessation of B12 injection treatment, neurologic symptoms re-appeared, and despite this, repeatedly elevated serum B12 concentrations above the upper limit of the assay were found. We demonstrated that this was caused by the presence of macro-B12, which not only resulted in erroneous and longstanding elevated serum B12, but also masked her underlying B12 deficiency.

[Narwhal10 in reply to jade_s]

Hi jade_s,

Thank you. I know you have a penchant for reading research and obviously, some authors are contactable via their email addresses.

In a previous post, Sleepybunny posted regarding Open Access research. Another wonderful way, I recently found out but it really does depend on mobility, how unwell or fatigued a person is, is contacting your local university library.

I am very fortunate I live in a reasonably sized city and the university said you are more than welcome to come along have access to all our books, journals or as you are a city library member, you can join for a small fee.

I appreciate that this isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, may live in a small village or are really suffering with this hideous illness and other conditions.

🤓

[jade_s in reply to Narwhal10]

Oh how wonderful! I hadn't realized universities were amenable to that, but yes many universities subscribe to most of the journals and are a great way to access the research. I am lucky I am still affiliated with a university, so I am able to download most papers, but most people can't. A shame really. All the new european funded projects now required OpenAccess, so that is a really good thing!

[newlandvale]

i have ME. When I tested positive for Covid I immediately upped my B12 injections to avoid Long Covid (medical name for ME). Lived to tell the tale! B12 is my answer to everything according to my non-PA friends!

[tomdickharry]

I can't remember the sources now, but there are several papers that report on B12 being antiviral in general and COVID in particular.

[Technoid in reply to tomdickharry]

An interesting review is available on that topic:

"The role of vitamin B12 in viral infections: a comprehensive review of its relationship with the muscle–gut–brain axis and implications for SARS-CoV-2 infection."

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

[tomdickharry in reply to Technoid]

That's one of the papers I was thinking of. Many thanks.