Vitamin D Deficiency and TB | CDC EID

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Volume 16, Number 5–May 2010
Dispatch
Vitamin D Deficiency and Tuberculosis Progression
Najeeha Talat, Sharon Perry, Julie Parsonnet, Ghaffar Dawood, and Rabia Hussain
Author affiliations: Aga Khan University, Karachi, Pakistan (N. Talat, R. Hussain); Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, California, USA (S. Perry, J. Parsonnet); and Masoomeen General Hospital, Karachi, Pakistan (G. Dawood)

Suggested citation for this article

Abstract
To assess the association between vitamin D deficiency and tuberculosis disease progression, we studied vitamin D levels in a cohort of tuberculosis patients and their contacts (N = 129) in Pakistan. Most (79%) persons showed deficiency. Low vitamin D levels were associated with a 5-fold increased risk for progression to tuberculosis.
Deficiency of vitamin D (25-hydroxycholecalciferol) has long been implicated in activation of tuberculosis (TB) (1). Serum levels of vitamin D in TB patients are lower than in healthy controls (2,3). Paradoxically, prolonged treatment of TB also causes a decline in serum vitamin D levels (2). Several studies have suggested that vitamin D is a potent immunomodulator of innate immune responses (4,5) by acting as a cofactor for induction of antimycobacterial activity (6). Of the 22 countries that have the highest TB incidence, Pakistan ranks eighth. In a previous study in Karachi, we observed that active disease developed in 7 (6.4%) of 109 TB case-contacts within 2 years (7). In the present study, we explored the role of vitamin D deficiency in TB disease progression within this cohort.

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Suggested Citation for this Article
Talat N, Perry S, Parsonnet J, Dawood G, Hussai R. Vitamin D deficiency and tuberculosis progression. Emerg Infect Dis [serial on the Internet]. 2010 May [date cited]. http://www.cdc.gov/EID/content/16/5/853.htm

DOI: 10.3201/eid1605.091693