Asthma sufferers could halve risk of serious attacks by taking vitamin D

♦ Asthma sufferers could halve their risk of suffering a severe attack which requires hospital treatment by taking vitamin D pills, a study suggests.

Researchers at Queen Mary University of London (QMUL) found that the number of asthma sufferers visiting A&E because of an attack dropped from six per cent to three per cent in people taking vitamin pills. There was also a 30 per cent reduction in the number of people requiring treatment or steroids for attacks.

The report’s authors say supplements are a cheap and effective way of cutting down on potentially deadly asthma attacks.

Prof Adrian Martineau. the lead researcher, said: “These results add to the ever growing body of evidence that vitamin D can support immune function as well as bone health. Vitamin D is safe to take and relatively inexpensive so supplementation represents a potentially cost-effective strategy to reduce this problem.”

Around 5.4million people in Britain need treatment for asthma. Asthma deaths arise primarily as symptoms worsen, often due to viral respiratory infections. Vitamin D is thought to protect against such attacks.

The new study involved 955 participants who were followed over a year and their vitamin D intake compared to the attacks they suffered.

Dr David Jolliffe, from QMUL, first author on the paper, added: “Further trials are ongoing internationally, and we hope to include data from them in a future analysis to determine whether the promise of today’s results is confirmed in an even larger and more diverse group of patients.”

The research was published in The Lancet Respiratory Medicine.