Did Wearing Mask and Lockdowns Affect Vitamin D Levels During the Coronavirus Disease-2019 Pandemic?

Objective: To investigate the effects of wearing mask and lockdowns during the coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on the vitamin D levels in females. Materials and Methods: This retrospective study included female adults aged 18-64 years who underwent vitamin D evaluation at our hospital in April and May from 2017 to 2020. Vitamin D levels were categorized as follows: <10 ng/mL (severe deficiency); 10 to <20 ng/mL (deficiency); 20 to 30 ng/mL (insufficiency) and >30 ng/mL (normal). Results: A total of 835 (90.8%) out of 920 females had vitamin D deficiency, and among them 463 (50.3%) had vitamin D severe deficiency. In April and May of 2020 (during the national lockdown period), 74 (89.2%) out of 83 subjects had vitamin D deficiency. Vitamin D levels were found to be higher in 2017 than the other years (p<0.001). There was no significant difference between the lockdown year (2020) and the 2018 and 2019 years regarding vitamin D levels (p>0.05). Conclusion: Our findings indicate that there is a serious and urgent public health problem regarding with vitamin D deficiency (>90%) in our population; and about 50% of them had severe deficiency. This problem was not different during the lockdown period compared with the previous two years.