Vitamin D Supplementation Doesn't Prevent Active Tuberculosis

Historically, one of the primary treatment approaches in tuberculosis (TB) sanitariums was heliotherapy — exposure to sunlight. More recent work found that the risks for latent TB and active TB increase with vitamin D deficiency. Moreover, 6 months of vitamin D supplementation appeared to decrease the incidence of tuberculin skin test conversion in Mongolian school-age children. Now, investigators have conducted a randomized, placebo-controlled trial of weekly oral Vitamin D (14,000 IU) to decrease incidence of latent and active tuberculosis and acute respiratory infection in 8851 children in Mongolia aged 6 to 13 years old with negative baseline QuantiFERON-TB Gold (QFT) results.

At 3 years, the mean serum vitamin D concentration was signif…