The rules for the prescription of the doctor have changed vitamin D and its analogues (cholecalciferol, calcifediol): the Italian Medicines Agency (Aifa) has updated Note 96 on the new criteria based on the scientific evidence of the latest studies. In order for it to be prescribed, the minimum level in the blood will no longer have to be 20 nanograms per milliliter but 12 nanograms.
The new role of vitamin D
In a statement, Aifa explains that the criteria have changed “following the publication of new scientific evidence which further clarified the role of vitamin D in the absence of concomitant conditions of risk“. Specifically, it is about the American study Vital (published in the magazine Nejm in 2022) and the European one Do-Health (Published on Jama already in 2020). Both studies show that vitamin D does not prevent or in any way improve the risk of fractures bone loss in the healthy population if you don’t have risk factors such as osteoporosis. “These results were also confirmed among subjects with the lowest levels of vitamin 25(OH)D”, added Aifa: it is a particular form of vitamin D produced by the liver and it is a value that is used to evaluate the reserves that are in the blood.
The topic related to Covid
The same studies, among other things, underline what we had already learned in the pandemic: taking vitamin D does not prevent and does not reduce the risk of contracting Covid-19. “At the moment there is no evidence to consider vitamin D an important aid in the fight against the coronavirus“, reads the Note. The new studies, then, have introduced a new risk category which includes people who have “severe motor deficits or bedridden living at home” and a new paragraph on the potential risks associated with the misuse of vitamin D preparations was introduced.
As the Agency writes, Note 96 was published in the Official Gazette no. 43 of 20 February 2023. Republic he recalled that our Health System had spent up to 280 million euros for reimbursement on vitamin D: the decline began in 2020 when Aifa itself had started to set limits with the first note on prescriptions but in the Covid era , then, consumption had soared again by 20% due to medical prescriptions with an average per capita expenditure of 5 euros. Every day, in Italy, 142 people out of a thousand would take a dose.