Your diet may reduce your chances of severe COVID-19

Of course, Merino said, people with a healthy diet can be different in many ways from those with less healthy eating habits. Thus, his team considers factors such as age, race, exercise habits, smoking, body weight and whether people live in low- or high-income neighborhoods.

Obesity, for example, is a risk factor for severe COVID-19. And body weight explains a good part of the relationship between diet and the risk of COVID-19, the study found.

But the diet itself still shows a protective effect, the researchers note.

The connection was actually strongest among people living in economically deprived areas, Merino said. The researchers estimated that if one of these two factors was not present — poor diet or deprivation — nearly a third of the cases of COVID-19 in the study group could be prevented.

However, Glatt warned that it is very difficult to separate every effect of the diet from everything else that people do in their lives.

“There are so many variables,” he said.

People who strive to eat healthily, Glatt said, are likely to be concerned about their health in general and COVID-19 prevention in particular.

The researchers asked respondents about their habits when wearing masks and these answers did not explain the diet-COVID relationship.

But, Glatt said, “it’s impossible to account for everything” – including whether people worked from home, used public transportation, or were willing and able to avoid other crowded indoor situations.

Merino pointed out some other limitations of the study. While about a quarter of respondents were 65 or older, they were fairly healthy as a group — with little reporting of chronic conditions such as heart disease and diabetes.

In addition, Merino said, the study was conducted in 2020 – before someone was vaccinated and before the emergence of a highly contagious version of Delta.

It is not known whether a healthy diet can have an additional effect on a vaccinated person or during Delta dominance.

These warnings, both Merino and Glatt, said that eating a lot of whole, plant foods is certainly a wise idea, as people with good nutrition are usually healthier and more resilient.

“It’s very reasonable to assume that a healthy diet will be beneficial,” Glatt said.