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From: Letitia Pepper <letitiaepepper@yahoo.com> Sent: Wednesday, July 22, 2020 10:25 PM To: publiccomment@sdcounty.ca.gov; Andrew.Potter@sdcounty.ca.gov Subject: [External] Nutritional Advice Should Be an Important Part of All Public Outreach During Efforts to Combat and Survive COVID-19, Especially to Increase Awareness in the Latino and Other Communities of People with Darker Skin Colors Dear Clerk of the Board: Please pass this e-mail on to each of the County Supervisors and to the County's Public Health Officer, plus to whoever is in charge of the County's program to do outreach to the Latino Community and other communities of people with darker skin colors. This is important information, released in a very recent study done on people in 10 European countries who succumbed to the disease. That study shows a strong correlation between low Vitamin D-3 blood levels and death from COVID-19. It also suggests that one factor in the higher death among America's Latino and African American communities is that while their increased melanin levels protect their skin from UV rays, it also restricts their skins' ability to synthesize Vitamin D-3 from exposure to sunshine. This study therefore indicates that many peoples' lives can be saved if the public is given, early and often, simple dietary advice on how to protect themselves with diets that include generous amounts of Vitamin D-3. This same advice could also reduce the seriousness of the infections that people do end up contracting. To work properly, Vitamin D should also be supplemented with magnesium and Vitamin A, all of which can be provided in common foods as well as supplemented with relatively inexpensive vitamins and minerals. This information should be part of any outreach to all members of the public, but is especially important to share with persons whose skin color is darker because of increased melanin levels. Thus, it should be part of your planned outreach to members of the Latino community, as well as communities of African American, Haitian, Jamaican, Cuban, Brazilian, Native American and similar groups of county residents. Notably, a young Marine veteran, with somewhat darker skin color, told me last week that the VA had given him a full year's supply of Vitamin D-3, and that it is sending out newsletters to veterans urging them to be taking Vitamin D-3 supplements. Several other people with whom I spoke, who have very dark skin, told