According to a study posted by medRxiv, healthy levels of good HDL cholesterol means less threat from the COVID-19.
According to the research, some 317,306 people were examined in the UK Biobank study, including 869 people who were hospitalized for coronavirus. All of them were healthy with good HDL levels and were at lower risk of becoming infected with the coronavirus, and those who did become infected were less likely to be hospitalized.
It is stated that healthy levels of HDL are at least 40 mg/dL (1 mmol/L) for men and 50 mg/dL (1.3 mmol/L) for women, as per the US guidelines.
The study then claimed that after taking health behaviors, socioeconomic status, and other factors into account, the odds of hospitalization for COVID-19 went down 9% with every 0.2 mmol/L (roughly 8 mg/dL) increase in HDL-cholesterol.
It is also stated that some previous studies of Biobank participants found the same inverse relationship between HDL and hospitalizations for other infectious diseases.
However, it is not proven that HDL itself protects against coronavirus. Still, the authors said, the anti-inflammatory and immune properties of HDL may explain their findings.
