Association between severity of COVID-19 symptoms and habitual food intake in adult outpatients

Abstract

Objective To evaluate the association between habitual frequency of food intake of certain food groups during the COVID-19 pandemic and manifestations of COVID-19 symptoms in adult outpatients with suspected SARSCoV-2 infection. Design We included 236 patients who attended an outpatient clinic for suspected COVID-19 evaluation. Severity of symptoms, habitual food intake frequency, demographics and Bristol chart scores were obtained before diagnostic confirmation with real-time reverse transcriptase PCR using nasopharyngeal swab. Results The results of the COVID-19 diagnostic tests were positive for 103 patients (44%) and negative for 133 patients (56%). In the SARS-CoV-2-positive group, symptom severity scores had significant negative correlations with habitual intake frequency of specific food groups. Multivariate binary logistic regression analysis adjusted for age, sex and occupation confirmed that SARSCoV-2-positive patients showed a significant negative association between having higher symptom severity and the habitual intake frequency of ‘legumes’ and ‘grains, bread and cereals’. Conclusions Increase in habitual frequency of intake of ‘legumes’, and ‘grains, bread and cereals’ food groups decreased overall symptom severity in patients with COVID-19. This study provides a framework for designing a protective diet during the COVID-19 pandemic and also establishes a hypothesis of using a diet-based intervention in the management of SARS-CoV-2 infection, which may be explored in future studies.