Melatonin Significantly Reduces Covid-19 Mortality

STORY AT-A-GLANCE

• While most well-known as a natural sleep regulator, melatonin also has many other important functions. It boosts immune function, helps recharge glutathione and may improve treatment of certain bacterial diseases; it has anticonvulsant and antiexcitotoxic properties, and is a potent antioxidant with the rare ability to enter your mitochondria
• In viral infections, melatonin lowers the overreaction of the host cells to the pathogen, thereby raising the host’s tolerance to the virus. This gives the host time to develop the adaptive immune response and eradicate the invading pathogen
• Melatonin attenuates several pathological features of COVID-19, including excessive oxidative stress and inflammation, exaggerated immune response resulting in a cytokine storm, acute lung injury and acute respiratory distress syndrome
• An October 2021 study found melatonin significantly lowered mortality when given to severely infected COVID patients. In the standard care only group, 13 of the 76 patients died (17.1%), compared to just one of the 82 patients (1.2%) who received melatonin in addition to standard care — a reduction in mortality of 93%
• During the second week of infection, a time when severely infected patients can take a drastic turn for the worse, the melatonin group fared much better than the standard care only group, with only two patients developing sepsis, compared to eight in the standard care only group

Melatonin is a hormone synthesized in your pineal gland and several other organs,¹ indeed in most cells, including human lung monocytes and macrophages, as it is actually synthesized in your mitochondria.²

While most well-known as a natural sleep regulator, melatonin also has many other important functions.³ Notably, it plays an important role in cancer prevention⁴ and may prevent or improve certain autoimmune diseases, such as Type 1 diabetes.⁵

It also has anticonvulsant and antiexcitotoxic properties,⁶ and is a potent antioxidant⁷ with the rare ability to enter your mitochondria,⁸ where it helps prevent mitochondrial impairment, energy failure and the death of mitochondria damaged by oxidation.⁹ It also:

• Boosts immune function
• Helps recharge glutathione¹⁰ (and glutathione deficiency has been linked to COVID-19 severity)
• May improve the treatment of certain bacterial diseases, including tuberculosis¹¹
• Helps regulate gene expression via a series of enzymes¹²

As noted in the Journal of Critical Care:¹³

“Melatonin is a versatile molecule … Melatonin plays an important physiologic role in sleep and circadian rhythm regulation, immunoregulation, antioxidant and mitochondrial-protective functions, reproductive control, and regulation of mood. Melatonin has also been reported as effective in combating various bacterial and viral infections.”