COVID-19 Pandemic: At this time when the infection due to coronavirus has been spreading at a faster rate, there is a need to study various interactions related to the infection.
In regards to the above, a new study has been developed that precisely explores the different interactions between immune cells and airway cells at the molecular level.
This is basically to identify why there is a greater chance among some people to develop severe COVID-19 infection.
Ever since COVID-19 pandemic prevailed across the world, the study to find out all such parameters started taking pace.
At this time when we already witness a great rise in the coronavirus scare, there is evidence that says SARS-CoV-2 which is termed as the new COVID-19 pandemic mainly affects people in different ways.
COVID-19 Pandemic: Individuals Already Affected with SARS-CoV-2 Experience Mild COVID-19 Version
As per a study done, close to 80 percent of individuals who are already affected with SARS-CoV-2 tend to experience only a mild version of COVID-19.
In simpler words, it means that they will automatically get better as the time passes. And so, they don’t need to go to the hospital for treatment.
In addition to this, there are certain risk factors involved that basically trigger the level of infection of COVID-19 that may include older age, gender with some pre existing health ailments.
All these factors when combined can relate to the severity of the covid-19 and can take the shape of a COVID-19 pandemic.
At this time when no specific information is available about the coronavirus, there are a few experts who believe that an excessive immune reaction with the virus may damage lungs.
After this happens, there is a possibility that the individual may start experiencing severe COVID-19 symptoms.
Analyzing individual cells
After the infection from the virus continue to prevail, scientists decided to analyze individual cells to know how the infection actually spreads.
They also wanted to analyze how different cells behave with each other. In order to get the results, the multidisciplinary team of scientists started performing a single cell RNA sequencing analysis of both the upper and lower respiratory tract samples.
The samples were collected from as many as 19 individuals who were infected with coronavirus. Among these as many as 5 individuals didn’t show any symptoms for the new coronavirus.
In short, scientists analyzed as many as 160,528 people with their individual cells.
Out of the 19 people who were earlier tested positive for COVID-19 pandemic, 8 were found to have been suffering from moderate ailment.
Out of these 11 were found critical and 2 people died from the infection.
The scientists then analyzed all those individuals with COVID-19 infection and found a 3 times increase in the gene expression of the enzyme angiotensin converting to 2 (ACE2) gene.
This enzyme finally encodes the receptor which is used by the new coronavirus by attaching itself to these cells and spreads infection.
Take a look what Prof. Irina Lehmann, who happens to be the head of the Molecular Epidemiology Research Group at the BIH, Germany has to say in this regards.
“It is interesting to note that in the case of COVID-19, the signaling protein interferon, which is actually the immune system’s central defense strategy against viral infections, contributes to the epithelial cells producing more ACE2 and hence becoming more vulnerable to viral infection,” she concluded.
This is what she has to further say, “In COVID-19, the immune system thus helps the virus to infect further cells, thereby amplifying the disease,” she stated.
After analyzing individuals with Covid-19 pandemic symptoms, the team of scientists identified the specific subsets of both immune and epithelial cells that were present in the samples collected earlier.
After matching the results, scientists found proinflammatory cell types that may be the core reason of driving cell death in the region of lungs.
See what Prof. Roland Eils has to say about this, “Especially in severely ill patients, we observed that an over reactive immune system drives the destruction of the lung tissue.
This might explain why these patients are more severely affected by the infection than patients in whom the immune system reacts appropriately.”
Another professor who also analyzed the results among different individuals weighs in on the findings given below.
Take a look at what she has to say, “These results suggest that our treatments in COVID-19 patients should not only be directed against the virus itself but should also consider therapies that constrain the immune system, such as those now being used with dexamethasone, possibly even at the onset of the disease to prevent the immune system from overreacting.”
Stay tuned for more such updates only at medanomaly.com
References:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/why-are-some-people-at-greater-risk-of-severe-covid-19#Analyzing-individual-cells
