For bald people, covid is more dangerous
The connection between male baldness and high vulnerability to coronavirus has been revealed
Biologists from the USA and Italy have found that gene variations that increase the chances of baldness in men significantly increase the likelihood of their infection with coronavirus and hospitalization with severe forms of COVID-19. This was announced on Thursday by the press service of the European Dermatological and Venereological Society (EADV).
"Our observations show that the number of CAG repeats in the AR (androgen receptor - VM) gene associated with men's predisposition to baldness also affects how often its carriers develop severe forms of COVID–19. This suggests that such a biomarker can be used to identify those carriers of the virus for whom the risk of entering the intensive care unit will be maximum," said Andy Goren, professor at the Marconi University in Rome (Italy), whose words are quoted by the EADV press service.
Almost from the first days after the outbreak of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus epidemic in Wuhan, doctors began to notice that the disease caused by it infects and kills men much more often than women.
Biologists initially attributed these differences to the fact that men's lung cells contain significantly more ACE2 receptor molecules, which the virus uses to infect, than similar corpuscles in women's respiratory organs. Subsequently, the opinions of experts were divided, although most researchers continue to believe that men are indeed more susceptible to this disease.
Professor Goren and his colleagues accidentally discovered a previously unknown biomarker that allows them to identify men most vulnerable to coronavirus attacks. They made this discovery by drawing attention to the fact that approximately 80% of men who were admitted to the intensive care unit with severe forms of COVID-19 were carriers of various forms of baldness.
New methods of treatment
As a rule, only every second or third man suffers from such hair problems, this forced scientists to find out in detail what factors could contribute to the penetration of the coronavirus into the body of men prone to baldness. Enlisting the support of 65 patients, the scientists took samples of their DNA and studied their structure in detail.
This analysis showed that the probability of hospitalization of men depended not only on the condition of their hair, but also on how many so-called CAG repeats were present in the AR gene responsible for the reaction of cells to testosterone molecules and other male sex hormones. As a rule, the more such sites contain the AR gene, the more its carriers are prone to baldness.
As it turned out, a similar relationship also exists between the length of these repetitions and the probability of getting into intensive care with severe forms of COVID-19. The exact nature of this connection is not yet known, but biologists suggest that its existence is explained by the fact that the activity level of the TMPRSS2 enzyme, one of the key "accomplices" of the coronavirus, directly depends on variations in the structure of the AR gene.
According to biologists, this feature of infection can be used not only to identify patients most vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 attacks, but also to fight the virus by suppressing the work of TMPRSS2 with drugs that reduce the activity of the AR gene. Professor Goren and his colleagues plan to present the first results of experiments with such substances to the public in the near future.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru