More than a respiratory disease

[Xtinalee]

Thoughts on this? Hoping it’s true to help find a cure ASAP
elemental.medium.com/coronavirus-may-be-a-blood-vessel-disease-which-explains-everything-2c4032481ab2

Interesting.

TRIGGER WARNING - this article is fairly terrifying to read if you or a family member has coronavirus, so do be aware.

The key takeaway is the last few lines and it is actually very encouraging - that the disease could be quite easy to treat potentially with common existing drugs - statins and ACE inhibitors.

It's the first article I've read that both comes up with a plausible hypothesis for how the disease works and suggests a treatment that exists already.

Weirdly if that's the case, then it reduces my 75 year old dad's risk (he's on blood thinners), but raises mine. 46, history of DVTs, Factor V Leiden, on oestrogen HRT.

Horrendous but they have treatments available if I read correctly .. What do you think of this one www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3086177/coronavirus-uses-same-strategy-hiv-dodge-immune-response-chinese

@effingterrified do you think if you got the virus then took ACE inhibitors you’d be better ? Or take them prior ? (Bearing in mind there’s side effects of that)

Fascinating. This kind of article sums up why - if avoiding the disease is impossible - I still want to delay getting it. Every day, week and month that passes, our understanding of it improves, as do potential methods of disease management. I feel sorry for those that contracted it in the upheaval and panic of the first wave.

OP, the first article you linked to would suggest that ACE inhibitors might be a potential treatment and/or preventative for Covid.

But obviously without testing to prove that, I couldn't possibly say if that is the case or not. It's certainly an interesting and plausible theory, but at this stage, that's all it is, a hypothesis.

I guess some statistical analysis might reveal if people already on statins and ACE inhibitors before they got ill have better outcomes ie lower death rates or less severe illnesses.

I know that in the case of statins, there were some recent articles suggesting that these did indeed lead to better outcomes and therefore suggesting them as a potential treatment or prophylactic.

The HIV comparison seems rather more dubious.

Mainly because lots of/most people do seem to recover from this virus, without help, whereas that's obviously not the case with HIV.

So it seems to be creating unnecessary panic to draw comparisons between the two.

I don't know if anyone let alone the majority who have spontaneously tested negative for HIV but that routinely happens with Covid.

Interesting. About the statins.

I'd be very interested to see if there are any other articles related to this vascular theory. It's terrifying. It would put my 6 year old straight into shielding where at the moment she's at the normal child risk level. I might contact her neuro. Meanwhile if anyone has seen anything else please post. I'll google obvs.

I have been bed ridden for 12 weeks with cornavirus and I can tell you with absolute certainty it's not just a respiratory virus. I am a very fit and healthy 36 year old with no pre-existing conditions.

It's a very odd virus given the numbers of people who also have no symptoms at all.

.... maybe we should take the article with a pinch of salt: the researchers said in a non-peer reviewed paper ...

This is very interesting reading.

I mean, hardly anything is peer reviewed at this point. Thousands of people are reporting vascular/neuro symptoms, along with breathlessness that doesn't seem connected to low oxygen levels in the blood.

If this is true, would a daily mini aspirin help guard against it? During pregnancy i was prescribed that for high blood pressure, but not sure if that is the same thing discussed here.

This is very interesting, frightening I agree but it does point to possible treatment.

Ylvamoon lots of papers are being released without peer review at the moment to get the information out there, or that's my understanding at least.

Neither article above is from a very reliable source so I wouldn't at this stage think of what they claim as anything other than interesting hypotheses.

Here's a rather more reliable source about potential benefits of statins, Oblomov20. This story was widely reported:

uk.reuters.com/article/uk-health-coronavirus-science/statins-may-help-older-coronavirus-patients-avoid-symptoms-covid-19-more-than-respiratory-illness-idUKKBN22R2WJ

Do be very wary of 'scientific' breakthroughs that are only reported on political sites.

If they were genuine, you'd expect to read about them on medical sites.

Yes I've already read about this, it is also a suggestion as to why it seems that people with underlying heat/blood pressure issue and things like diabetes seem to be at way higher risk of complications then those with lung conditions like service asthma and other lung conditions.

There is still a lot of work to do on this, better to wait to get it until they know a lot more.

I don't think the article in OP is that radically interesting.

"An infectious disease always has a complex interaction with its host."

that link is about... influenza. And the complex processes followed how influenza kills people. Vascular issues, heart stopping, secondary pneumonia, hyper immune responses, are in there too.

It's certainly an interesting and plausible theory, but at this stage, that's all it is, a hypothesis.

Well, yes, because at the start of the pandemic people were worried that ACE inhibitors INCREASED your risk from covid-19. To the extent that hypertension societies across the world issued statements telling people to keep taking their medication.

I don't think anyone sensible would claim that coronavirus is anything like flu. It is clearly far, far more deadly and spreads far more easily.

The article in the OP was very clearly not about flu, it was about coronavirus. Did you somehow read the wrong article?

However, I reiterate, it's in an unreliable source so I would take its hypotheses, interesting though they are, with a large pinch of salt until we know more.

AKissAndASmile - thanks, I didn't know that.

A really important post.

Guys - do NOT take medical advice from a random link on Medium.

@effingterrified

The HIV comparison seems rather more dubious.

Mainly because lots of/most people do seem to recover from this virus, without help, whereas that's obviously not the case with HIV.

So it seems to be creating unnecessary panic to draw comparisons between the two.

I don't know if anyone let alone the majority who have spontaneously tested negative for HIV but that routinely happens with Covid.

I agree. It also relies on the fact that anyone reading it has a good knowledge of how white blood cells - killer cells/helper cells and general immune system works. FWIW any illness, whether it be HIV, injury or the common cold, can weaken the immune system. Also important to remember that although both viruses need to invade a host cell to complete their life cycle HIV is a retrovirus - it inserts its RNA into our DNA to create more of itself. Coronavirus takes over the cell rather than becoming part of it. HIV also lies dormant in many parts of the body which is why it's so difficult to cure. Coronavirus does not do this.

As far as HIV testing goes, no test is 100% but the latest antigen/antibody tests are highly reliable, if anything more likely to produce a false positive than a false negative due to being highly sensitive. This is of course allowing for the window period.