How does coronavirus kill? Clinicians trace a ferocious rampage through the body, from brain to toes
As the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 surges past 2.2 million globally and deaths surpass 150,000, clinicians and pathologists are struggling to understand the damage wrought by the coronavirus as it tears through the body. They are realizing that although the lungs are ground zero, its reach can extend to many organs including the heart and blood vessels, kidneys, gut, and brain.
“[The disease] can attack almost anything in the body with devastating consequences,” says cardiologist Harlan Krumholz of Yale University and Yale-New Haven Hospital, who is leading multiple efforts to gather clinical data on COVID-19. “Its ferocity is breathtaking and humbling.”
Understanding the rampage could help the doctors on the front lines treat the fraction of infected people who become desperately and sometimes mysteriously ill. Does a dangerous, newly observed tendency to blood clotting transform some mild cases into life-threatening emergencies? Is an overzealous immune response behind the worst cases, suggesting treatment with immune-suppressing drugs could help? What explains the startlingly low blood oxygen that some physicians are reporting in patients who nonetheless are not gasping for breath? “Taking a systems approach may be beneficial as we start thinking about therapies,” says Nilam Mangalmurti, a pulmonary intensivist at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP).
Well it is biowarfare. So you expect it to be pretty nasty. But then again it is a virus. So we can prepare for it.
ReplyDelete"What explains the startlingly low blood oxygen that some physicians are reporting in patients who nonetheless are not gasping for breath? "
ReplyDeleteOn the one hand it makes it hard to breathe. On the other hand a frequency within the 5G range disassociates iron from the haemoglobin ... leading to iron poisoning and hypoxia. But there will be no stalling that 5G rollout. No lockdown for those workers.
"“Taking a systems approach may be beneficial as we start thinking about therapies,”
ReplyDeleteSure but we already know the therapies. Every call for another study is a lethal stalling tactic.