{"id":5532,"date":"2020-04-09T01:02:15","date_gmt":"2020-04-09T01:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/?p=5532"},"modified":"2020-04-09T01:02:19","modified_gmt":"2020-04-09T01:02:19","slug":"higher-levels-of-coronavirus-entry-point-enzyme-in-lungs-of-copd-patients-and-smokers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/higher-levels-of-coronavirus-entry-point-enzyme-in-lungs-of-copd-patients-and-smokers\/","title":{"rendered":"Higher levels of coronavirus ‘entry point’ enzyme in lungs of COPD patients and smokers"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

People with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and people who currently smoke may have higher levels of a molecule, called angiotensin converting enzyme II (ACE-2), in their lungs according to a study published in the\u00a0<\/strong>European Respiratory Journal<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0today (Thursday).<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Previous research shows that ACE-2, which sits on the surface of lung cells, is the ‘entry point’ that allows coronavirus to get into the cells of the lungs and cause an infection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The new study also shows that levels of ACE-2 in former smokers is lower than in current smokers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The research was led by Dr Janice Leung at the University of British Columbia and St. Paul’s Hospital, Vancouver, Canada. She said: “The data emerging from China suggested that patients with COPD were at higher risk of having worse outcomes from COVID-19. We hypothesised that this could be because the levels of ACE-2 in their airways might be increased compared to people without COPD, which could possibly make it easier for the virus to infect the airway.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The team studied samples taken from the lungs of 21 COPD patients and 21 people who did not have COPD. They tested the samples to gauge the level of ACE-2 and compared this with other factors, such whether they were from people who never smoked, were current smokers or former smokers. Not only did they find higher levels of ACE-2 in COPD patients, they also found higher levels in people who were smokers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The researchers then checked their new findings against two existing study groups, which together contain data on a further 249 people – some non-smokers, some current smokers and some former smokers. Again, they found levels of ACE-2 were higher in current smokers but lower in non-smokers and in those who were former smokers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr Leung said: “We found that patients with COPD and people who are still smoking have higher levels of ACE-2 in their airways, which might put them at an increased risk of developing severe COVID-19 infections. Patients with COPD should be counselled to strictly abide by social distancing and proper hand hygiene to prevent infection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We also found that former smokers had similar levels of ACE-2 to people who had never smoked. This suggests that there has never been a better time to quit smoking to protect yourself from COVID-19.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Professor Tobias Welte is an infections expert from the European Respiratory Society and is a coordinator for the national German COVID-19 task force and was not involved in the study. He said: “This study gives some interesting insight into why some people may be at risk of more severe COVID-19 symptoms than others. What it does not tell us is whether it’s possible to manipulate ACE-2 levels to improve survival in patients infected with COVID-19 or whether this would make a difference in COPD patients who contract the infection.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

People with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and people who currently smoke may have higher levels of a molecule, called angiotensin converting enzyme II (ACE-2), in their lungs according to a study.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":5533,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1662,2296,2294,854,40],"class_list":["post-5532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsmakers","tag-anti-smoking","tag-coronavirus","tag-covid-19","tag-quit-smoking","tag-smoking"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5532","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5532"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5532\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5534,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5532\/revisions\/5534"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zestmag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}