Research into the coronavirus is in full swing. Has a new study identified the reason for death from Covid-19 and a new therapeutic approach?
- A new study into severe courses of the disease Covid-19 unearthed groundbreaking findings.
- The results suggest a new, promising treatment approach .
- Here you will find the Corona news from Germany as well as the current infection numbers as a card. All information on the subject is also available on our Facebook page Corona-News.
Munich - More than 600,000 people worldwide have already died of an SARS-CoV2 infection. The corona pandemic continues to dominate world events in 2020. Researchers and doctors are working at full speed on new approaches to vaccination, but above all to treat the disease Covid-19 *.
All questions about the dangerous coronavirus * have certainly not yet been fully clarified, but experts now seem to have achieved a groundbreaking insight. Is the particularly severe course of the disease and thus often death related to immune cells?
Coronavirus research: New study delivers groundbreaking result - Covid-19 leads to immune thrombosis
The specialist magazine "EBioMedicine by The Lancet" published a study on the course of the disease in intensive care patients and possibly presented trend-setting results.
Certain white blood cells are particularly strongly activated by Covid-19, clump together and form networks in the blood vessels of the lungs (Neutrophil Extracellular Traps, short: NET), summarizes the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) involved in the research. together. They had compared autopsy material and blood samples from Covid 19 patients with samples from healthy people and those who were less seriously ill.
Coronavirus / immune thrombosis: is that the cause of death from Covid-19? Blood vessels in the lungs become blocked
This clogs the vessels. This is not just a classic clotting of the blood (thrombosis), but a reaction of the immune cells. That is why the researchers also speak of an immune thrombosis. In the lungs, it causes the body's oxygen supply to stop working.
The networks mentioned, which are ejected into the blood plasma by the granulocytes - a subtype of white blood cells - probably lead to the clogging of the small blood vessels and thus to complications that are hardly treatable.
Coronavirus: new treatment approach? These drugs could help with Covid-19 therapy
The biggest problem: Although this NET formation is to a certain extent a known and normal process in the human body in inflammation, it is not limited to individual areas of an organ when suffering from Covid-19 *, according to the researchers at FAU . The webs attack many blood vessels and even various organs. In the lungs, the closure of the micro-vessels takes place particularly quickly.
So far, the German Medical Journal confirms, the immune thrombosis has not been considered in the treatment. The findings could therefore make a new therapeutic approach possible. The concentration of white blood cells must be inhibited and the excessive NET formation prevented, describes the FAU. The drug dexamethasone could help, it attacks the enzymes that are active. Taking the well-known anticoagulant heparin also seems promising. It has already been given to Covid 19 patients to prevent thrombosis, an increase in the dose is now being discussed. In the best case scenario, this can prevent NET formation. (* Merkur.de is part of the Ippen editorial network.)