Corona study: People with a certain gene variant die less often

Created: 2022-08-02 15:16

By: Tanja Koch

Anyone who has to reckon with a fatal course after a positive corona test is apparently related to the genes.

© Julian Stratenschulte/dpa

It was already known that certain genes increase the risk of severe corona infections.

But now there are new insights into genes and mortality.

Essen – Researchers at the University of Duisburg-Essen have discovered that a specific gene variant reduces the risk of death from corona diseases by around 35 percent.

They had examined the course of the disease in 1570 people who had tested positive for the corona virus between March 11, 2020 and June 30, 2021, as the university announced on Monday (August 1).

The result was published in the journal

.

The gene variant is "GNB3 TT", which is carried by around 10 percent of the population in Europe.

“GNB3 is a gene that encodes an important functional subunit of the so-called G proteins.

The G proteins are involved in many processes in the body.

Among other things, our working group was able to show in its own preparatory work that the gene variant described in the study results in the activation of immune cells," study author Birte Möhlendick told

.

An early and adequate immune response plays a major role in the course of Covid-19.

"In this study, on the one hand, we looked at whether the patients with different degrees of severity had different immune responses and whether the gene variant in GNB3 might be responsible for this," said the scientist from the Institute of Pharmacogenetics.

Corona study: 20 percent of the participants died

"As is already known, we were also able to observe that younger age and the absence of cardiovascular disease or diabetes reduces the risk of dying after infection with SARS-CoV-2 by half," said the study leader, according to the release .

The blood group also influences the severity of a corona course.

205 of the study participants (13 percent) had a mild course of the disease, 760 (48 percent) came to the hospital and 292 (19 percent) were treated by intensive care physicians.

313 people, that is 20 percent of the courses examined in the study, died.

also read

Intermittent fasting: lose weight with the 16:8 diet - fitness expert reveals how to lose five kilos a week

Do you sleep badly?

Which common mistakes rob you of sleep – the pillow has to fit too

Corona course with ventilation: certain gene variants increase the risk

"We were also able to show," says Möhlendick, "that the cells of people with the GNB3 TT genotype reacted most strongly to the coronavirus, which may explain why the risk of death is so greatly reduced in these gene carriers." June 2021, the current omicron variant, which was first detected in autumn 2021, has not yet been recorded.

Previous studies had already shown that genes can play a role in corona.

Corona infected people with a different gene variant are three times more likely to need artificial ventilation, as a team from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig found out in 2020.

A person's blood group also has an influence on how easily he is infected with Corona and how severely he falls ill with it.

(dpa)