Both traditional and e-cigarettes appear to predispose people to increased inflammation, severe coronavirus infection and subsequent cardiovascular complications.
Healthy young people, who are either smokers or e-cigarette vapers, likely face an increased risk of developing severe Covid-19, according to a new small study by scientists in the US led by a Greek.
Both traditional and electronic cigarettes seem to they predispose humans for increased inflammation, severe coronavirus infection, and subsequent cardiovascular complications.
The researchers, led by associate professor Theodoros Kelesidis of the University of Los Angeles (UCLA) School of Medicine, who made the relevant publication in the “Journal of Molecular Medicine”, analyzed blood plasma taken before the pandemic from 45 non- smokers, 30 vapers and 29 smokers.
The study tested the levels of specific proteins in the blood (ACE2, furin, Ang II, Ang 1-7, IL-6R, sCD163, L-selectin, ADAM17) that the coronavirus needs to multiply and infect human cells .
Found out that healthy smokers and vapers had increased levels of such proteins, compared to non-smokers-vapers, which makes them more vulnerable to Covid-19.
“The main message is that smoking is worse, but vaping is not innocent either. This is something that has been found in many lung diseases, but not in Covid-19. It is a very interesting and novel finding that vaping changes the levels of key proteins that the virus uses to reproduce,” said Dr. Kelesidis.
“The vapers e-cigarette users may be at greater risk than non-smokers for developing lung infections and inflammatory disorders. Electronic cigarettes are not harmless and should be used for as little time as possible by those who want to quit regular cigarettes and not at all by non-smokers”, added the Greek scientist, who is a graduate of the Medical School of the University of Athens (2004). in microbiology and immunology from UCLA (2013), then he was a researcher at Harvard University (2005-09) and since 2013 he has been teaching at UCLA.
See the scientific publication here
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