An American team of researchers has just shed light on the risk factors that contribute to making respiratory infections, and in particular that of the MERS-CoV coronavirus, more serious for diabetics than for the rest of the population.
Responsible for 1.6 million deaths worldwide in 2015, diabetes is characterized by an abnormally high and chronic level of sugar in the blood (hyperglycemia). In question: a lack of insulin, a hormone produced by the pancreas, and which naturally regulates the level of glucose present in the blood.
In addition to the complications it can cause, diabetes, whether type 1 or type 2, also increases the risk of several health problems, sometimes serious or even fatal. Among them, vision problems that can go as far as blindness, kidney problems, cardiovascular diseases, but also respiratory infections.
A new study, conducted by researchers from the University of Maryland School of Medicine (UMSOM) and Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, has just been published on this subject. Published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation Insightit shows how diabetes contributes to mortality from infections with MERS-CoV, the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus.
A dysfunction of the immune response in question
Since its appearance in Saudi Arabia in 2012, MERS-CoV has infected more than 2,400 people and caused 800 deaths, a mortality rate of 35%. For researchers, diabetes is undoubtedly a major risk factor. To prove this, they studied the link between diabetes and MERS-CoV in mice.
They then discovered that the virus did not replicate more easily in diabetic mice than in control mice. In contrast, diabetic mice exhibited a delayed and prolonged inflammatory response in the lung. This means that the immune response of diabetic mice was slower and weaker and therefore the increased severity of MERS-CoV infection in diabetic patients is likely due to a malfunction in the body’s response to infection. .
“In this context, it is essential to understand how diabetes contributes to disease severity following MERS-CoV infection,” explains Professor Matthew Frieman, lead author of the study. “Our next step is to determine what drives the impaired immune response in diabetics and how to reverse these effects with therapeutic treatments for treating patients.”
Towards better management of diabetic patients
Among the lines of research discussed, researchers would like to know whether or not health care providers need to do more to manage and stabilize glucose levels in diabetic patients with a dangerous respiratory infection, and if this better management would help lessen the effects of these infections.
“This is an important discovery for patients with diabetes and the doctors who treat them,” says E. Albert Reece, Dean of Umsom. “We’ve known for a long time that patients with diabetes have worse outcomes when they contract a serious infectious disease, but this new understanding of immune function could pave the way for better treatments.”
Ultimately, this discovery could also shed light on other respiratory diseases such as influenza or pneumonia, which can also affect diabetic patients more seriously.
