Home » Health » Scientists have found out how smoking affects COVID-19 – Rambler / doctor

Scientists have found out how smoking affects COVID-19 – Rambler / doctor

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American biologists have studied the molecular mechanisms that are associated with the risk of developing a more severe form of COVID-19 in smokers. The results are published in the Cell Stem Cell edition.

Clinicians stressed that among those who smoke, the number of severe cases and deaths from COVID-19 is higher than among nonsmokers. However, the reasons for this are still not entirely clear.

Scientists at the Center for Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research at the University of California Los Angeles, using a cellular model, have recreated the processes occurring in the airways of smokers infected with the coronavirus.

The airway is the body’s first line of defense against airborne pathogens. Scientists have grown from stem cells taken from the lungs of five healthy, nonsmoking donors, a culture of cells of the so-called air-liquid interface, which accurately replicate the behavior and functions of cells in the human respiratory tract.

“Our model mimics the upper airway — the first place a virus enters. This is the area that produces mucus to trap viruses, bacteria, and toxins, and contains finger-like cells that push that mucus up and out.”

– said the head of the study, Bridget Gomperts.

The scientists then created the “smoking effect” and analyzed how it affects healthy organisms.

In models exposed to smoke, the researchers saw two to three times as many infected cells. They found that the reason for the more serious infection in smokers is, at least in part, due to blocking the activity of the immune system’s messenger proteins called interferons.

“If you think of the airway as high walls that protect a castle, smoking is creating holes in those walls. It reduces natural defenses, allowing the virus to enter,”

– explained the scientist.

We will remind, earlier “Rambler” talked about how smoking invisibly leads to blindness.

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