According to one doctor, the impact is similar to a patient suffering from both SARS and AIDS at the same time, as it also affects the immune system. It provokes his exaggerated reaction, as the Spanish flu virus did.
"The impact of Covid-19 on the human body is like a combination of SARS and AIDS because it damages both the lungs and the immune system," said the Global Times at the end of last week, Peng Chong, Intensive Care Director of Zhongnan University Hospital in Wuhan .
After a week of infection, according to the IFLscience server, the disease reaches the third stage, from mild colds and mild pneumonia to a severe one that goes into respiratory failure. Shortly after infection, the immune system is activated, but in some cases there is a so-called cytokine storm, where the immune system reacts to the infection exaggerated, which further worsens the condition of the infected. It was the cytokine storm that caused a large number of victims of the Spanish flu between 1918 and 1919.
In his conclusions on the impact on the lungs, Pcheng relied on the findings of the pathologist of Chungchong University, Liu Liang, whose team performed autopsies of two dozen victims of the disease.
Typical dyspnoea is a manifestation of fibrosis
“Liu's autopsy results influenced me. Based on them, I think it is most important now to intervene at an early stage of the disease to protect patients' lungs from fibrosis, ”Pcheng said. In pulmonary fibrosis, the fine and airy lung tissue turns into a rigid impermeable connective tissue, so that oxygen does not reach the blood from the alveoli. This reduces the possibility of oxygenation of the blood and infected people lack oxygen. If Pcheng does not intervene in time, no other means of ensuring blood oxygenation can be used.
One symptom of Covid-19 is breathlessness, which is a typical manifestation of pulmonary fibrosis.
Liu published his report on autopsies in the Chinese Journal of Forensic Medicine. He reported that there was excessive mucus production, leading to pneumonia in response to severe alveoli damage.
An earlier study published in the medical journal Lancet stated that CT examinations of 81 patients' lung 'showed changes in interstitial tissue suggesting fibrosis'.
"It is too early to report that these lung changes are irreversible fibrosis," News.com.au quoted at the conclusion of the study, saying that it was unclear whether all necropsies had fibrosis.
Impacts on spleen and heart
The Chinese National Health Commission then reported that post-mortem and post-mortem biopsies revealed changes in the lungs of varying magnitude in 19 victims. Their spleen decreased significantly and the heart muscle (myocardium) suffered from necrosis.
In one patient, an 85-year-old man, the same pathological changes that SARS and MERS caused were seen in the lungs. Although lung fibrosis was not as widespread as in patients with SARS, inflammatory effusion was greater. The patient was hospitalized in January with a stroke. After death, it turned out that the brain was insufficiently supplied with blood.
Autopsy on part of the victims suggested that one of the most common causes of death could be excessive mucus production. According to ongoing treatment results, the use of mucus aspirators reduced the number of victims.
