ABSTRACT
Introduction : The blood group is an important biological parameter in the development of several infectious, bacterial or viral diseases. Many studies have shown that virus SARS-cov2 preferentially attaches to the epithelial cells of people with blood group A (affinity between protein S and antigen A). The main objective of the study was to find the relationship between blood group, D-dimer level and the severity of infection SARS-cov2. Patients and Methode: This is an exposure-non exposure descriptive study (SARS-cov2 infection+) of 133 Tunisian patients included consecutively between January and April 2021 at Rabta hospital. The patients were subdivided into groups according to the presence or absence of antigen A. The phenotype distribution of SARS-cov2 patients was compared with that of a control group of 2801 patients not affected by SARS-cov2 and with the blood group distribution of a blood donor population ( N = 3072). Results: During the study, 133 Tunisian patients were included. Group A (group A and AB) was present in 39.8% of patients ( N = 53) versus non-A group (group O and B) in 60.2%. The average D-dimer level was 7291.59 ng/ml in group A versus 3047.34 ng/ml in non-A group with a statistically significant difference ( p = 0). The rate of resuscitation was higher in group A (34.6%) versus non-A group (11.1%) with a statistically significant difference ( p = 0.02). The period of hospitalisation was longer in group A (average 15.06 days) versus non-A group (average 10.08 days) with a statistically significant difference ( p = 0.02). The blood type was not independently associated with the mortality rate. It was 19.2% in group A versus 13.9% for the NON-A group with a difference not statistically significant ( p = 0.5). Conclusion: This study suggests the ABO blood group could be one of the factors that play a role in determining SARScov2 susceptibility severity with more need for resuscitation and an increase in the period of hospitalisation. A large study would be interesting to confirm these results.