SARS-CoV-2 and Influenza Vaccines in People with Excessive Body Mass-A Narrative Review.

In the face of a growing number of overweight people and two widely known viral diseases, SARS-CoV-2 and influenza, it is crucial to be aware of the impact of excess body weight on immunisation against these diseases. The aim of this review is to show the effectiveness of SARS-CoV-2 and influenza vaccines in overweight and obese patients. Excessive adipose tissue releases cytokines and maintains local hypoxia, which causes persistent low-grade inflammation. These factors make excess body mass patients' immune systems weaker. Under such conditions, the humoral response becomes less efficient, leading to a weakened ability to fight against infection and an increased risk of developing lower antibody titres. Vaccines help to reduce morbidity both in normal-weight and excess body mass people, although most studies show that patients with higher BMI tend to lose the antibodies produced more quickly. It is shown that the most effective vaccines (in terms of preventing the infection and potential post-illness complications) are the BNT162b2 vaccine against SARS-CoV-2 and the inactivated influenza vaccine against influenza among both obese and non-obese subjects.

Availability of Cardiodiabetological Drugs in Poland during the First Year of COVID-19 Pandemic: Retrospective Study

There were worries that the COVID-19 pandemic could result in a shortage of supplies of some drugs. We aimed to analyze if the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in the availability drop of different cardiodiabetological medicaments. Special attention was put to combined therapies and to investigate the general availability of these drugs. Data were obtained from the Polish startup company GdziePoLek regarding the availability of 121 cardiodiabetolocigal drugs divided into 23 separate categories in Polish pharmacies. The period of the analysis was limited from 1 January 2019 to 31 December 2020. The threshold of a 20% decrease of median availability was set to found drugs with the most severe drop in availability during the COVID-19 pandemic. We also identified medicaments with a median availability of less than 50%. We identified two drugs with the most severe drop in availability level during COVID-19 pandemics: acenocoumarol (decrease by 52.0%) and nitrendipine (decrease by 98.3%). In 2019 and 2020, 27 of 121 drugs had a median availability lower than 50%. The limited availability concerned the most novel agents and polypills, mostly non-insulin antidiabetic drugs. The decrease in drug availability in Poland was not as severe as expected. Accessibility to some novel non-refunded medicaments is limited.

Excess Body Mass-A Factor Leading to the Deterioration of COVID-19 and Its Complications-A Narrative Review.

Currently, the world is facing two serious pandemics: obesity and COVID-19. It is well-established that the prevalence of obesity has risen dramatically, causing a deterioration in the health quality of the population and increasing susceptibility for the unfavourable course of acute infections. It has been observed that excess body mass significantly influences the COVID-19 outcome. The aim of this review is to present the latest scientific reports on the impact of excess body mass on the course and complications of COVID-19. The Web of Science, PubMed, and Google Scholar databases were searched. Only studies reporting patients stated to be COVID-19 positive based on the results of a nasopharyngeal swab and the ribonucleic acid test were included. It is shown that thromboembolic and ischemic complications, namely stroke, disseminated intravascular coagulation, severe hyperglycaemia, and leukoencephalopathy are more likely to appear in COVID-19 positive patients with obesity compared to non-obese subjects. COVID-19 complications such as cardiomyopathy, dysrhythmias, endothelial dysfunction, acute kidney injury, dyslipidaemia, lung lesions and acute respiratory distress syndrome have a worse outcome among obese patients.

Perinatal Mental Health during COVID-19 Pandemic: An Integrative Review and Implications for Clinical Practice.

The COVID-19 pandemic and measures implemented to decelerate its spread have consequences for mental health of societies. The aim of our review was to analyze depressive and anxiety symptoms in perinatal women. The search used PubMed and Web of Science databases. Most studies showed an increase in the prevalence of depression and/or anxiety symptoms. Risk factors identified in our study were mainly related to the possibility of COVID-19 infection, changes in the organization of perinatal care, social isolation and financial problems. Protective factors included social support, the woman's own activity and knowledge about COVID-19. The results of our study point to the importance of the mental health screening including suicide risk assessment in perinatal women. Much of the mental health needs of perinatal women can be met in primary or perinatal care services; however, women with mental health issues should be offered psychiatric consultations and psychological support, and sometimes urgent psychiatric hospitalization is necessary. Healthcare professionals should provide information addressing uncertainty about COVID-19, organization of midwifery and medical care as well as mental health problems and how to get help. Mental health interventions in pregnant women may involve planning physical activity and encouraging to engage in online social activities.

Hypertension and renin-angiotensin system blockers are not associated with expression of angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) in the kidney.

AIMS: Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) is the cellular entry point for severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2)-the cause of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). However, the effect of renin-angiotensin system (RAS)-inhibition on ACE2 expression in human tissues of key relevance to blood pressure regulation and COVID-19 infection has not previously been reported. METHODS AND RESULTS: We examined how hypertension, its major metabolic co-phenotypes, and antihypertensive medications relate to ACE2 renal expression using information from up to 436 patients whose kidney transcriptomes were characterized by RNA-sequencing. We further validated some of the key observations in other human tissues and/or a controlled experimental model. Our data reveal increasing expression of ACE2 with age in both human lungs and the kidney. We show no association between renal expression of ACE2 and either hypertension or common types of RAS inhibiting drugs. We demonstrate that renal abundance of ACE2 is positively associated with a biochemical index of kidney function and show a strong enrichment for genes responsible for kidney health and disease in ACE2 co-expression analysis. CONCLUSION: Our results indicate that neither hypertension nor antihypertensive treatment is likely to alter the expression of the key entry receptor for SARS-CoV-2 in the human kidney. Our data further suggest that in the absence of SARS-CoV-2 infection, kidney ACE2 is most likely nephro-protective but the age-related increase in its expression within lungs and kidneys may be relevant to the risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Smoking, Vaping, and Tobacco Industry During COVID-19 Pandemic: Twitter Data Analysis.

The reports suggesting a beneficial effect of nicotine on coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) severity may encourage smoking. We aimed to analyze tweets on COVID-19 and smoking coming from casual Twitter users and Twitter accounts representing the tobacco industry. We collected tweets on COVID-19 and smoking from January 1 to May 1, 2020, using Twitter application programming interface. We analyzed sentiment, likes, or retweet to followers ratios, and the posts coming from the casual users to find pieces of news that could affect the discourse. Tweets coming from industry were analyzed manually. We analyzed n = 33,890 tweets on COVID-19 and smoking. The sentiment of tweets was negative, hitting a nadir in mid-March, but became less negative in April when preprints suggesting benefits from smoking on COVID-19 were released. Similar trends were observed for the ratios of likes or retweets to followers. We found 58 messages from the tobacco industry concerning COVID-19. Twenty-two (37.9 percent) mentioned the efforts of tobacco companies to support the development of a COVID-19 vaccine. Two tweets included Food and Drug Administration statements that there is no evidence that vaping increases the risk of COVID-19. The occurrence of preprints suggesting benefits of smoking in COVID-19 might increase sentiment and reactions to tweets on tobacco products and the virus. The authors of potentially controversial articles should restrain from the promotion of their results before the completion of the peer-review process. Twitter presents a convenient tool to monitor e-discourse during a health crisis. The research community should monitor the tobacco industry's social media.