COVID-19 and Gastrointestinal manifestations

ABSTRACT

SARS-CoV-2 appeared in December 2019 in the Wuhan and has been rapidly spreading from China to other countries. In March 2020 has been declared a pandemic and one of the most important public health emergencies. It's a virus that typically concern respiratory system, and is manifested by fever, dry cough, dyspnea and fatigue. Moreover, gastrointestinal, and hepatic manifestations can also appear. In this article we briefly describe the link between angiotensin-converting enzyme II (ACE2) and digestive system, a receptor that mightly can be the entry mechanism of SARS-COV2. Gastrointestinal symptoms can be abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting and diarrhea. Liver chemistry abnormalities are also common and include elevation of aspartate transferase, alanine transferase, and total bilirubin. Furthermore, an important fact is that viral RNA has been isolated from stool specimens of COVID-19 patients even more when tests from respiratory system turn negative. Finally, we underline the role of gut microbiota between SARS - COV2 infection and inflammatory respone and immune homeostasis.