Familial Mediterranean Fever and COVID-19: Friends or Foes?
Front Immunol
; 11: 574593, 2020.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-846257
ABSTRACT
Familial Mediterranean Fever (FMF) and COVID-19 show a remarkable overlap of clinical symptoms and similar laboratory findings. Both are characterized by fever, abdominal/chest pain, elevation of C-reactive protein, and leukocytosis. In addition, colchicine and IL-1 inhibitors treatments that are effective in controlling inflammation in FMF patients have recently been proposed for off-label use in COVID-19 patients. Thus, FMF may resemble a milder recapitulation of the cytokine storm that is a hallmark of COVID-19 patients progressing to severe disease. We analyzed the sequence of the MEFV-encoded Pyrin protein - whose mutations cause FMF- in mammals, bats and pangolin. Intriguingly, although Pyrin is extremely conserved in species that are considered either a reservoir or intermediate hosts for SARS-CoV-2, some of the most common FMF-causing variants in humans are present as wildtype residues in these species. We propose that in humans, Pyrin may have evolved to fight highly pathogenic infections.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Familial Mediterranean Fever
/
Pneumonia, Viral
/
Colchicine
/
Coronavirus Infections
/
Pandemics
/
Pyrin
/
Betacoronavirus
/
Mutation
Type of study:
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
Topics:
Variants
Limits:
Animals
/
Humans
Language:
English
Journal:
Front Immunol
Year:
2020
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Fimmu.2020.574593
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