Increased Hints Suggest COVID-19 Might Activate Diabetes

Diabetes is already known to be a key risk factor for contracting severe COVID-19, and those suffering from this condition have a higher risk of mortality.

Paul Zimmet, a researcher currently studying the metabolic illness at Monash University in Australia, said, "diabetes is dynamite" if a person gets COVID-19.

To date, Zimmet is one of the many researchers thinking that diabetes does not make anyone more susceptible to the said virus. However, it might trigger diabetes in some individuals.

"Diabetes itself is a pandemic just like the COVID-19 pandemic. The two pandemics could be clashing," he said.

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COVID-19 Destroys Beta cells

In most type 1 diabetes patients, the immune cells of the body begin to destroy Beta cells, which are responsible for the production of the hormone insulin in the pancreas, frequently abruptly.

In the middle of April, 18-year-old Finn Gnadt, a student from Germany, had been infected with COVID-19, even though he said that he was feeling well.

He also said that his parents had fallen sick following a "river cruise in Austria," so his family went through the test for virus antibodies produced in reaction to the virus.

Gnadt thought he was able to endure the killer virus unharmed. However, several days after, he began feeling exhausted and excessively thirsty.

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Then, in early May, he got diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. With this, Dr. Tim Hollstein, his physician at the University Hospital Schleswig-Holstein, suggested that the abrupt onset might have something to do with the virus.

Furthermore, in the case of Gnadt, his physician suspected that COVID-19 had destroyed his Beta cells as his blood did contain the immune cell types that typically impair the pancreatic islets where the Beta cells live.

Increased Evidence

The idea is based on a number of people, including Ghadt, who have naturally contracted diabetes after they got infected with COVID-19 and on pieces of evidence from several other people with the said virus who have gone through hospital confinement with tremendously high levels of blood sugar.

Zimmet explained that when the body is not producing adequate insulin to break down sugar, it uses ketones as a substitute fuel source. He elaborated that sometimes, there is a need to start with a tiny proof to hunt an assumption.

Several researchers referred to other evidence, as well. They specified that various viruses, which include the one that leads to severe acute respiratory syndrome or SARS, have been associated with autoimmune conditions like type 1 diabetes.

The Latest COVID-19 Hint

The latest hint on COVID-19 that can trigger diabetes is coming from an experimental study in small lab-grown pancreases, which came out last week suggests that the said infectious disease might indeed activate diabetes by impairing the cells controlling blood sugar.

However, according to metabolic-disease researcher Naveed Sattar, other studies are careful about such suggestions saying that there is a need to closely monitor diabetes rates in those who previously had COVID-19, and identify if rates rise over and above predicted levels.

According to clinician-scientist Abd Tahrani from the University of Birmingham in the UK, to establish such a connection between the two illnesses, there is a need for researchers of more substantial evidence.

He added that there is also a need for well-structured mechanistic and experimental research and epidemiological cohort research.

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