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Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective?
Sub-Saharan Africa has generally experienced few cases and deaths of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In addition to other potential explanations for the few cases and deaths of COVID-19 such as the population socio-demographics, early lockdown measures and the possibility of under reporting, we...
Autores principales: | , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Frontiers Media S.A.
2021
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7930213/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33679730 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fimmu.2021.565625 |
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author | Kalungi, Allan Kinyanda, Eugene Akena, Dickens Howard Kaleebu, Pontiano Bisangwa, Innocent M. |
author_facet | Kalungi, Allan Kinyanda, Eugene Akena, Dickens Howard Kaleebu, Pontiano Bisangwa, Innocent M. |
author_sort | Kalungi, Allan |
collection | PubMed |
description | Sub-Saharan Africa has generally experienced few cases and deaths of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In addition to other potential explanations for the few cases and deaths of COVID-19 such as the population socio-demographics, early lockdown measures and the possibility of under reporting, we hypothesize in this mini review that individuals with a recent history of malaria infection may be protected against infection or severe form of COVID-19. Given that both the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and Plasmodium falciparum (P. falciparum) merozoites bind to the cluster of differentiation 147 (CD147) immunoglobulin, we hypothesize that the immunological memory against P. falciparum merozoites primes SARS-CoV-2 infected cells for early phagocytosis, hence protecting individuals with a recent P. falciparum infection against COVID-19 infection or severity. This mini review therefore discusses the potential biological link between P. falciparum infection and COVID-19 infection or severity and further highlights the importance of CD147 immunoglobulin as an entry point for both SARS-CoV-2 and P. falciparum into host cells. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7930213 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2021 |
publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-79302132021-03-05 Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? Kalungi, Allan Kinyanda, Eugene Akena, Dickens Howard Kaleebu, Pontiano Bisangwa, Innocent M. Front Immunol Immunology Sub-Saharan Africa has generally experienced few cases and deaths of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). In addition to other potential explanations for the few cases and deaths of COVID-19 such as the population socio-demographics, early lockdown measures and the possibility of under reporting, we hypothesize in this mini review that individuals with a recent history of malaria infection may be protected against infection or severe form of COVID-19. Given that both the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and Plasmodium falciparum (P. falciparum) merozoites bind to the cluster of differentiation 147 (CD147) immunoglobulin, we hypothesize that the immunological memory against P. falciparum merozoites primes SARS-CoV-2 infected cells for early phagocytosis, hence protecting individuals with a recent P. falciparum infection against COVID-19 infection or severity. This mini review therefore discusses the potential biological link between P. falciparum infection and COVID-19 infection or severity and further highlights the importance of CD147 immunoglobulin as an entry point for both SARS-CoV-2 and P. falciparum into host cells. Frontiers Media S.A. 2021-02-18 /pmc/articles/PMC7930213/ /pubmed/33679730 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fimmu.2021.565625 Text en Copyright © 2021 Kalungi, Kinyanda, Akena, Kaleebu and Bisangwa. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms. |
spellingShingle | Immunology Kalungi, Allan Kinyanda, Eugene Akena, Dickens Howard Kaleebu, Pontiano Bisangwa, Innocent M. Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? |
title | Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? |
title_full | Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? |
title_fullStr | Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? |
title_full_unstemmed | Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? |
title_short | Less Severe Cases of COVID-19 in Sub-Saharan Africa: Could Co-infection or a Recent History of Plasmodium falciparum Infection Be Protective? |
title_sort | less severe cases of covid-19 in sub-saharan africa: could co-infection or a recent history of plasmodium falciparum infection be protective? |
topic | Immunology |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7930213/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33679730 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fimmu.2021.565625 |
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