Coronavirus test illustration -
Sunil Ghosh / Hindustan Times / Shutterstock / SIPA
Covid-19 patients carrying a segment of Neanderthal DNA, inherited from a cross with Homo sapiens some 60,000 years ago, are at greater risk of severe complications from the disease, according to researchers.
The genetic coding inherited from this distant cousin of modern humans, for example, makes them three times more likely to need mechanical ventilation, reveals a study published in
Nature on
Wednesday.
There are many reasons why some patients need intensive care, while others have only mild symptoms, if any.
Being elderly, male, a medical history can worsen the outcome of the disease.
Genetic factors also have a role, so suggest this work.
Bangladeshis particularly at risk
Recent research by the Covid-19 Host Genetics Initiative reveals that a genetic variant in a region of chromosome 3 - one of the 23 pairs in the human genome - is associated with more severe forms of the disease. disease.
This same region was already known to harbor genetic code from Neanderthals, which prompted the study authors to seek a link to Covid-19.
This potentially dangerous segment for Covid-19 patients is not distributed evenly across the globe, according to the study.
About 16% of Europeans are carriers, and about half of the population of South Asia, with the highest proportion (63%) in Bangladesh.
This could explain why people of Bangladeshi origin hospitalized in Britain are two more likely to die from Covid-19 than the general population, as another study found.
The incriminated gene segment is almost absent from the genome of the inhabitants of East Asia and Africa.
About 2% of the DNA of non-Africans originates in the genome of Neanderthals, according to several studies.
Politics
Coronavirus: Prime Minister Jean Castex went to a Paris hospital on Thursday evening
World
Coronavirus: Donald Trump has tested positive for Covid-19 and is in quarantine
Science
Neanderthal
Genetic
Coronavirus
Research