Malnutrition in SARS-CoV-2 infected patients

An outbreak of viral pneumonia was reported in Wuhan, China, at the end of December 2019, and subsequent sample analyses discovered the involvement of a new strain of coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2), which belongs to the same family of single-stranded enveloped RNA viruses that caused the emergences of SARS-CoV in 2003 and MERS-CoV in 2012. Symptoms of COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2 syndrome) may occur within 2–14 days after exposure and can lead to difficulties in cilium beating of airway cells and to alveolar damage. Infected patients experience mild to severe manifestations, such as fever, dry cough, dyspnoea, abdominal pain, and diarrhea. Most cases resolve rapidly, but the infection can still be fatal in about 3% of cases. Much like MERS or the coronavirus that infects pigs, the enteric affections can be prominent, possibly leading to the loss of absorptive potential. Just a few weeks after its discovery, the COVID-19 has been considered a serious worldwide threat. Preliminary data suggest that male older adults and subjects with immune dysfunctions might be more susceptible to the worse viral disease, but there is a need to further investigate the virulence factors. One of the factors most discussed is the malnutritional status of the host, but most of the beliefs are anecdotal. The dataset was used to write the article "The Malnutritional Status of the Host as a Virulence Factor for New Coronavirus SARS-CoV-2", which was published by the Journal Frontiers in Medicine in 2020.