Very clear and important article:
Viewpoint: Here’s Why COVID-19 Is Much Worse Than Flu
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infectioncontroltoday.com/view/viewpoint…
"Unlike influenza, SARS-CoV-2 uses ACE2 receptors to infiltrate cells. Similar to HIV, SARS-CoV-2 can silently spread throughout the host’s body and attack almost every organ.
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"Medicine appears to have largely bought into the SARS-CoV-2 seasonal influenza analogy. Everything appears to be focused on pulmonary disease. Fringe coronavirus deniers started the narrative that COVID-19 was like the flu.
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"This disinformation narrative has taken hold and has even affected decision making of prominent scientific committees, where disease severity is increasingly defined as a hospitalization (most commonly due to pulmonary distress),..
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"..rather than the potential chronic and long-term disabling sequelae.
"COVID-19 has a number of presentations and pulmonary is just one."
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"More than anything else, the receptor used for attachment determines the behavior of any virus, along with what organs and even species it can infect.
[important!]
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Human rhinoviruses---the common cause of a cold, uses the ICAM-1 receptor...to replicate in sinus tissues
The influenza virus attaches to cells via sialic acid receptors,... primarily targets a patient’s lungs
HIV uses the CD4 receptor residing on Lymphocytes.
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In the case of SARS-CoV-2, the virus which causes COVID-19, the ACE2 receptor is used for viral entry into the cells. The ACE2 receptor is entirely different to that used by the rhinovirus and seasonal flu...This receptor is present throughout the body, not just the lungs.
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"Clinically, SARS-CoV-2 combines some of the properties of the seasonal flu plus HIV. Similar to the seasonal flu, SARS-CoV-2 can primarily attack the lungs. But ACE2 receptors are everywhere. Similar to HIV, the virus can also enter a stealth mode, silently spreading...
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...throughout the host’s body and attacking almost every organ, especially those with a high ACE2 receptor concentration. And similar to HIV, SARS-CoV-2 also frequently causes asymptomatic spread.
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"In full stealth mode SARS-CoV-2 can asymptomatically attack the vasculature & heart.Myocarditis can occur and the patient is totally unaware of the damage until an arrhythmia or symptomatic myocarditis develops. In young asymptomatic patients this is not an uncommon sequela.
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"SARS-CoV-2 targeting the cardiovascular system of the body should be a given. It has been known for a long time that ACE receptors are involved in cardiovascular regulation. ACE inhibitors and ACE II blockers have long been used to treat high blood pressure.
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"This is the same pathway the virus infects.
"Thus, there are multiple presentations of SARS-CoV-2 including pulmonary, cardiac, gastrointestinal (GI), and central nervous system (CNS).
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"Recently, there has been mounting evidence regarding the central nervous system effects. As early as July 2020, scientists were sounding the alarm regarding COVID-19 brain damage: Including temporary brain dysfunction, strokes, nerve damage and brain inflammation...
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