Son ‘dodgers’ of SARS-CoV-2‘super resistant’, ‘surfers’ of all the pandemic waves that they have not been infected despite maintaining continuous exposures, living with infected people or doing jobs in which contagion was almost inevitable. This ‘shield’ contrasts with the situation of people who, despite not presenting greater predisposing factors -age or associated morbidities, for example-, not only became infected but, in some cases, presented the more serious forms of infection and even died.
The individual immunity It was one of the first causes that was considered in this kind of ‘viral autoimmunity’. But they did not lose sight of the personal genetic traits, whose peculiarities would act as protectors against SARS-CoV-2, giving the organism a range of ‘hyperimmunity’. In fact, the potential power of genes in the development and severity of Covid-19 and its influence on immune responses was in the spotlight since the first months of the pandemic.
In a work published in Nature ImmunologyFrench immunologist and pediatrician Jean-Laurent Casanova, director of the Laboratory that he shares between the Rockefeller University of New York, and the Necker Children’s Hospital, in Paris, pointed out that “the genetic landscape of an individual in particular and one General population would play a critical role in shaping the dynamics of Covid-19.”
What’s more, this renowned world expert told Diario Médico that the Multisystem Inflammatory Syndrome of Covid-19 (MIS-C) which severely affects some children also has a genetic explanation. “There is a genetic cause and, at least in some children, MIS-C appears through inborn errorsCasanova advanced.
The questions and steps that were taken around the genetic causes of the severity of Covid-19 went away moving, almost simultaneouslytowards the other side of the coin: people who have never been infected with this viral disease, opening the unknown again: can genetics clarify also why are there people who continually avoid SARS-CoV-2?