ORLANDO, Fla. - As the most recent spike in COVID-19 cases plagues the world, researchers wonder why COVID-19 hits some people harder than others.
"Male, older age, things like that, not surprisingly" are high-risk factors," said Dr. Brian Rini, a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University.
But what about your blood type? In a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, scientists performed a genetic analysis on people who currently had COVID-19 and those who did not. They found that people with Type A blood had a 50% greater risk of needing oxygen support or a ventilator if they were to contract COVID-19, while people with Type O blood had a 50% reduced risk of having severe COVID-19, but the link of blood type to illness is not new.
"Different blood types have different antigens on the surface of the red blood cells," Rini continued.
That makes certain blood types more susceptible to illness, such as cholera, recurrent urinary tract infections, and a bug that can cause ulcers and stomach cancer.
More research is needed to see the further implications from this finding, but for right now, it provides scientists more information to fight the novel virus.
Some explanation as to why Type O blood has a reduced risk of severe COVID-19 might be people with Type O are better able to recognize certain proteins as foreign, and then fight them off better, including proteins on virus surfaces.
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September 08, 2020 at 02:01AM
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Health Beat: The link between blood type and COVID-19 - WFMZ Allentown
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