We all must be aware that men and ageing women are more prone to COVID-19 risk as they have a weaker immune system. But, if recent research has to be believed post-menopausal women are at even higher risk of contracting COVID-19.
The research was published on 2 August 2020 on medRxiv, led by King’s College London, researchers found that the presence of estrogen (a hormone) in women protects from novel coronavirus. This estrogen level decreases in post-menopausal women making them more susceptible to it.
However, researchers also finds something which gives a hope to aging women. Let’s find out more about this research.
Research methodology, participants
Scientists at King’s College London were curious about the effect of COVID-19 on women entering the menopause. It is already known that females have a stronger immune response to a variety of viral infections because of the presence of estrogen, more robust humoral and cellular immune responses.
To find out whether the reduced level of estrogen in post-menopausal women does increases the chances of corona virus risk, they launched study in the UK on 24th March 2020.
For this, they needed female participants who were using COVID Symptom Tracker App (Mobile app), were in menopause state and was into Combined Oral Contraceptive Pill (COCP) and postmenopausal women taking Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT).
The study was conducted into more than 500,000 women participants. Scientist captured the self-reported information related to COVID-19 symptoms. Data used for this study included records collected between 7th May – 15th June 2020.
Also Read: How to Boost Immune System to Fight Virus
Results find post-menopausal women at higher risk
Post-menopausal women aged 40-60 years had a higher rate of COVID-19 symptoms, with consistent, but not significant trends observed for tested COVID-19 and disease severity. However, women aged 18-45 years taking COCP exhibited significantly lower COVID-19 symptoms, with a reduction in hospital attendance.
Fortunately, Post-menopausal women using HRT or hormonal therapies did not exhibit COVID-19 symptoms for HRT users alone.
This made doctors support a protective effect of estrogen on COVID-19 and a negative
association with COCP use. HRT use was positively associated with COVID-19 symptoms.
What can be done
Research is being carried out in whole world to bring out effective treatment and vaccination. Till then we can protect ourselves by use of face mask. One other concrete way is to boost the immune system which counters the effect of virus. This can be done by regular intake of immune booters, the one I would like to recommend is “Immune Complex” which consists of ingredients from rare herbs.
References:
Estrogen and COVID-19 symptoms: associations in women from the COVID Symptom StudyRicardo Costeira, Karla A Lee, Benjamin Murray, Colette Christiansen, Juan Castillo-Fernandez, Mary Ni Lochlainn, Joan Capdevila Pujol, Iain Buchan, Louise C Kenny, Jonathan Wolf, Sebastien Ourselin, Claire Steves, Timothy Spector, Louise Newson, Jordana BellmedRxiv 2020.07.30.20164921; doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.07.30.20164921
Dr Sunit Sanjay Ekka is a physiotherapist in practice for the last 15 years. He has done his BPT from one of the premium Central Government physiotherapy colleges, ie, SVNIRTAR. The patient is his best teacher and whatever he gets to learn he loves to share it on his Youtube channel and blog.
