Covid-19 Could Make People More Prone To Other Infections By Wreaking Havoc With Gut Bacteria

An intricate network of gut microbiota ecosystems work hard towards preventing a pathogenic bacteria from colonizing and weakening your body. But when the gut microbiota gets impaired, the loss of that barrier of protection can make way for dangerous pathogens to take over. In a recent study published in the journal Nature Communications, researchers found that even a mild Covid infection can reduce the diversity of gut microbiota and make people more vulnerable to other infections.

“Our findings suggest that coronavirus infection directly interferes with the healthy balance of microbes in the gut, further endangering patients in the process,” said study co-senior author Ken Cadwell, a microbiologist. “Now that we have uncovered the source of this bacterial imbalance, physicians can better identify those coronavirus patients most at risk of a secondary bloodstream infection.”

While the over-use of antibiotics in the last few decades has resulted in antibiotic resistance, in the last two years, studies have further revealed that disruptions or damages to the existing network of an individual’s gut bacteria are linked to more severe Covid infections.

To further investigate whether the disruption occurred before or after a Covid infection, researchers at NYU Grossman School of Medicine enrolled 96 people who were hospitalized with Covid in 2020. All of the patients were either based in New York City or New Haven. They observed that every single one of them had low gut microbiome diversity. Whereas the colonies of several microbes that are resistant to several antibiotics increased — thanks to the rampant overuse of antibiotics in the early stages of the Covid-19 pandemic.

The drug-resistant microbes that originated in the guts were able to enter the bloodstream in 20% of the patients.

“Our data suggest dynamics in COVID-19 patients may be similar to those observed in cancer patients: blood stream infection-causing organisms may translocate from the gut into the blood, potentially due to loss of gut barrier integrity, through tissue damage downstream of antiviral immunity instead of chemotherapy,” the researchers concluded in their study.