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It remains a strange concept that prompts questions: why does one die from corona, while the other does not even notice that he has had the virus. The risk factors have already been identified: age, weight, gender and underlying conditions, but that only explains part of the story. The innate immune system may play a role in this, reports De Volkskrant.
Sophie Uyoga of the African research institute Kemri came to the conclusion this summer that of thousands of Kenyan blood donors, one in twenty had antibodies against Covid-19. So there would be about the same number of infections in Kenya as in Belgium. But where we had nearly 10,000 deaths, in Kenya (more than 50 million inhabitants) only 589 people died from the corona virus.
Age
Two factors undoubtedly also play a role: Africans are on average younger. Secondly, less testing is done and not every corona death will end up in the statistics as such. But even if you correct for that, the numbers remain remarkable. Microbiology professor Yap Boum of Mbarara University in Uganda offers another explanation: “We think that the exposure we have to infectious diseases, of which malaria and pneumonia are the most common, boosts our immunity,” he says in de Volkskrant.
It would also explain why women are twice as likely to die from a corona infection as men. Scientists from the American research program Women’s Health Research reported last week that women naturally use less of certain inflammatory proteins against the virus. This reduces the risk of a life-threatening chain reaction of the immune system (cytokine storm). Such an aspect of the natural defenses could also play a role in other less severely affected population groups.
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