Doctors at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) have revealed that differences in lung physiology and immune function in children can be a reason why they avoid more severe COVID-19 disease than adults.
According to the research paper recently published in the American Journal of Physiology – Pulmonary and Cellular Physiology, only about 1.7% of the 149,082 first cases in the U.S. were infants, children, and adolescents under the age of 18.
The role of the lung and the immune response in children and its role in protecting against corona–
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The authors note that children under the age of 18 make up 22% of the U.S. population, and only 3 child deaths have been identified by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as of April 2020.
Lung function and immune response in children
Researchers have found that angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 enzymes called ACE2 are the doors that allow corona virus to enter the cells of the body, less in children’s lungs than in adults.
Children’s lung tissues naturally have a higher concentration of T-organized T cells, and patients with higher levels of T cells are known to have an inhibitor factor, an anti-inflammatory cytokine.
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The results of the paper were achieved through cooperation in a multidisciplinary group consisting of pediatricians, adult scientists and scientists in pediatric surgery, critical adult care, neonatal medicine, and molecular biology.
“We, as physicians, have faced a challenge on how to treat COVID-19 and learn in real time,” said Dr. Bindo Akanti, associate professor of critical care medicine at McGovern College of Medicine.
He added: “I knew that in order to discover the best way to treat adults, we needed to team up to find the reason why children could be spared from the severe disease associated with the virus.
As a result of this collaboration, the team started a new study using blood samples from patients at different stages of COVID-19 to further understand how to treat the virus and the variations in disease development between children and adults.
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