Can Covid-19 Cause Type-I diabetes??

3 min readJun 26, 2020

Posted in Tags: Uncategorized #diabetes, biochemistry, biology, blood, chemicals, chemistry, covid infection, covid-19, covid19, death, diabetes, heart disease, molecular biology, molecular medicine, natural, organic, pancreas, pandemic, science, vegan

We know that diabetes significantly increases the chances of developing AND dying from COVID-19. However what about COVID-19 CAUSING diabetes? Making people more susceptible to developing it. Well, that’s what new evidence is pointing to with the COVID-19 viral infection leading to diabetes’ development…

There have been a number of cases where individuals have suddenly developed type-I diabetes after a bout of COVID-19. The people arrive at the hospital with high levels of blood sugar and ketones. Ketones are produced when the body runs low of blood glucose to use for energy. Therefore, when there isn’t enough insulin or blood sugar, fatty deposits throughout the body (mainly in the level first) are converted and used as energy. The ketone is the byproduct of said conversion. So how does COVID-19 start trigger the onset of spontaneous diabetes? The answer begins with our immune system and an enzyme known as Angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 ( ACE2). SARS-CoV-2 uses this enzyme to enter cells and begin their course of infection. Because COVID-19 causing diabetes is a VERY bold assertion to make, researchers need to conduct epidemiological studies, and also experimental studies on pancreatic organoids (masses of pancreatic cells in a petri dish essentially), to determine if a link can be established. To do this, scientists need data. Therefore, researchers are now establishing a database for those wishing to help in this study. The database is like any other patient database, HIPAA compliant and secure, but it’s use is rather unique. Doctors and researchers will be able to see how many patients who had NO diabetes but had high-blood sugar (a sign of prediabetes), and who then later develop diabetes after their COVID-19 infection. Already there is mounting evidence in vivo (in test tube) studies revealing that COVID-19 is capable of destroying α- and β-cells (alpha and beta-cells). These cells are found in the pancreas and are used to sense and secret insulin in response of high blood sugar. Too much blood sugar and an organism can enter a coma or die. Likewise, too little too. Beta-cells release insulin, whereas alpha-cells cause the releasing of glucagon, which tells the body to release sugar back into the blood if blood sugar is too low. So far, this is evidence that COVID-19 worsens symptoms of diabetes. For us to relate a casual relationship, we need to work harder to record data necessary to do analytical studies with epidemiological data.

Published by Michael Tran

Molecular cellular biologist, writer, and in grad school for Public Health. View more posts

Originally published at http://moleculardrugs.wordpress.com on June 26, 2020.

Can Covid-19 Cause Type-I diabetes??

Published by Michael Tran

Written by Michael Tran