TY  - JOUR
A1  - Ritter, Andreas Hans
A1  - Kreis, Nina-Naomi
A1  - Louwen, Frank
A1  - Yuan, Juping
T1  - Obesity and COVID-19: molecular mechanisms linking both pandemics
T2  - International journal of molecular sciences
N2  - The coronavirus disease 2019 COVID-19 pandemic is rapidly spreading worldwide and is becoming a major public health crisis. Increasing evidence demonstrates a strong correlation between obesity and the COVID-19 disease. We have summarized recent studies and addressed the impact of obesity on COVID-19 in terms of hospitalization, severity, mortality, and patient outcome. We discuss the potential molecular mechanisms whereby obesity contributes to the pathogenesis of COVID-19. In addition to obesity-related deregulated immune response, chronic inflammation, endothelium imbalance, metabolic dysfunction, and its associated comorbidities, dysfunctional mesenchymal stem cells/adipose-derived mesenchymal stem cells may also play crucial roles in fueling systemic inflammation contributing to the cytokine storm and promoting pulmonary fibrosis causing lung functional failure, characteristic of severe COVID-19. Moreover, obesity may also compromise motile cilia on airway epithelial cells and impair functioning of the mucociliary escalators, reducing the clearance of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2). Obese diseased adipose tissues overexpress the receptors and proteases for the SARS-CoV-2 entry, implicating its possible roles as virus reservoir and accelerator reinforcing violent systemic inflammation and immune response. Finally, anti-inflammatory cytokines like anti-interleukin 6 and administration of mesenchymal stromal/stem cells may serve as potential immune modulatory therapies for supportively combating COVID-19. Obesity is conversely related to the development of COVID-19 through numerous molecular mechanisms and individuals with obesity belong to the COVID-19-susceptible population requiring more protective measures.
KW  - COVID-19
KW  - obesity
KW  - adipose-derived mesenchymal stem/stromal cells
KW  - cytokine storm
KW  - immune response
KW  - inflammation
Y1  - 2020
UR  - http://publikationen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/55511
UR  - https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hebis:30:3-555112
SN  - 1422-0067
N1  - © 2020 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access
article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution
(CC BY) license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
VL  - 21
IS  - 16, art. 5793
SP  - 1
EP  - 28
PB  - MDPI
CY  - Basel
ER  -