The presence of genes that date back to Neanderthal Man played an important role in the spread of Covid in Val Seriana , one of the areas where there were the most victims in the first wave.
This is supported by the “Origin” study by the Mario Negri institute , published in the “iScience” magazine and presented today at Palazzo Lombardia.
«The sensational thing - comments Giuseppe Remuzzi , director of the Mario Negri Institute - is that 3 of the 6 genes associated with this risk arrived in the modern population from Neanderthals , in particular from the Vindija genome which dates back to 50 thousand years ago and was found in Croatia."
A certain region of the human genome, the study shows, was significantly associated with the risk of contracting Covid and becoming seriously ill.
" Perhaps once upon a time this genome protected Neanderthals from infections, now it causes an excess of immune response which not only does not protect us but exposes us to a more severe disease", explains Remuzzi.
"The victims of the Neanderthal chromosome in the world - he adds - are perhaps one million and they could be precisely those who, in the absence of other causes, die from a genetic predisposition ."
9,733 people from Bergamo and its province took part in the study and filled out a questionnaire on their clinical and family history related to Covid. 92% of participants who had the virus had become infected before May 2020. Among these, 12 people had had symptoms as early as November-December 2019.
People who had had "severe" Covid more frequently had first-degree relatives who died from the virus than participants with mild Covid or who were not infected, a finding that highlights a contribution of genetics to the severity of the disease .
«The results of the research - commented the president of the Lombardy Region Attilio Fontana – give an answer to one of the questions that any of us asked ourselves in the midst of the pandemic: why some contract the virus asymptomatically and others in a serious and alas sometimes with dramatic epilogues? ».
(Unioneonline/L)