Asthmatics at no elevated risk of dying from Covid-19, study finds

Asthma does not elevate the risk of severe coronavirus symptoms or death, a new study found.

The researchers reviewed 57 studies conducted on a total of 587,000 people to carry out their analysis.

Almost 350,000 people in the pool who had contracted Covid-19 were from Asia, Europe, and North and South America.

They found that people with asthma had a 14 per cent lower risk of contracting Covid-19 and were significantly less likely to be hospitalized with the virus.

Lead author Anthony Sunjaya from the University of New South Wales in Australia said, “While we showed that people with asthma do not seem to have a higher risk of infection with Covid-19 compared to those without asthma and have similar outcomes, we need further research to better understand how the virus affects those with asthma.”

The results showed that just over seven in every 100 people who turned out Covid-19 positive also had asthma, compared to just over eight in 100 in the general population having the condition.

The study is contrary to previous findings that claimed people with chronic respiratory conditions like asthma were reported to be at greater risk to contract respiratory illnesses such as Covid-19, MERS, among others.

“Respiratory infections like those caused by coronaviruses can exacerbate asthma symptoms and corticosteroid treatment may increase susceptibility to Covid-19 infection and its severity,” Sunjaya said.

Severe illness — requiring admission to ICU and/or ventilator use — and death from Covid-19 in people with asthma find “no significant difference” of people with asthma being at higher risk, the team stated.

The findings of the study were published in the journal Science Daily.