Antioxidant status in children and adolescents with COVID-19

Abstract

Background. The COVID-19 pandemic has raised the importance of this problem to the first stage and has affected healthcare system around the world. Despite the more favorable COVID-19 course, the child population should be at focus of special attention, due to the active participation in its distribution. The course of COVID-19 includes a cascade of pathological processes accompanied by the generation of reactive oxygen species, which can have extremely negative consequences for the developing organism. The research of these processes in children is vital and will improve the effectiveness of preventive and therapeutic measures. The aim: to analyze changes in enzymatic and non-enzymatic links in the antioxidant defense in children and adolescents with diagnosed COVID-19 infection.Materials and methods. 17 children and adolescents (average age – 12.35 ± 4.01 years) were examined, including 8 boys (47 %) and 9 girls (53 %) with COVID-19 infection. The control group of children and adolescents (practically healthy) according to the «copy-pair» principle was selected. We used spectrophotometric methods.Results. In the group of children and adolescents with diagnosed COVID-19 infection, there were lower levels of total antioxidant activity (p < 0.0001), superoxide dismutase activity (p < 0.0001), content of reduced glutathione (p = 0.048) and retinol (p = 0.015), increase in glutathione reductase activity (p = 0.015) relative to the control.Conclusion. The obtained data indicate the insufficiency of antioxidant system components number in children and adolescents with diagnosed COVID-19 infection and indicate the advisability of antioxidant therapy using to stabilize these indicators.