Coronavirus Disease 2019 and Diabetes Mellitus: How both Aggravate the Severity of Each Other

Abstract

Background and aim: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a global pandemic that pose severe threat to human life. It associates with several diseases including diabetes mellitus (DM) thereby aggravating the risk or severity of the disease. Presently, there is no document that provides full scenario on how the diseases’ (COVID-19 and DM interacts. This study elucidates the hypothetic associations between the two diseases. Methods: Relevant articles were retrieved from Google Scholar, PubMed, ScienceDirect and Medline using the keywords: ‘SARS-CoV 2’, ‘diabetes mellitus’ and ‘COVID-19’. Results: Findings from several experimental studies showed that COVID-19 and DM both aggravates severity of one another. This affirmed to the fact that patients suffering from both pandemics are definitely at increased risk of severe disease pathogenesis. Reports revealed that, COVID-19 infection promotes elevation of blood glucose, whereas, DM compromises immune response particularly the innate immune network which is the main defense system against COVID-19 among other factors. Conclusions: This article provided a hypothetical scenario of the mechanisms of interactions between COVID-19 and DM. Future investigators would find it useful in the design and development of clinical/basic research targeted at therapeutic remedy for management of DM in persons infected with COVID-19.