Relationship between selenium deficiency and vulnerability to ebolavirus disease in beni, drc

Abstract

In Ebola patients, selenium aids in regulating blood clotting and possibly assist in coagulopathy properties of the Ebola haemorrhagic fever. Therefore, the objectives of this study were to determine the Selenium levels of people living in Beni, DRC and whether there is an association between Ebola vulnerability and selenium deficiency.This was a case control study with cases being Ebola virus disease survivors and controls were their contact persons during the time of infection. Students t-test were computed to determine if there exist a significant difference in the population means selenium levels in the case group and control group. Logistic regression analysis model was fitted into the data to determine the association between selenium deficiency and vulnerability to EVD adjusting for demographic and socio-economic factors.The mean difference in selenium levels of non - survivors was higher than that of survivors. A t-test conducted suggested that this difference in mean was statistically significant with p-value less than 0.05 (0.00181). The odds of getting infected by Ebola while having normal selenium levels, is 3.47 (confidence interval, 1.30 - 10.21) times higher than when one has high selenium levels after adjusting for all other covariates as mentioned above.There was a statistically significant relationship between Ebola vulnerability and selenium deficiency.