- Experts have found that some patients with COVID-19 are developing type 1 or type 2 diabetes.
- It is not clear whether diabetes can be a permanent side effect of coronavirus infection.
- People with autoimmune diseases, pre-diabetes or obesity are at high risk for COVID-19 complications.
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Diabetes is known to be a risk factor for severe cases of COVID-19.
But new evidence suggests that the reverse may also be true: some patients who have recovered from COVID-19 are developing diabetes, including type 1 and type 2, according to research published in November 2020 in Diabetes, Obesity and Metabolism.
More than one in 10 coronavirus patients (14.4%) was recently diagnosed with diabetes after recovering from the disease caused by the new coronavirus, according to the analysis of 3,711 patients in eight different studies.
New cases of diabetes may be the result of inflammation and insulin problems related to COVID-19, according to the study’s authors, researchers from several universities, including McMaster University in Canada.
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COVID-19 may worsen existing health problems, such as pre-diabetescausing type 2 diabetes
In at least some of these cases, it may be that some of the patients in the study already had diabetes and did not know about it until they were hospitalized by COVID-19, according to the study.
But the evidence also suggests that COVID-19 may be sufficient to aggravate metabolic health problems that exist in developed type 2 diabetes, according to Dr. Jose Aleman, assistant professor of endocrinology at NYU Langone Health.
“Stressful conditions lead to high levels of regulatory hormones that raise blood sugar to help the body fight any insults it is experiencing, such as illness or injury,” Aleman told Insider. “For people with underlying diseases, this may be enough to kick them over the edge.”
These conditions include pre-diabetes, obesity, insulin resistance or high blood pressure. This may explain how the virus is related to new cases of type 2 diabetes, which occurs when people become less responsive to insulin and have blood sugar control as a result.
Experts are more confused by new cases of type 1 diabetes
What is less clear is how it can also be related to new cases of type 1 diabetes. While type 2 diabetes occurs when people become less sensitive to insulin, type 1 occurs when people don’t produce enough insulin in the first place , due to the lack of specific cells in the pancreas called beta cells.
The best theory we have today, according to Aleman, is that COVID-19 can cause the immune system to overreact and destroy some of the body’s own cells while fighting the virus.
The researchers found that the coronavirus, or the body’s immune response to it, can disrupt pancreatic beta cells, potentially triggering the onset of type 1 diabetes.
Patients with existing autoimmune disorders or older patients with immune system problems may be particularly at risk for this.
We don’t know if COVID-related diabetes is permanent
However, we still don’t know enough about how the two diseases are related to fully understand patients’ long-term prognosis. At least some patients are likely to have ongoing problems.
“I think this will be one of COVID’s long-term complications,” said Aleman.
In the meantime, he recommends that people at risk of diabetes start treatment for underlying diseases, such as obesity and high blood sugar, now as a preventive measure.
“It is difficult to treat when you are already sick and in the hospital, and that is a motivation to treat these diseases now,” he said.