The under-reported role of toxic substance exposures in the COVID-19 pandemic.

Abstract

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and previous pandemics have been viewed almost exclusively as virology problems, with toxicology problems mostly being ignored. This perspective is not supported by the evolution of COVID-19, where the impact of real-life exposures to multiple toxic stressors degrading the immune system is followed by the SARS-CoV-2 virus exploiting the degraded immune system to trigger a chain of events ultimately leading to COVID-19. This immune system degradation from multiple toxic stressors (chemical, physical, biological, psychosocial stressors) means that attribution of serious consequences from COVID-19 should be made to the virus-toxic stressors nexus, not to any of the nexus constituents in isolation. The leading toxic stressors (identified in this study as contributing to COVID-19) are pervasive, contributing to myriad chronic diseases as well as immune system degradation. They increase the likelihood for comorbidities and mortality associated with COVID-19. For the short-term, tactical/reactive virology-focused treatments are of higher priority than strategic/proactive toxicology-focused treatments, although both could be implemented in parallel to reinforce each other. However, for long-term pandemic prevention, toxicology-based approaches should be given higher priority than virology-based approaches. Since current COVID-19 treatments globally ignore the toxicology component almost completely, only limited benefits can be expected from these treatments.

• Authors: Ronald N Kostoff, Michael B Briggs, Alan L Porter, Antonio F Hernández, Mohammad Abdollahi, Michael Aschner, Aristidis Tsatsakis
• Journal: Food and chemical toxicology : an international journal published for the British Industrial Biological Research Association (Food Chem Toxicol) Vol. 145 Pg. 111687 (Nov 2020) ISSN: 1873-6351 [Electronic] England
• PMID: 32805343 (Publication Type: Journal Article, Review)
• Copyright: Copyright © 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Chemical References

• Hazardous Substances

Topics

• Betacoronavirus
• COVID-19
• Coronavirus Infections (etiology, prevention & control, psychology)
• Hazardous Substances (adverse effects)
• Healthy Lifestyle
• Humans
• Pandemics (prevention & control)
• Pneumonia, Viral (etiology, prevention & control, psychology)
• Quarantine
• SARS-CoV-2