PLoS ONE (Jan 2022)

CMV seropositivity is a potential novel risk factor for severe COVID-19 in non-geriatric patients

  • Simone Weber,
  • Victoria Kehl,
  • Johanna Erber,
  • Karolin I. Wagner,
  • Ana-Marija Jetzlsperger,
  • Teresa Burrell,
  • Kilian Schober,
  • Philipp Schommers,
  • Max Augustin,
  • Claudia S. Crowell,
  • Markus Gerhard,
  • Christof Winter,
  • Andreas Moosmann,
  • Christoph D. Spinner,
  • Ulrike Protzer,
  • Dieter Hoffmann,
  • Elvira D’Ippolito,
  • Dirk H. Busch

Journal volume & issue
Vol. 17, no. 5

Abstract

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Background COVID-19 has so far affected more than 250 million individuals worldwide, causing more than 5 million deaths. Several risk factors for severe disease have been identified, most of which coincide with advanced age. In younger individuals, severe COVID-19 often occurs in the absence of obvious comorbidities. Guided by the finding of cytomegalovirus (CMV)-specific T cells with some cross-reactivity to SARS-CoV-2 in a COVID-19 intensive care unit (ICU) patient, we decided to investigate whether CMV seropositivity is associated with severe or critical COVID-19. Herpes simplex virus (HSV) serostatus was investigated as control. Methods National German COVID-19 bio-sample and data banks were used to retrospectively analyze the CMV and HSV serostatus of patients who experienced mild (n = 101), moderate (n = 130) or severe to critical (n = 80) disease by IgG serology. We then investigated the relationship between disease severity and herpesvirus serostatus via statistical models. Results Non-geriatric patients (Conclusions We identified ‘CMV-seropositivity’ as a potential novel risk factor for severe COVID-19 in non-geriatric individuals in the studied cohorts. More mechanistic analyses as well as confirmation of similar findings in cohorts representing the currently most relevant SARS-CoV-2 variants should be performed shortly.