Women are “up to twice as likely” to suffer from “long-lasting COVID-19” than men, reveals a review of scientific literature conducted by an international group of researchers.
Of 32 scientific articles on this subject, 26 “reported a significant difference between the sexes in the appearance of symptoms of long-lasting COVID”, indicates the analysis published in theItalian Journal of Gender-Specific Medicine.
In general, women suffer more from the “neuropsychiatric” symptoms of long-lasting COVID, such as depression, anxiety or chronic fatigue.
Canadian neurologist and professor at the University of Toronto Maria Carmela Tartaglia, who co-authored this study, considers these results “doubly surprising”, because, if women are more affected by long-term COVID than men, these conversely are more at risk of dying from the disease or suffering from serious complications.
“We do not really understand why there is this difference, she concedes to Le Devoir, but the difference between the sexes is obvious. According to his study, “the risk of developing long-lasting COVID is up to twice as high in women as in men.”
A few suspects, however, are in the dock. Female hormones, such as estrogen and progesterone, could play a role, as they do in other known autoimmune diseases. The recently published study also indicates that, after 60 years, the difference between the sexes fades, which could confirm the role of hormones. “After the menopause, things change,” says Ms. Tartaglia.
Women are also more prone to suffer from these psychological ailments, she adds.
She also points out that “gender”, and not just “sex”, is to be taken into account, because social factors and traditionally female types of occupations could contribute to accentuating the long-term COVID syndrome.
“We have more questions than answers right now,” she admits. It is in any case a virus that makes us realize the importance of sex and gender in the study of the disease, because it has a big impact. »
This text is taken from our newsletter “Coronavirus mail” of April 11, 2022. To subscribe, click here.