Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has infected millions of people worlwide and caused a pandemic that is still ongoing. The virus can cause a disease named as COVID-19 which is composed of multi systemic manifestations with a pulmonary system predominance. As the time passes we are dealing more and more with the effects and complications of the disease in survivors which has shown a wide variety as far as concerns the clinical outcome and the timeline of symptoms in different patients. Since the lungs are the most involved organs and the post-COVID prolonged and persistent effects are mainly related to the pulmonary system it is crucial to define and predict the outcome and to determine the individuals that can progress to fibrosis and loss of function of lungs. This review summarizes the current literature regarding the pulmonary complications in post-COVID syndrome and the management of these conditions.
The COVID-19 pandemic has brought countries’ health services into sharp focus. It was drawn to our group’s attention that healthcare workers (HCWs) had a lower mortality rate against higher COVID-19 incidence compared to the general population in Turkey. Since risk of exposure to tuberculosis bacillus among healthcare workers are higher than the population, we aimed to investigate if there is a relationship between BCG and
Mycobacterium tuberculosis
exposure history with COVID-19 severity in infected HCWs. This study was conducted with 465 infected HCWs from thirty-three hospitals to assess the relationship between COVID-19 severity (according to their hospitalization status and the presence of radiological pneumonia) and BCG and
Mycobacterium tuberculosis
exposure history. HCWs who required hospital admission had significantly higher rates of chronic diseases, radiological pneumonia, and longer working hours in the clinics. Higher rates of history of contact and care to tuberculosis patients, history of tuberculosis, and BCG vaccine were observed in hospitalized HCWs. HCWs who had radiological pneumonia had a significantly increased ratio of history of care to tuberculosis patients and a higher family history of tuberculosis. The findings from our study suggest that the lower mortality rate despite the more severe disease course seen in infected HCWs might be due to frequent exposure to tuberculosis bacillus and the mortality-reducing effects of the BCG vaccine.
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