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Strange, new coronavirus symptoms baffle scientists

Some effects are relatively mild, for example, a loss of smell and taste or inflamed toes, but others are much more fatal.

By Aaron Sull, World Israel News

Research is showing that coronavirus, which has claimed the lives of over 150,000 and has infected more than 2.2 million, can damage a lot more than just the lungs.

“While the lungs are kind of taking the brunt of it because our immunity is so low to coronavirus, it’s actually able to move around and circulate throughout our whole body,” Dr. Eric Cioe-Peña, an emergency room physician and the director of global health at Northwell Health in New York, told Live Science.

“Any new virus that hops to humans can kind of go rampant in the body because our immune system hasn’t seen anything similar,” he said.

Some effects are relatively mild, for example, a loss of smell and taste or inflamed toes, but others are much more dangerous.

Brain

A study published in the International Journal of Infectious Diseases in April found evidence that coronavirus can cause brain damage and deadly neurological diseases such as meningitis and encephalitis.

Kidneys

Early studies show that 14-to-30 percent of coronavirus patients hospitalized in China and New York are on dialysis or receiving continuous renal replacement therapy after having lost kidney function, according to Johns Hopkins School of Medicine.

Blood

Studies published in Thrombosis Research found 20-to-30 percent of coronavirus patients in the Netherlands and France have developed blood clots.

“There is growing evidence that people hospitalized with Covid-19 are at risk from blood clots in multiple locations: the lungs (causing pulmonary embolus), the brain (causing stroke) and the veins (causing deep vein thrombosis),” said Tim Chico, a professor of cardiovascular medicine at Sheffield University in England, as quoted by The Straits Times

“The risk of blood clots with Covid-19 appears to be even greater than the increased risk of blood clots seen in other severe illnesses,” he said.

Although the reason coronavirus is causing havoc in the body is still unknown, some believe it is causing a hyper-aggressive response in the immune system that attacks not only the virus, but also healthy cells throughout the body as well.