COVID-19 pandemic has poses a significant health burden globally. Hypothesis suggests that immunity against hepatitis A virus (HAV) may offer protection from COVID- 19. The infection had spread to 213 countries, with 7.3 million people infected and 413,733 dead, as of 10June 2020. This data was added with the World Health Organization susceptibility classification on the worldwide prevalence of HAV, and the study investigated relationship between HAV susceptibility and COVID-19 mortality.

The data from 213 countries were examined that revealed a remarkable increasing trend in COVID-19 mortality rates by HAV susceptibility. The mortality risk related to living in a more susceptible country (medium/high) was 27.8 times higher (95% CI for OR: 3.6–213.2), when a cut-off of 200/million population was included.

The study concluded that, in spite of confounding factors in different countries, an association might exists between hepatitis A susceptibility of the population and COVID-19 mortality. However, further studies are required to substantiate these findings.

Source: Sarialioğlu F, Belen FB, Hayran KM. Hepatitis A susceptibility parallels high COVID-19 mortality. Turk J Med Sci. 2021 Feb 26;51(1):382-384.