Higher rate of COVID-19 death before vaccination linked to certain common inflammatory immune conditions: New analysis of 17 million patient GP records in England provides important evidence for decisions around future booster vaccine programs
People with certain inflammatory immune conditions affecting the joints, bowel and skin, such as rheumatoid arthritis, may have been more at risk of dying or needing hospital care if they got COVID-19 before vaccination compared with the general population, according to a new study published in The Lancet Rheumatology.
The findings are based on analysis of 17 million patient GP records in England during the first phase of the pandemic from March-September 2020, when the UK was in lockdown and before vaccines were available. Since then, many of the people treated with medicines analysed in this study have been specifically targeted for third primary vaccine doses followed by boosters and are on a list of people to offered anti-viral treatments.
The study was conducted by a team from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) using the OpenSAFELY platform with colleagues from the St John’s Institute of Dermatology at Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust, University of Oxford, King’s College London, the University of Exeter and University of Edinburgh.
More than one million patients in the analysis had immune mediated inflammatory diseases (IMIDs). These included inflammatory bowel disease such as Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, conditions affecting the joints such as rheumatoid arthritis, and skin conditions including psoriasis.
After accounting for age, sex, deprivation, and smoking status, the research suggests that people with IMIDs affecting the bowel, joints and skin had a 23% increased risk of COVID-19-related death and 23% increased risk of COVID-related hospitalisation compared to people without IMIDs before the introduction of vaccines and anti-viral treatments. People with inflammatory joint disease appeared to be at greatest risk compared to those with gut or skin disease. Compared to the general population, the risk of death was estimated by the researchers to be approximately eight extra deaths per 1,000 people with joint disease in a year (without taking into account other differences between people with and without joint disease, e.g. age and other health conditions).
Study author Professor Sinéad Langan, Wellcome Senior Clinical Fellow and Professor of Clinical Epidemiology at LSHTM, said: “During the height of the pandemic in England in 2020, many people with inflammatory conditions affecting the bowel, joints and skin were advised to stay at home and shield because doctors did not know how COVID-19 would affect them, or what the effects of drugs such as immune modifying therapies used to treat IMIDs would be.
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