If people suffering from diabetes are more likely to develop a serious form of Covid-19, it seems that the opposite is also the case among young people. In any case, this is what a new study published by American researchers reveals, Monday October 14, 2024, in the journal JAMA Network Open, reports the Washington Post . According to their results, children and adolescents infected with Covid-19 are much more likely to develop type 2 diabetes than children who have suffered from another respiratory infection.
Significant differences
To arrive at these conclusions, the scientists consulted the electronic medical records of more than 600,000 children aged 10 to 19 between January 2020 and December 2022. By comparing the data from the group affected by the coronavirus and those from the group affected by other respiratory infection, such as influenza or rhinovirus, it was found that the “coronavirus group” was 50% more likely to be diagnosed with type 2 diabetes after six months, compared to the other group. For young people experiencing obesity, this gap is even twice as significant.
However, several elements should be taken into account regarding these results. First of all, the question of vaccination arises. Indeed, during the period studied, the Food and Drug Administration, the public health authority in the United States, only authorized vaccines against Covid-19 for 5-11 year olds from October 2021. However, according to Pauline Terebuh, lead author of the study and epidemiologist at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine in Cleveland (Ohio), vaccines, like all public health interventions, would reduce the number of infections. risk of complications linked to coronavirus infection.
An association worth exploring
Steven M. Willi, director of the Diabetes Center at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, reiterated that the study only shows a correlation between Covid and type 2 diabetes, not a causal link. This increased diabetes “could be attributed to a lack of immunity, but it could also be linked to school closures and activity restrictions” reducing physical exercise, he suggested, emphasizing the importance of carrying out more in-depth research.
Therefore, parents do not necessarily have to worry about their child developing type 2 diabetes if they have been infected with Covid. In addition, Covid-19 is not the only virus that can trigger this type of so-called autoimmune reaction. This is also the case for mononucleosis (Epstein-Barr virus), which is associated with diseases such as multiple sclerosis and lupus, or the Zika virus, associated with Guillain-Barré syndrome. Note that there is no scientific consensus to say whether or not type 2 diabetes could be an autoimmune disease.
