Covid ‘perfect storm’ as more patients hit by fungal infections

were steroids, which happen to be immunosuppressants. Wary of secondary bacterial infections in intensive care units, doctors often gave coronavirus patients broad- spectrum antibiotics as a precaution. But the combination of lungs battered by Covid, impaired immune systems, and both good and bad bacteria wiped out by antibiotics left critically ill patients exposed to moulds and spores.

“It’s an unfortunate perfect storm for these organisms, and we’re seeing it,” said Dr Tom Chiller, the chief of the Mycotic Diseases Branch at the US-based Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

Even before the pandemic, rates of the rare and lethal “black fungus” mucormycosis infection in India were estimated to be about 70 times higher than in the rest of the world. With Covid, a fresh epidemic germinated, driven in part by liberal steroid use in hospitals and a high proportion of susceptible patients with uncontrolled diabetes.

Scientists now say concerning reports of other fungal infections, caused by pathogens including Aspergillus and Candida auris, have emerged in hospitalised Covid patients. In particular, the common fungal infection aspergillosis, often seen in combination with the flu, has been observed in critically ill Covid patients globally, from the US to the UK, France, Pakistan and India.

“Essentially, the more damage there is in the lung from a virus, the more likely you are to get a fungal infection,” said Dr Darius Armstrong-James, a clinical senior lecturer in respiratory fungal diseases at Imperial College London. “And the problem with fungal infections is that they’re much more lethal than bacterial infections. They’re difficult to treat, difficult to diagnose and cause a lot more mortality.”

( The Guardian, UK)