The World Health Organisation (WHO) notified that smoking can lead to a higher risk of severe illness and death from the coronavirus in hospitalized patients. However, the organization could not specify how high the risks are.
The UN health agency reviewed 34 published studies on the association between smoking and Covid-19 in a scientific brief published this week. This indcluded hospitalisation, the probability of infection, severity of disease and death.
In this review, WHO noted that 18% of the hospitalized coronavirus patients are smokers and that there appeared to be a significant link between whether these patient’s smoked and the severity of disease they suffered, the patient’s risk of dying and the type of hospital interventions required.
However, In April, French researchers released a study which suggested that smokers were at a lesser risk of catching Covid-19 and planned to test nicotine patches on patients and health workers. But that somehow did not work out.
WHO mentioned that smoking impairs lung function making it harder for the body to fight off coronaviruses and other respiratory diseases.