Hormonal treatments for prostate cancer may prevent or limit COVID-19 symptoms

Men have roughly twice the risk of developing severe disease and dying from COVID-19 than women. Scientists say this is in part because women mount stronger immune reactions to the disease’s microbial cause: the infamous coronavirus called SARS-CoV-2. Now research with prostate cancer patients points to another possible explanation, which is that the male sex hormone testosterone helps SARS-Cov-2 get into and infect human cells. SARS-CoV-2 initiates infections by first latching onto its human cell receptor. But it can only pass into a cell with the aid of a second protein called TMPRSS2. Testosterone regulates TMPRSS2, such that levels of the hormone and the protein rise and fall together in tandem. If testosterone levels are depressed, scientists speculate, then TMPRSS2 levels might also be so low that the novel coronavirus is blocked at the gates. At least five clinical trials are now investigating if drugs acting on testosterone and its own receptor “could either prevent or cure COVID-19 symptoms,” said Dr. Andrea Alimonti from the University of Lugano in Bellanzona, Switzerland. Positive results from one study During a recent study, Alimonti’s team reviewed data from 42,434 men who were being treated for prostate cancer in the Veneto region of Italy. Among them, 5,273 were getting androgen deprivation therapies (ADT) that suppress testosterone. (The hormone fuels prostate tumors, so ADT is for some men a mainstay of treatment.) According to that in...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Living With Prostate Cancer Prostate Knowledge Treatments HPK Source Type: blogs