The nasopharyngeal and salivary microbiomes in COVID-19 patients with and without asthma

Abstract ​

So far, our understanding of the associations between respiratory infections and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) in the context of asthma is limited. Although our previous study and others did not find a correlation between preexisting asthma and increased risks of severe coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outcomes,1-3 people with asthma usually have an increased vulnerability to conventional respiratory viral infections. Thus, continuous investigation on SARS-CoV-2 infection in people with asthma is important.

People with asthma harbor altered airway microbiota, which has been suggested to mediate an increased susceptibility to severe illnesses upon viral respiratory infections.4 However, the microbiomes of patients with asthma during SARS-CoV-2 infection have not yet been characterized. To this end, we performed a microbiome study using nasopharyngeal samples and saliva samples from COVID-19 patients with and without preexisting asthma.