Chronic Disease, Environmental Chemicals, and COVID19

Abstract:

There is a global epidemic of chronic, noncommunicable diseases such as obesity, type II diabetes, cardiovascular disease, asthma, and cancer. The COVID19 pandemic is superimposed upon this epidemic, and there are similar risk factors in addition to age, immunological, liver, kidney, and neurological disorders. Environmental pollution – air, water, soil - is responsible for at least 9 million deaths each year. Air pollution has been reported to increase susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2. This may relate to the multiple health effects associated with chronic air pollution. A host of environmental chemicals are associated with increased risks of essentially all the health conditions, except age, which increase susceptibility to the virus. PCBs, dioxins, PAHs, PFAS, bisphenols, and phthalates represent such a few of the classes of chemicals which are associated with such susceptibility factors. For example, PFAS are associated with cancer, kidney and liver effects, immune suppression, and obesity; BPA has been linked to heart disease, obesity, and diabetes; Phthalates have shown neurodevelopmental impacts and obesity. Are people who have exposure to such chemicals at increased risk for COVID19? These all represent large classes of chemicals and, like PCBs and dioxins, could be regulated as classes, as there is no way to test all the members of these classes. A class approach combined with attention to essentiality may offer a way forward for health protective policies.