UNBELIEVABLE: U.S. Doctors Have Started Giving Men With Coronavirus Estrogen After Finding the Virus Kills Half as Many Women
By Daily Mail. Doctors are wondering if giving men two female sex hormones could make them more likely to survive the novel coronavirus. . .
This has led many researchers to wonder if the hormones mainly produced in women could be protective, reported The New York Times.
Two hospitals in the US are now putting that theory to the test, giving men estrogen or progesterone for a limited amount of time to see if it boosts their immune systems, decreases inflammation and reduces the severity of the illness.
Scientists say they don’t know why women seem less likely to die, but have suggested that women naturally tend to have stronger immune systems and are less likely to have long-term health conditions which make patients more vulnerable.
In China, researchers pointed the finger at men being more likely to smoke and drink, but this was a cultural factor which may be different in other countries. (Read more from “UNBELIEVABLE: U.S. Doctors Have Started Giving Men With Coronavirus Estrogen in the Hopes of Boosting Their Immune Systems After Finding the Virus Kills Half as Many Women” HERE)
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Doctors Have No Idea If It Will Work, But What the Heck. . .
By Nicoletta Lanese. The sex hormones estrogen and progesterone, which women produce in larger quantities than men, help to regulate the female immune system and may grant women special resistance against infections and harmful immune system responses, the Times reported. With that in mind, scientists at Cedars-Sinai and the Renaissance School of Medicine at Stony Brook University plan to treat small groups of COVID-19 patients with the hormones, to see if they make a difference.
“We may not understand exactly how estrogen works [to counteract COVID-19], but maybe we can see how the patient does,” Dr. Sharon Nachman, the principal investigator of the Stony Brook University trial, told the Times.
The Stony Brook trial will include 110 patients with confirmed or presumed cases of COVID-19 who develop at least one serious symptom, such as high fever, shortness of breath or pneumonia, but do not yet require mechanical breathing support through intubation, according to ClinicalTrials.gov. All men ages 18 and older may enter the trial, as well as women ages 55 and older (women’s estrogen levels tend to decline after menopause.) Half the participants will be treated with an estrogen patch placed on their skin for one week, while the other half will receive standard medical care. (Read more about the coronavirus estrogen plan HERE)
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