Clin Infect Dis
. 2020 Jun 4;ciaa709.
doi: 10.1093/cid/ciaa709. Online ahead of print.
Alterations of the Gut Microbiota in Patients With COVID-19 or H1N1 Influenza
Silan Gu 1 , Yanfei Chen 1 , Zhengjie Wu 1 , Yunbo Chen 1 , Hainv Gao 2 , Longxian Lv 1 , Feifei Guo 2 , Xuewu Zhang 3 , Rui Luo 1 , Chenjie Huang 1 , Haifeng Lu 1 , Beiwen Zheng 1 , Jiaying Zhang 1 , Ren Yan 1 , Hua Zhang 1 , Huiyong Jiang 1 , Qiaomai Xu 1 , Jing Guo 1 , Yiwen Gong 1 , Lingling Tang 2 , Lanjuan Li 1
Affiliations
- PMID: 32497191
- DOI: 10.1093/cid/ciaa709
Abstract
Background: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is an emerging serious global health problem. Gastrointestinal symptoms are common in COVID-19 patients, and SARS-CoV-2 RNA has been detected in stool specimens. However, the relationship between the gut microbiome and disease remains to be established.
Methods: We conducted a cross-sectional study of 30 COVID-19 patients, 24 influenza A (H1N1) patients, and 30 matched healthy controls (HC) to identify differences in the gut microbiota by 16S ribosomal RNA (rRNA) gene V3-V4 region sequencing.
Results: Compared with HC, COVID-19 patients had significantly reduced bacterial diversity, a significantly higher relative abundance of opportunistic pathogens, such as Streptococcus, Rothia, Veillonella and Actinomyces, and a lower relative abundance of beneficial symbionts. Five biomarkers showed high accuracy for distinguishing COVID-19 patients from HC with an area under the curve (AUC) up to 0.89. Patients with H1N1 displayed lower diversity and different overall microbial composition compared with COVID-19 patients. Seven biomarkers were selected to distinguish the two cohorts with an AUC of 0.94.
Conclusion: The gut microbial signature of patients with COVID-19 was different from that of H1N1 patients and HC. Our study suggests the potential value of the gut microbiota as a diagnostic biomarker and therapeutic target for COVID-19, but further validation is needed.
Keywords: COVID-19; H1N1; biomarker; dysbiosis; intestinal microbiota.