ArticleEBioMedicine2021
Shorter leukocyte telomere length is associated with adverse COVID-19 outcomes: A cohort study in UK Biobank.
Article in EBioMedicine, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 55 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
55 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it, 78 citations in OpenAlex.
- Infection and telomere length: A systematic review.PloS one · 2025Pooled it
- Identifying factors contributing to increased susceptibility to COVID-19 risk: a systematic review of Mendelian randomization studies.International journal of epidemiology · 2022Pooled it
- Genetic evidence for a causal role of depression in late-onset Alzheimer disease: A Mendelian randomization study.Medicine · 2026Article
- Age-adjusted leukocyte telomere length predicts long-term mortality in older patients discharged from acute care hospitals.GeroScience · 2026Article
- Inflammatory cytokines are not associated with early age-related macular degeneration: a two-sample Mendelian randomisation study.Eye (London, England) · 2026Article
- Leukocyte telomere dynamic change in patients with mild to moderate covid-19 during three weeks of follow-up: Relation with therapy.Journal of medical biochemistry · 2026Article
- Deep Biological Clocks in Critical Care Medicine: A Scoping Review Toward Translational Precision Care.Journal of personalized medicine · 2026Review
- Identifying direct risk factors in UK Biobank via simultaneous Bayesian-frequentist model-averaged hypothesis testing using Doublethink.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Maternal smoking during pregnancy, other reproductive factors, and neonatal jaundice: A two-sample Mendelian randomization study.Tobacco induced diseases · 2026Article
- Heterogeneous leukocyte telomere trajectories and inflammatory resolution 12 months after mild COVID-19: an exploratory cohort study.Frontiers in aging · 2026Article
- Imaging, Pulmonary Function, and Histopathologic Findings of Persistent Fibrosis in a Longitudinal Cohort 3 Years after COVID-19.Annals of the American Thoracic Society · 2025Article
- Telomere Length and COVID-19 Severity: A Comparative Cross-Sectional Study Across the Clinical Spectrum.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- Remote Blood Collection for Telomere Length Measurement: Assessing the Impact of Sample Characteristics and Handling on DNA Quality and Assay Outcomes.American journal of human biology : the official journal of the Human Biology Council · 2025Article
- Causal links between iron status, mitochondrial function, and laryngeal and hypopharyngeal cancers: a Mendelian study.Discover oncology · 2025Article
- Article
- Causal Association Between Inflammatory Factors and Hypertrophic Scar: A Two-Sample Mendelian Randomization Study.Journal of cosmetic dermatology · 2025Article
- Genetic determinants of inflammatory cytokines and their causal relationship with inflammatory disorders of breast: a two-sample Mendelian randomization study.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Hemorrhoids and cardiovascular disease: A bidirectional Mendelian randomization study.Open medicine (Warsaw, Poland) · 2025Article
- Telomere length and COVID-19 disease severity: insights from hospitalized patients.Frontiers in aging · 2025Article
- Leukocyte telomere length and telomerase activity in Long COVID patients from Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.Memorias do Instituto Oswaldo Cruz · 2025Article
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Authors and funding
16 authors at 4 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
Background Older age is the most powerful risk factor for adverse coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19) outcomes. It is uncertain whether leucocyte telomere length (LTL), previously proposed as a marker of biological age, is also associated with COVID-19 outcomes. Methods We associated LTL values obtained from participants recruited into UK Biobank (UKB) during 2006-2010 with adverse COVID-19 outcomes recorded by 30 November 2020, defined as a composite of any of the following: hospital admission, need for critical care, respiratory support, or mortality. Using information on 130 LTL-associated genetic variants, we conducted exploratory Mendelian randomisation (MR) analyses in UKB to evaluate whether observational associations might reflect cause-and-effect relationships. Findings Of 6775 participants in UKB who tested positive for infection with SARS-CoV-2 in the community, there were 914 (13.5%) with adverse COVID-19 outcomes. The odds ratio (OR) for adverse COVID-19 outcomes was 1·17 (95% CI 1·05-1·30; P = 0·004) per 1-SD shorter usual LTL, after adjustment for age, sex and ethnicity. Similar ORs were observed in analyses that: adjusted for additional risk factors; disaggregated the composite outcome and reduced the scope for selection or collider bias. In MR analyses, the OR for adverse COVID-19 outcomes was directionally concordant but non-significant. Interpretation Shorter LTL is associated with higher risk of adverse COVID-19 outcomes, independent of several major risk factors for COVID-19 including age. Further data are needed to determine whether this association reflects causality. Funding UK Medical Research Council, Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council and British Heart Foundation.
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