Evidence map›Paper›PMID 34754698›Full record

ArticleCureus2021

Does Fecal-Oral Transmission of SARS-CoV-2 Due to Low Sanitation Conditions Contribute to Low Mortality Rates From COVID-19.

Nathan Rothschild

Open access · diamondAbstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Cureus, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
1citing papers in PubMed
0.1field-weighted citation impact, top 50% of its field
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

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.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

1 citing paper in PubMed, 2 citations in OpenAlex.

  1. Review
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author at 1 institution in 1 country.

Nathan RothschildBiotechnology, Tel-Hai College, Tel-Hai, ISR.
Tel Hai Academic College · IL

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

backgroundThe novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a global pandemic generated by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The primary infection site is mucosal surfaces, mainly the lungs and the intestine, where epithelial cells can be infected. COVID-19 has spread throughout the world, causing millions of deaths and hundreds of millions of confirmed infections. Despite the global spread of SARS-CoV-2, there are extreme differences between countries in mortality rates and confirmed infections.

methodsPearson correlations and a t-test were performed on data from 137 countries in order to test the correlation between number of deaths from diarrheal diseases (pre-COVID-19 pandemic data) as a marker for countries' sanitation level, and the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths per million.

resultsIt was found that countries' prevalence of confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths per million are statistically correlated with their sanitation level.

conclusionsThe hypothesis proposed in this article is that the low mortality rates from COVID-19 in countries where the level of sanitation is low are due to fecal-oral infection of the population by SARS-CoV-2, rather than infection of the respiratory system. This hypothesis is supported by the protective effect of the low sanitation level presented in this work and the fact that lung infection by SARS-CoV-2 can cause severe pathology, while infection in the intestine generally causes minor or no symptoms.

Indexed as

covid-19environmental sanitationfecal-oral infectionimmune responsesars-cov-2

Identifiers

PMID34754698
PMCPMC8571565
OpenAlexW3202576374

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.