Viral co-pathogens in COVID-19 acute respiratory syndrome – what did we learn from the first year of pandemic?

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijid.2022.01.018Get rights and content
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Highlights

  • During the COVID-19 pandemic, respiratory pathogen distribution has changed dramatically.

  • Occurrence of co-pathogen during COVID-19 infection is varied.

  • We describe the occurrence of respiratory pathogens during the first year of pandemic.

  • Patients with COVID-19 ARI had very low occurrence of co-pathogen infections.

Abstract

Objective

: This study aimed to describe the distribution of respiratory pathogens and the occurrence of co-pathogens during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Methods

We used a multiplex polymerase chain reaction (PCR) panel targeting 23 microorganisms to analyze the oro-pharyngeal samples of patients admitted to our hospital with acute respiratory infection (ARI) between March 1, 2020, and February 28, 2021. We matched 40 to 50 patients who were SARS-CoV-2 positive and SARS-CoV-2 negative per month for age and sex.

Results

A total of 939 patients with multiplex PCR test results were included in the study. Respiratory pathogens where detected in only 8/476 (1.6%) patients with COVID-19 versus 87/463 (18.7%) patients with non–COVID-19 ARI patients. Diversity and rates of pathogens vastly differed from previous years but showed seasonal variance.

Conclusion

Patients with SARS-CoV-2 infection presenting with ARI during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated paucity of respiratory co-pathogens.

Keywords

COVID-19
SARS-CoV-2
co-infections

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4

these authors contributed equally to the article