Blood Type Related to COVID-19 High or Low Risk

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Scientists think that the antigen receptors on red blood cells in type A blood is more susceptible to the novel coronavirus and can lead to more blood clotting. ID 90875323 © Incomible| Dreamstime.com

Posted By: Melanie Carbine August 1, 2020

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Michael Lewis, age 38, has had all the advantages of an upper middle class White American and he had no health risks to cause him to worry if he got sick. Still, he self-isolated with his partner at home and he worked on some independent projects at home including looking at options to create a news website for Chikin Melele. His only social interaction was a family dinner every Sunday.

When people started going back to church in June, covid-cases began to increase again where they lived in Utah. His brother-in-law got sick, but his covid-test came back negative. So, the father-in-law assumed he had the same cold and did not get tested. Three days after family dinner, Michael woke up feeling extra fatigued and when his covid-test came back positive, the rest of the family got tested. Of 8 people in the family, 4 of them had tested positive for the virus.

Of those who got sick, they all had either type A or AB blood. The members of the family who did not get sick had type B or O blood. Michael suffered only mild symptoms for about a week – extreme tiredness, a cough and a sore throat. However, it is now a month later and his sense of smell has not quite returned. He says he can faintly smell chemicals with really strong odors like chlorine. His brother-in-law’s wife also says she still cannot really taste anything.

As we learn more about the novel coronavirus, more questions surface. One question that remains hard to explain has been how blood type might increase or decrease the risk of contracting the virus. People with blood type O- seem less likely to get sick when in contact with the virus, but it is hard to determine the reason.

Physicians experimented with blood transfusions from animals to humans as early as 1665 but they were banned when some transfusions resulted in death. Today blood transfusions are common, a procedure where doctors take blood from one person and put it into the body of another. Successful blood transfusions prevent death from childbirth, surgery and excessive blood loss. It was not until 1940 that scientists completely figured out that there are different blood types and they can only be combined in certain combinations safely.

In 1901, Austrian-born American biologist Karl Landsteiner discovered that there are four blood types: A,B, AB, and O. Then in 1940, Landsteiner and another scientist, Alexander Wiener, discovered that each blood type can also be + or -.

Identifying blood type is essential for blood donations. O- is known as the universal donor because all blood types can accept O- blood, however O blood cannot receive any other type of blood. A blood can receive A or O blood, and B blood can receive B or O blood. AB is the universal recipient because AB blood can receive A, B or O blood. The red blood cells have protein and sugar molecules specific to blood type on their surfaces that respond to the antibodies of the other blood types. Antibodies are also produced when a body successfully fights off an infection or virus.

Scientists have been studying the relationship between blood type and illnesses since the SARS epidemic in 2002. People with type A blood seem to be more susceptible to exposure than people with type O blood. Recent studies of COVID-19 patients in China, Italy and Spain, and New York all support the idea that blood type is connected to how an individual will be affected by the virus. The virus uses a substance that is readily available on the surface of type A blood cells to grow and the virus particles carry the blood group antigen of the person infected. However, type O blood already has antibodies for type A and B antigens. This might be why someone with O- blood is less likely to develop symptoms when exposed to the virus. Type O blood have lower levels of the proteins that activate blood clotting, and scientists think that COVID-19 activates blood clotting.

However, this does not mean a person with type O blood is immune. Type O blood is common among Black Americans but they have experienced higher rates of illness from this virus than White Americans. You can find out your blood type when you donate blood or if antigen testing is available in your state.