Cannabis potential effects to prevent or attenuate SARS-COV2 contagion

  1. M. Herrera-Gómez Paula
  2. F. Echeverri-Cataño Luis
  3. S Giraldo
  4. Y Ruiz Colorado-
  5. Alberto Vélez van Meerbeke

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Abstract

Medical cannabis has gained an exponential interest in recent years. Therapeutic targets have been broadened from specific applications over pain control, chemotherapy side effects, treatment-resistant epilepsies and multiple sclerosis, among others. Several in vitro and animal studies, along with few human controlled studies, suggest cannabinoids have a potential therapeutic role over medical conditions comporting inflammatory mechanisms. Given the tremendous world-wide impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, research efforts are converging towards the use of cannabinoids to attenuate severe or fatal forms of the disease. The present survey aims to explore possible correlations between cannabis use, either recreational or medical, over the presence of SARS-COV-2 contagion, along with the symptom’s severity. 4026 surveys were collected via electronic form. Results suggest a relation between any type of cannabis use and a lower risk of SARS-COV-2 contagion ( p= 0,004; OR=0,689, IC95% 0,534-0,889). Despite several methodological limitations, the present survey steps up the urge to expand our understanding on cannabinoids potential use on human controlled studies, that can better arm us in the fight against the current COVID-19 pandemic.

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  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2022.03.31.22273181: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    EthicsIRB: Ethical considerations: This research is supported by the Ethics Committee from Universidad Tecnologica de Pereira (Comité de Bioética de la Universidad Tecnologica de Pereira), who gave the ethical approval (# 52-28062).
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power AnalysisSample size calculation and sampling strategy: We calculated sample size with an expected frequency of 50%, an acceptable error of 5%, and a design effect of 1 for a population survey, of a minimum sample size of 384 participants.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    Statistical analyses were conducted on IBM SPSS Statistics for Mac, Version 26.0.
    SPSS
    suggested: (SPSS, RRID:SCR_002865)

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Another limitation is the absence of data in regard to doses quantification and biomarkers of endocannabinoid response in individuals consuming cannabis having SARS-CoV2 positive or suspected infection, in order to compare effects among different populations, dosing quantification, doses-response relation, biological and sociodemographic characteristics. These considerations could be taken into account for future research under more rigorous experimental protocols. Despite our survey limitations, we can consider a reasonable amount of evidence pointing at the phytocannabinoids possible mechanisms to prevent contagion or attenuate symptoms severity. The SARS-CoV-2 initial contagion enters the host through spike proteins (SP) having a high affinity with angiotensin-converting-enzyme 2 (ACE2) and transmembrane protease serine 2 (TMPRSS2). Both proteins are expressed in multiple tissues, especially in lung, urogenital and gastrointestinal tissue, and participate in the fusion of the virus envelope with the the target cells membranes through an endocytosis mechanism. Inside the cell, the mRNA virus is released, completing the transcription and translation process of the viral structures through the ribosome, packaged in the Golgi apparatus, and infecting the contiguous cells by exocytosis 12. Cytokine release syndrome is triggered by internalization of ACE2 and activation of angiotensin 2, which in turns activates the expression of KB nuclear factor, increasing proinflammatory cyt...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.

    About SciScore

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  2. Version published to 10.1101/2022.03.31.22273181v1 on medRxiv