Experiment Report of Cancer and COVID-19 Cytokine Study 2022-12-02

In the latest decade of cancer research, serum Interleukin 6(IL-6) in cytokines has received special attention. IL-6 itself acts as a driver of tumorigenesis and anti-apoptotic signaling, and it is also a key indicator of cancer risk, diagnosis, and prognosis. The journal “Nature Medicine” published an article about IL-8 concentrations in May 2020, which analyzed nearly 3,000 patients and found that IL-8 concentration was significantly associated with worse prognosis, and higher IL-8 concentrations were also found to be associated with later stages of tumor grade and larger size of tumors. The survival ratio between patients with high and low IL-8 concentrations even exceeds more than three times. And TNF-α can stimulate tumor cell growth, proliferation, invasion, metastasis, and angiogenesis.

In the October 2020 issue of “Nature Medicine”, Dr. Del Valle and others studied the serum IL-6, IL-8, Tumor Necrosis Factor-α(TNF-α), and IL-1b in hospitalized patients with COVID-19. They highlighted in a comprehensive multivariate analysis that high serum IL-6 and TNF-α levels were still significantly associated with worse prognoses in COVID-19 patients. They propose to measure IL-6 and TNF-α first to stratify patients by their condition in further prospective clinical trials to treat patients with COVID-19. And showed encouraging preliminary efficacy in the treatment of severe COVID-19 patients.

A research report on 148 severe COVID-19 patients currently published in the “European Heart Journal” pointed out that 66% of severe patients suffered heart damage, including cardiovascular disease, arrhythmia, myocarditis, and other sequelae. In addition, in a study led by the University Hospital Frankfurt in Germany, researchers examined the heart health of about 100 people who had recovered from COVID-19. After MRI scans, 78 of them showed signs of heart damage, and in about 76% of those who recovered, their blood contains high levels of troponin, a protein normally produced after a heart attack; Another 60 recovered patients showed signs of heart inflammation 71 days after their diagnosis. There is no doubt that COVID-19 damages the lungs the most, but many studies have confirmed that the infection can also cause damage to the heart, kidneys, liver, intestines, and even the brain and central nervous system which cause encephalitis, seizures, and sympathetic storming, patients suffered strokes, and many suffered from anosmia or dysosmia.

In an article in “Nature”, the famous British scientific writer Michael Marshall discussed the most urgent question about the long-lasting disorder that arises following infection with the virus that causes COVID-19 (Long COVID), that is, many people who have tested positive for the virus, whether they are diagnosed with mild symptoms, asymptomatic, recovered, or severe patients, will be attacked by the new coronavirus and cause damage after 4 weeks. The UK Office of National Statistics(ONS), following up on more than 20,000 people who tested positive for COVID-19, found that even at week 12, 13.7% of those who tested positive for COVID-19 were still experiencing symptoms caused by COVID-19. Therefore, as of June 13, 2021, there were 175 million people infected with COVID-19 in the world. If 13.7% of infected people have long-term symptoms according to the UK ONS data, it means that about 24 million people around the world are still suffering from the pain caused by the sequela of COVID-19 after being infected for 3 months.

Animal experiments conducted by Development Center for Biotechnology (DCB), Taiwan have confirmed that after administering human tumor cells to mice and then administering chemotherapy drugs such as 5-Fluorouracil (5FU) and Cisplatin, it was found that SEH® 997 Wan Sheng Lin concentrated solution not only has a protective effect on the liver of mice, but also can reduce human cytokines IL-6, IL-8, TNF-α, and can increase white blood cells 1.8~3 times, lymphocytes 1.2~4.7 times, monocyte 1.8~11.3 times. In addition, it has been confirmed in animal experiments that it can minimize side effects such as arrhythmias leading to cardiac hypertrophy, which may cause an increase in organ weights, such as heart, liver, spleen, and kidney, and can relieve pain. 

References:
1. Schalper, K.A., Carleton, M., Zhou, M. et al. Elevated serum interleukin-8 is associated with enhanced intratumor neutrophils and reduced clinical benefit of immune-checkpoint inhibitors. Nat Med 26, 688–692 (2020).
2. Del Valle, D.M., Kim-Schulze, S., Huang, HH. et al. An inflammatory cytokine signature predicts COVID-19 severity and survival. Nat Med 26, 1636–1643 (2020).
3. Mark Nicholls, COVID-19 and cardiovascular disease, European Heart Journal, Volume 41, Issue 29, 1 August 2020, 2727–2729.
4. Michael Marshall, The four most urgent questions about long COVID-19, Nature 594, 168-170 (2021).