association between human leukocyte antigen and covid-19 severity

In the last days of 2019, a new coronavirus emerged in wuhan, china, and less than three months its disease, now called covid-19, was announced a global pandemic by who. covid-19 usually causes respiratory symptoms and can lead to more severe conditions like ards. hla has a crucial role in regulating the immune system; thus, different hla allele types can be a protective or risk factor for some diseases, so we aimed to find such associations to determine whether some alleles can predict susceptibility or resistibility to covid-19 and finally facilitate vaccine development. in this case-control study, 15 admitted covid-19 cases with severe symptoms and ten individuals with mild covid-19 symptoms were enrolled in the case and control groups, respectively. they were genotyped for hla a/b/dr loci using a low-resolution hla typing test. these alleles were more prevalent in case (severe covid-19) group: a*24 (53.33% vs 10%), b*50 (20% vs 10%), b*55 (20% vs 10%), drb1*04 (40% vs 20%) and drb1*11 (53.33% vs 30%) but the difference was only statically significant in a*24 allele (p=0.027; odd ratio=10.286). a*24 was also more prevalent in all patients than the general population in iran. a*24 was the only allele more prevalent in severe covid-19 cases with statistical significance. this allele was reported to be a risk factor for such autoimmune diseases as type 1 diabetes, myasthenia gravis, and systemic lupus erythematosus, which may be related to reported immune system hyperresponsiveness in severe covid-19 cases.