Postponed COVID-19 may be associated with more active aging processes and shorter life expectancy, Sergei Voznesensky, an associate professor at the Department of Infectious Diseases of the RUDN University, and a virologist, professor at Moscow State University, Doctor of Biological Sciences, Alexei Agranovsky, in an interview with RBC.

According to Voznesensky, for reasonable conclusions that people who have had a coronavirus infection age faster, more research is needed. So far, the available data is insufficient.

“Too little time has passed (since the start of the pandemic) for us to be able to assess life expectancy and how it has been impacted by a human illness. Probably, we can talk about some predictions, ”Agranovsky said.

According to him, all the data indicate that the infection should be attributed to acute respiratory diseases, which in the overwhelming majority of cases disappear without a trace. Complicating the course of COVID-19 are chronic diseases that a person had before.

“It is somewhat far-fetched to assert that the transferred infection is an absolute fact of a decrease in life expectancy,” the specialist said.

But at the same time, he explained that the pathogen of SARS-COV-2 has a serious chance of becoming a factor limiting life expectancy, because it acts on many organs, on many tissues, and causes postcoid syndrome. If we consider it from this point of view, then, in theory, the virus can be counted among the factors limiting life expectancy.