Covid-19: acquired acute porphyria hypothesis
Lianne Abrahams
Abstract
Pandemic Covid-19 pneumonia, of SARS-CoV-2 aetiology, presents an existential threat to health care systems globally. Multiple therapeutic and prophylactic agents are currently undergoing clinical trial, including 23 clinical trials of (hydroxy)chloroquine in China. While progress towards a curative agent or vaccine is promising, the principal limiting factor in public health emergency is time, and therefore a pre-existing licensed therapeutic would offer reprieve to health care systems operating at the edge of capacity. In this brief communication, the author argues that Covid-19 has high probability of being more than a disease of pneumonia, and that critical Covid-19 patients may be experiencing a form of acquired acute porphyria. Readily available interventions exist to treat acute porphyria and the position is advanced that urinalysis of critical Covid-19 patients would diagnose this pathology.