AUTHOR=Xu Shu-Zhen , Wang Zhi-Xin , Fang Xi , Chen Cong , Yang Xiao-Ke , Shuai Zong-Wen , Tao Sha-Sha 

TITLE=No genetic causal association between systemic lupus erythematosus and COVID-19

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Immunology

VOLUME=Volume 14 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/immunology/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2023.1183570

DOI=10.3389/fimmu.2023.1183570

ISSN=1664-3224

ABSTRACT=Objective Emerging evidence show that the prevalence of Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), the prototype of autoimmune disorders, is increased compared to the general population. However, the conclusion is inconsistent and the causal relationship between COVID-19 and SLE remains unknown. Methods In this study, we aimed to evaluate the bidirectional causal relationships between COVID-19 and SLE by bidirectional Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis, including MR-Egger, weighted median, weighted, and inverse variance weighting (IVW) mode. Results The results of IVW showed a negative effect of SLE on severe COVID-19 (OR= 0.962, P= 0.040) and COVID-19 infection (OR= 0.988, P= 0.025), which disappeared after Bonferroni correction. No causal effect of SLE on hospitalization COVID-19 was observed (OR= 0.983, P= 0.148). In the reverse analysis, no causal effects of severe COVID-19 infection (OR= 1.045, P= 0.664), hospitalization COVID-19 (OR= 0.872, P= 0.109) and COVID-19 infection (OR= 0.943, P= 0.811) on SLE were found. Conclusion The findings of our bidirectional causal inference do not support a genetically predicted causal relationship between SLE and COVID-19, thus their association observed in previous observational studies may be caused by confounding factors.