Protecting yourself from the flu means preserving your heart from a heart attack. And significantly. The viral infection and the consequent inflammation of the body’s response can in fact create a sort of “upheaval” that heavily affects the individual’s cardiovascular well-being. Not for nothing, the ischemic heart disease guidelines of the European Society of Cardiology give the flu vaccination a class 1 recommendation, the same level that have drugs that are taken regularly, such as cholesterol-lowering statins or acetylsalicylic acid.
I study
To signal once again the risk of seasonal infection now comes a study presented to European Congress of Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ECCMID 2023) scheduled in Copenhagen. The research, conducted by Annemarie de Boer at the Jsomeone Center for Life Sciences and Primary Care, UMC of Utrecht, found that people diagnosed with the flu are six times more likely to have a heart attack in the week after being tested for the virus than in the year before or after infection.
Flu, because those at heart risk (and not only) must get vaccinated
by Federico Mereta
Analysis of 26,000 cases
It is not the first time that there is clear talk of an increased risk of myocardial infarction after the flu. But the Dutch research is striking for the amount of data collected, which converge towards an indication of the risk associated with the flu. Test results from 16 laboratories in the Netherlands were examined for a total of approximately 40% of the population covered, including death registers and hospital data to obtain the complete picture. A total of 26,221 laboratory-confirmed influenza cases between 2008 and 2019 were evaluated; 401 people had at least one heart attack (myocardial infarction) within a year of being diagnosed with influenza (419 heart attacks in total).
Of the 419 heart attacks, 25 occurred in the first seven days after the flu diagnosis, 217 in the year before the flu diagnosis, and 177 in the year after the flu diagnosis (excluding the first seven days). Approximately one third of individuals (139/401) died of various causes within a year of being diagnosed with influenza. The researchers calculated that people were 6.16 times more likely to have a heart attack in the seven days after being diagnosed with the flu than they were in the year before or after.
Heart door
Shingles increases the risk of heart attack and stroke, even after some time
by Federico Mereta
Because the flu is a danger to the heart and blood vessels
The flu virus can trigger a series of situations which, directly or indirectly, affect cardiac well-being. On the heart attack front, among the hypotheses to explain this relationship there is in particular the inflammation induced by the virus on the body. Phenomena harmful to the heart can develop: first of all the tachycardia, given that fever increases the frequency of the beat, and therefore the stress to which the wall of the heart is exposed. But they also count the possible lack of oxygenthe release of cytokines (substances that induce inflammation), the excessive response of the sympathetic nervous system and the consequent “stress” which is also reflected in the muscles of the arteries.
Result: If there is plaque along a coronary artery it can become more “unstable” and rupture. The substances that make it up, such as fats or material that are released and what happens to heal the “wound” on the arterial wall can lead to thrombosis, with occlusion of the vessel itself and the appearance of ischemia. But that’s not enough. It may happen that the influenza virus develops in areas outside the respiratory system, such as heart cells. This can lead to myocarditis which can give rise to heart failure and arrhythmias.
Covid, this is how much the risk of heart attack, stroke and arrhythmia increases in the first month after infection
by Federico Mereta
