Ventilators, Midkine, Mechanical Stress and the Induction of Lung Fibrosis

I need to go over this heavily cited article and the key COVID-19 articles that cite it several times.

The article does not point to midkine suppression necessarily being the best way to halt the midline signalling process that leads to permanent lung damage or death caused by an aggravating agent and furthermore by a mechanical ventilator. That said it does not attempt to be conclusive.

I don't have the necessary roadmap in my head to say much more except maybe to note that COVID-19 downregulates the ACE2 receptors but not ACE receptors. My knowledge has its limits so I will need to read more. That said we well know that mechanical ventilators add a second major whammy to the injury and inflammation caused by the virus and the body's inflammatory immune response to that virus.

Tens if not hundreds of thousands of people will find their way to a ventilator and so it will be important to minimise lung fibrosis caused or worsened by ventilators.

Anyway, this type of article is becoming available for access without subscriptions or university logins.

Mechanical Stress and the Induction of Lung Fibrosis via the Midkine Signaling Pathway