SARS-CoV-2 infection alters the gut microbiome in diabetes patients: A cross-sectional study from Bangladesh.

Populations of different South Asian nations including Bangladesh reportedly have a high risk of developing diabetes in recent years. This study aimed to investigate the differences in the gut microbiome of COVID-19 positive participants with or without T2DM compared with healthy control subjects. Microbiome data of thirty participants with T2DM were compared with twenty-two age-, sex-, and BMI-matched individuals. Clinical features were recorded while fecal samples were collected aseptically from the participants. Amplicon-based (16S rRNA) metagenome analyses were employed to explore the dysbiosis of gut microbiota and its correlation with genomic and functional features in COVID-19 patients with or without T2DM. Comparing the detected bacterial genera across the sample groups, 98 unique genera were identified, of which nine genera had unique association with COVID-19 T2DM patients. Among different bacterial groups, Shigella (25.0%), Bacteroides (23.45%), and Megamonas (15.90%) had higher mean relative abundances in COVID-19 patients with T2DM. An elevated gut microbiota dysbiosis in T2DM patients with COVID-19 was observed while some metabolic functional changes correlated with bidirectional microbiome dysbiosis between diabetes and non-diabetes humans gut. These results further highlight the possible association of COVID-19 infection that might be linked with alteration of gut microbiome among T2DM patients. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.