In this study, recently published in Neurology Neuroimmunology & Neuroinflammation, the authors conducted a survey on the risk of COVID-19 in patients with multiple sclerosis (MS) and neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorders (NMOSD). Patients in 10 MS centers from 8 cities including Wuhan were included. Eight hundred and eighty-two of 1,804 (49%) patients with MS and 2,129 of 3,060 (70%) patients with NMOSD were receiving disease-modifying drugs (DMDs). There were no alterations in the patients’ DMD regimens during January 15, 2020 to March 15, 2020. None of the patients with MS treated with DMDs developed COVID-19. However, 2 patients with relapsing NMOSD were diagnosed with COVID-19-related pneumonia. After treatment, both patients recovered from pneumonia and neither patient experienced a neurological relapse in the following 2 months. The authors concluded that no additional increased risk of COVID-19 infection was observed in patients with MS or NMOSD, irrespective of whether these patients received DMDs. They suggested that a battery of stringent preventive measures adopted by neurologists to reduce COVID-19 infection in these patients may have contributed to their results.
View Article: https://nn.neurology.org/content/7/5/e787