In our last post, we posited a simplistic view of how a covid infection could promote Alzheimer's disease, specifically in severe cases from the strains circulating in 2020. We said that a covid infection causes a "cytokine storm" that leads to inflammation in the brain severe enough to perhaps initiate Alzheimer's disease. Recall that the genes most closely associated with Alzheimer's disease appear to do so by creating an inflammatory environment in the brain. But, according to an editorial in the June 2023 issue of the journal Infectious Disorders (Bentham Science), the process is really quite complex, and the spike protein vaccines may do the same thing. The editorial was entitled "COVID-19 and Alzheimer's Disease: The Link Finally Established." (This link might be easier to read.) The authors have been involved in research on the relationship between Alzheimer's and covid.
What's even more disturbing is that covid (and perhaps the vaccines) actually accelerate the development of Alzheimer's. We noted in other posts (and in Beating the Dementia Monster) that the disease may actually begin 15 or 20 years before the first symptoms, but symptoms may begin appearing only four years or so after a covid infection.
A fuller explanation of how covid and the spike proteins might cause Alzheimer's involves the Renin-angiotensin system, or RAS. RAS involves every cell in the body, but most specifically the kidneys, the liver, blood vessels, the lungs, the adrenal glands, the pituitary gland, and the hypothalamus. (The pituitary gland and the hypothalamus are in the brain.) The most notable thing about the RAS is that it regulates blood pressure through a very complex process.
If the RAS is disrupted, it causes problems with:
- blood vessel constriction (raising blood pressure)
- toxic storms of pro-inflammatory cytokines
- the production of reactive oxygen particles that kill cells
- the formation of clots that obstruct blood vessels
- the growth of blood vessels and tumors
- the desaturation of blood in oxygen
- a deficit of oxygen supply to various cells, tissues, and organs
- organ fibrosis
- increases in organ volume
- nitric oxide levels, affecting inflammatory, immune, and memory phenomena
Is that enough? There are certainly well established relationships between Alzheimer's and high blood pressure, inflammation, and oxidation from reactive oxygen.
While the authors stated that the vaccine spike proteins are capable of causing the same mischief as the virus itself, it appeared to me that they floated this as an hypothesis. They didn't cite any research that found an unambiguous link between vaccinations and the development of Alzheimer's.
From everything I've seen, these concerns are most relevant to the original strain and the delta strain that appeared in the first two years of the pandemic. But we're still waiting to see what becomes of people who were over 65 when they had a covid infection severe enough to hospitalize them.
