Wang Lei, Chen Chidao, Wang Peng, Wang Fan, Wang Xixin, Sun Fengzhu, Ji Yanru, Huang Zhonghao
College of Medical Imaging, Qilu Medical University, Zibo, Shandong, China.
Medicine (Baltimore). 2025 Apr 25;104(17):e41999. doi: 10.1097/MD.0000000000041999.
An association between coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) and tuberculosis (TB) has been reported, although the causal relationship between these factors remains unclear. This study aimed to investigate the causal connection between COVID-19 and TB using Mendelian randomization (MR) analysis. The UK Biobank provided summary data on COVID-19 using the integrative epidemiology unit open genome-wide association studies (GWAS) pool. GWAS data on TB were also retrieved. The relationship between COVID-19 and TB was examined using 5 methods, the major method being inverse variance weighting. Additional methods included weighted median, MR-Egger regression, simple mode, weighted mode, and Wald ratio. No significant correlation was observed between COVID-19 and TB (odds ratio = 1.022, 95% confidence interval 0.955-1.032, P = .611). Reverse MR analysis also confirmed the absence of a causal relationship between COVID-19 and TB risk (P > .05). This study used several complementary MR approaches to explore the bidirectional relationship between COVID-19 and TB and revealed no significant bidirectional relationship. However, given the limited GWAS data for these 2 conditions, caution is warranted when interpreting these results. While previous epidemiological and retrospective studies have suggested that COVID-19 may impact TB, our bidirectional MR analysis based on European population genetic data suggests no two-way causality between COVID-19 and TB in this population.
虽然2019冠状病毒病（COVID-19）与结核病（TB）之间的因果关系尚不清楚，但已有二者存在关联的报道。本研究旨在利用孟德尔随机化（MR）分析探究COVID-19与TB之间的因果联系。英国生物银行通过综合流行病学部门开放全基因组关联研究（GWAS）库提供了COVID-19的汇总数据。还检索了TB的GWAS数据。使用5种方法检验了COVID-19与TB之间的关系，主要方法是逆方差加权。其他方法包括加权中位数、MR-Egger回归、简单模式、加权模式和Wald比率。未观察到COVID-19与TB之间存在显著相关性（优势比=1.022，95%置信区间0.955-1.032，P=0.611）。反向MR分析也证实COVID-19与TB风险之间不存在因果关系（P>0.05）。本研究使用了几种互补的MR方法来探究COVID-19与TB之间的双向关系，结果显示不存在显著的双向关系。然而，鉴于这两种疾病的GWAS数据有限，在解释这些结果时应谨慎。虽然之前的流行病学和回顾性研究表明COVID-19可能会影响TB，但我们基于欧洲人群遗传数据的双向MR分析表明，在该人群中COVID-19与TB之间不存在双向因果关系。
