• A new study has identified a possible link between COVID-19 infection and a raised risk for stroke and heart attack.
• The population-level research does not explain why this risk is manifesting but does point to long-term cardiac health ramifications due to COVID-19.
• While the results of this research seem concerning, more research is needed to confirm these findings.
• Experts say the best way to prevent a COVID-19-related cardiac event is to receive an updated vaccine to protect against severe illness.

Amid the recent rollout of updated COVID-19 vaccines, a new variant has come to the forefront.

Named XEC, the latest data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) notes it as the second most common variant in the country, behind KP.3.1.1.

While the CDC is confident that due to the variant’s lineage, the latest vaccines provide sufficient protection, severe COVID-19 — typically, where a person is hospitalized — has several potential risks that can affect you months, even years, down the road.

A new study published in Atherosclerosis, Thrombosis, and Vascular Biology found that those hospitalized with COVID-19 face similar cardiovascular disease risks as those with coronary artery disease. This puts these individuals in the same category as those with diabetes and peripheral artery disease.

The researchers found the risk of heart attack or stroke among those who’ve had a COVID infection of any severity was twice as high. The risk of a cardiovascular event was three times as high for those who were hospitalized for severe COVID-19 infection.

Daniel Makowski, DO, a clinical and sports cardiologist at Lehigh Valley Heart and Vascular Institute, said the cardiac risk from COVID-19 has been a concern since the early days of the pandemic. Makowski wasn’t involved in the study.

“From a cardiac perspective, our biggest initial concerns were about myocarditis, or inflammation of the muscle of the heart, but we didn’t know that much about long-term effects of the COVID virus in the initial stages,” Makowski said.

“Post COVID, in particular, we saw a lot of patients in the cardiology office who were dealing with long-term effects of [COVID], specifically problems with their autonomic system, like elevated heart rates, fatigue, different heart rhythm issues,” he told Healthline.

COVID-19 and heart attack, stroke risk

The team of American researchers used data from the UK Biobank, a leading source for health data.

The study included 219,673 people, 10,005 of whom had a confirmed case of COVID-19. Of these, 1,943 were identified as having severe COVID-19 cases. Another aspect of the study looked at the possible genetic and blood type connections intertwined with severe COVID-19 and cardiac risk.

The cardiac events in this category include stroke and heart attack. The study followed them for 1,003 days.

The researchers found that participants who were hospitalized with COVID-19 without a history of heart disease had around a 20% higher risk of major adverse cardiac events compared to those without COVID-19 but with a history of heart disease.

The findings also suggest that those with a non-O blood type have a higher risk of stroke or heart attack if they were hospitalized with COVID-19.

While the study does not suggest the physiological reason why these risks increase, Mohanakrishnan Sathyamoorthy, MD, the chair of internal medicine at Texas Christian University’s Anne Burnett Marion School of Medicine, said the study has important implications for those working in the field, even as more research is conducted to affirm the results.

“I think what the authors are trying to communicate in [terms of a] clinical call to action is: please look and modify every modifiable cardiovascular risk factor of a severe COVID-19 patient, whether or not they have any coronary disease, diabetes or peripheral arterial disease,” Sathyamoorthy, who wasn’t involved in the study, told Healthline.

According to William Schaffner, MD, a professor of infectious disease at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, the genetic component of this research is less studied across various infectious diseases. Schaffner wasn’t involved in the study.

“There’s a lot of folklore about that. And maybe there’s some truth in that — but it’s not really had a great deal of scientific investigation, so this is a baby step in that direction,” Schaffner told Healthline.

Why is COVID-19 linked to increased cardiac risk?

One of the next steps for research of this type is to identify the reason these risks are increasing.

For Makowski and his peers, that’s still an open question. “I think that is the biggest question, right? Why would that be? Is it that they were so sick during that time that it… maybe caused some injury to their vasculature, which made them more prone to develop plaque formation or injury in the blood vessel itself, or is there something else that’s contributing to it?” Makowski speculated.

Previous research has found that severe COVID-19 infection significantly increases the risk of heart attack and stroke, but this study adds that the use of antiplatelet agents, typically used to combat clotting in the arteries, reduces the risk of heart attack or stroke after being hospitalized for COVID-19.

Schaffner noted that an important aspect of this study is how it sheds more light on how infectious disease can leave their mark long after the initial symptoms have resolved.

“It just extends our concept of what an infection can do and initiate an inflammatory response in the body that can affect organ systems beyond what happens during the acute illness,” he said.

“And that’s also an area in which research is now just beginning to expand, making us more aware that there can be downstream effects that can extend for quite a period of time after we recover from certain acute infections,” Schaffner added.

According to Schaffner, the best way to reduce the risk of a cardiovascular event linked to a COVID-19 infection is to lower the risk of hospitalization by receiving an updated vaccine.

“This is another example of how [COVID] infection is a really nasty infection, and if it predisposes you, increases your risk, even if you are a seemingly healthy person for heart attack or stroke, you ought to do everything you can to reduce that risk, right? And the way to do that is to keep yourself out of the hospital with [COVID], and the best way to do that is with [the] vaccine,” Schaffner concluded.

Takeaway

New research suggests a link between COVID-19 infection and an increased risk of a cardiac event such as stroke or heart attack.

The study authors do not know why there appears to be an association, although there may be a genetic component. More research is needed to understand these findings.

According to experts, receiving an updated COVID-19 vaccine can help prevent severe illness and subsequent cardiovascular events.