Document is current

Article History

Received: 24 July 2024

Accepted: 15 May 2025

First Online: 28 May 2025

Declarations

:

: The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

: Human material: The study was approved in advance by the Ethics Committee of the Medical Faculty of the University of Heidelberg (No. S-242/2020). All described studies on humans or human tissue were conducted with the approval of the responsible ethics committee, in accordance with national law and in accordance with the Declaration of Helsinki of 1975 (in the current, revised version). Analysis was performed on lung tissue specimens from 17 patients with an age of 75.1±12.6 years that had passed away due to a COVID-19 infection. No minors were enrolled in the study. All patients gave their written consent. Animal material: No animal was sacrificed for the specific purpose of this study, as the thoracic visceral organ block is an animal by-product of commercial meat processing. The preparations were carried out under regular veterinary supervision of an approved meat processing plant and were treated with the same hygiene measures as for fresh meat. In accordance with Article 23 of Regulation (EC) 1069/2009, registration for the storage, handling, transportation and disposal of animal by-products for research purposes in category 3 was registered to the competent veterinary regulatory authority under registration number DE08221103321.

: All authors have approved the final version of the manuscript and gave their consent for publication.