Adult congenital heart disease: Special considerations for COVID-19 and vaccine allocation/prioritization

Jolanda Sabatino; Giovanni Di Salvo; Giuseppe Calcaterra; Pier Paolo Bassareo; Lilia Oreto; Ilaria Cazzoli; Maria Pia Calabrò; Paolo Guccione; Michael A Gatzoulis; Congenital Heart Disease Working Group of the Italian Society of Cardiology (SIC)

doi:10.1016/j.ijcchd.2021.100186

Adult congenital heart disease: Special considerations for COVID-19 and vaccine allocation/prioritization

Int J Cardiol Congenit Heart Dis. 2021 Aug:4:100186. doi: 10.1016/j.ijcchd.2021.100186. Epub 2021 Jun 16.

Affiliations

¹ Division of Paediatric Cardiology, Department of Women's and Children's Health, University of Padua, Padua, Italy.
² Division of Cardiology, "Magna Graecia" University, Catanzaro, Italy.
³ Post Graduate Medical School, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy.
⁴ University College of Dublin Mater Misericordiae University Hospital (National Adult Congenital Disease Service) and Our Lady's Children's Hospital Crumlin, Ireland.
⁵ Mediterranean Pediatric Cardiology Center, Bambino Gesù Pediatric Hospital, Taormina, Messina, Italy.
⁶ Pediatric Cardiology and Cardiac Surgery Department, Bambino Gesù Children's Hospital, IRCCS, Rome, Italy.
⁷ Department of Human Pathology of Adulthood and Childhood - Pediatric Cardiology Unit, University of Messina, Messina, Italy.
⁸ Adult Congenital Heart Centre, National Centre for Pulmonary Hypertension, Royal Brompton Hospital, London, UK.
⁹ National Heart & Lung Institute, Imperial College, London, UK.

Abstract

Individuals with the highest risk for adverse outcomes of COVID-19 should be prioritized by the vaccine allocation policies. We have conducted a literature review of published studies, which comprehend congenital heart disease (CHD) and COVID-19, in order to present the overall evidences of both exposure and clinical risk of patients with adult congenital heart disease (ACHD) and to propose a risk profile schema for those patients to be incorporated into vaccine distribution decisions.

Keywords: ACHD; COVID-19; Risk factors; Vaccine.