Chinese Medicine Treatment of Cytokine Storm Caused by COVID-19

COVID-19 has turned into a pandemic, threatening the lives of millions of people worldwide. Research has found that some COVID-19 patients will suddenly aggravate, resulting in a cytokine storm, respiratory distress syndrome, and death. It is necessary to articulate the mechanism of cytokine storm and propose a Chinese medicine treatment strategy for COVID-19.

A literature search was conducted using five databases on April 30, 2020, including PubMed, Google Scholar, Cochrane Library, China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI), and Wanfang Data with the keywords of “cytokine storm AND Chinese medicine AND COVID-19 “, “cytokine storm AND Chinese medicine AND SARS-CoV-2”. The outcome of interest was the concept and mechanism of cytokine storm, the characteristics, and the Chinese medicine treatment of COVID-19 cytokine storm, etc. A total of 43 articles were retrieved after removing duplicate articles.

The cytokine storm is also called cytokine cascade. The body overreacts with positive feedback without negative feedback, making a variety of abnormal cytokines accumulations, triggering a cytokine storm. COVID-19 cytokine storm does not occur in the early stages, but only after a period of development, it attacks not only the lungs but also the heart, kidneys, and other organs. The key pathogenesis is “toxins and blood stasis, lung failure” in Chinese medicine. The treatment is detoxification, removing blood stasis, and nourishing the lung. Chinese medicine should comprehensively regulate multiple targets and multiple pathways to intervene in the immune regulation of the body to intercept the progress of inflammation and focus on the integration of Chinese medicine with Western medicine to combine anti-virus and anti-inflammatory therapy.

The immune response caused by cytokine storm is a complex signal network with multiple targets and pathways and various cytokines acting together. Immunomodulation can balance the excessive inflammatory response and effectively control the replication and spread of SARS-CoV-2. Returning the immune response to a balanced state is an ideal method for treating COVID-19 cytokine storm. Chinese medicine can achieve overall coordination and balance. Nevertheless, the pharmacology of Chinese medicine must be further studied, and the mechanism of cytokine storm treatment should be thoroughly clarified.