Credit: RLT Images
While most scientists look at Covid-19 as a viral respiratory illness, Nir Barzilai takes a slightly different perspective. Instead Barzilai, founder of the Institute of Ageing Research at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, sees it as a disease of ageing.
The grim statistics show that he has a point. In Europe, people over 60 have accounted for 90% of fatalities since the start of August. While the impact of Covid-19 has been universal, older people have been disproportionally affected.
“This virus has no eyes, but it could see immediately who is old and more vulnerable,” says Barzilai.