Covid-19 and endothelia – Commentary from Tom Myers

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Tom Myers comments on this recent post from National Geographic: World’s brightest x-rays reveal COVID-19’s damage to the body.
This is a frighteningly beautiful picture – taken with a new X-ray method – of the body’s endothelia on Covid.  In this case, air is blue, open blood vessels are red, and blocked blood vessels are yellow.  A lot of yellow.  Lung alveoli are lined with endothelia, and capillaries are likewise endothelial – and of course, the lung is the first opportunity for an airborne virus to get at these squishy endothelial wet carpets of cells.
Image from National Geographic. This HiP-CT scan reveals the vasculature within a lung lobe from a 54-year-old male who died of COVID-19. HiP-CT scans show that in severe COVID-19 cases, the lungs’ blood vessels are severely damaged: Here, airspaces are colored with cyan, open blood vessels are colored in red, and blocked, damaged blood vessels are colored in yellow.
May our long global nightmare be over soon.  Keep breathing.