The blood-retinal barrier is designed to protect an individual’s vision from infections by preventing microbial pathogens from reaching the retina where they could trigger an inflammatory response with potential vision loss. A team of researchers at the University of Missouri School of Medicine has found the virus that causes COVID-19 can breach this protective retinal barrier with potential long-term consequences in the eye.

The team is led by Pawan Kumar Singh, PhD, an assistant professor of ophthalmology. They have researched ways to prevent and treat ocular infectious diseases.

According to a University of Missouri news release, by using a humanized ACE2 mice model, the researchers found that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, can infect the inside of the eyes even when the virus doesn’t enter the body through the surface of the eyes. Instead, they found that when viruses enter the body through inhalation, it not only infects organs like lungs, but also reaches highly protected organs like eyes through the blood-retinal barrier by infecting the cells lining this barrier.1