Excerpt

The global spread of Coronavirus SARS-CoV‑2 (SARS-CoV-2) was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11, 2020 and is currently posing major challenges for health care systems around the world . Besides the planning of intensive care resources, the lack of evidence-based therapy options is a particular problem for the treating physicians. General statements on the typical course of SARS-CoV‑2 infection cannot be made reliably at present. Disease patterns are unspecific, diverse, and vary widely, from asymptomatic courses to severe complications, such as pneumonia with lung failure, cardiovascular and cerebral manifestations, and ultimately death. Symptoms include fever, cough, and shortness of breath as well as neurological and cardiac manifestations [1]. Risk groups are mainly older people (with a steadily increasing risk of severe courses from above 50–60 years of age), smokers, and patients with certain pre-existing conditions (e.g., cardiovascular diseases, lung diseases, diabetes mellitus, cancer, and weakened immune system [2, 3]). Therefore, standardized and coordinated data collection on a large scale is of pivotal importance to learn about the natural course of the disease, to accelerate knowledge on the role of pre-existing comorbidities in the COVID-19 pandemic, and to identify factors associated with outcomes. …