TELOMERE LENGTH, SEVERITY OF CORONAVIRUS INFECTION AND PREMATURE AGING (LITERATURE REVIEW)
According to modern concepts, telomere length is one of the most reliable indicators of a person's overall health. It is associated with a predisposition to longevity or to diseases associated with age, such as hypertension, atherosclerosis, coronary heart disease and others. International experience in predicting the course of the disease caused by a new coronavirus infection (COVID-19) has shown that the likelihood of a severe course of the disease in elderly patients is inversely proportional to the patient's telomere length. The available scientific data allow us to consider telomere length as a biological predictor of assessing the severity of pneumonia caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus.