Protective Effect of Estrogen on Infection of Respiratory Virus

Estrogen is a multi-functional steroid hormone, which affects not only the female reproductive system, but also endocrine, cardiovascular, and metabolic systems. Estrogen has a potential therapeutic effect on a variety of lung diseases, and estrogen-receptor signaling plays a key role in the innate immunity, adaptive immunity and tissue repair in the course of infection of respiratory virus. Animal experiments have proved that estrogen therapy can reduce inflammatory factors, inhibit inflammatory response, reduce viral titer and so on, so as to improve the survival rate of mice infected with respiratory virus. In this paper, the protective effect of estrogen on the infection of respiratory virus and related mechanisms were reviewed.