Video #26 COVID-19: Deeper story - why smokers die from COVID-19

Richard Trudgen and Djiniyini Gondarra are joined by Dr Kerry Mills to go deeper into answering the question of why a lot of smokers were dying in China. Dr Mills explained that the virus looks for a special home in the lungs, called an ACE2 receptor. The virus inhabits this ACE2 receptor and starts breeding there. The nicotine in cigarettes makes many more of these special ACE2 receptors in the lungs, so smokers have many more receptor homes where the virus can breed. When the virus enters these ACE2 receptors, it produces thousands of small viruses. While they are breeding, they also destroy these ACE2 receptors homes, which makes people very sick, making it very hard for people to breathe.


The traditional worldview of Yolŋu means they want in-depth, science-based information in order to understand any new topic. This is what Yolŋu call the “dhuḏi-dhäwu” – the deep true story. This full series of videos attempts to answer some of their questions from a Yolŋu worldview, using their linguistic construction of knowledge.

Watch the full series by clicking the links below: