system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
How does COVID damage the lungs?

Read a lot about how harmful COVID can be to the lungs.  Heard from an XRay tech that COVID lungs are almost white on the XRays.

Don't understand how it can cause that.  What is in the virus that harms the lungs?

And how is it different from other diseases, like pneumonia?
gpt
**Pneumonia is a bigger term which covers the inflammation of lungs.** This can be bacterial or viral in origin. Covid-19 **can cause pneumonia**, this is the respiratory infection component of the infection. It can also leave you vulnerable to get pneumonia from other sources such as bacteria or other viruses. The virus can cause host of other symptoms also, which is why precautions are required and the list of symptoms health officials ask you to look out for are extensive.

Virus enters cells and hijacks them replicate itself, until the cell breaks down releasing the viral particles or our own immune systems deals with the cells. This damages the area and the organ causing inflammation. Inflammation in our bodies is basically just liquids collecting to an area, these show on the x-ray as white areas.