COVID-19 Impact on Neural Implant in Healthcare Industry
The COVID-19 pandemic has stood as a complex challenge in front of several healthcare companies and proved to be a global health threat. The first case of the COVID-19 pandemic was found in Wuhan, China. This virus had emerged in December 2019 and has been proven as a global pandemic by WHO in March 2020. Patients with other respiratory disorders such as Chronic Bronchitis, Lung Cancer, and Pneumonia are more susceptible to COVID-19. This pandemic has created a health crisis, and it has adversely affected our economies, healthcare and pharmaceutical sectors, and their core.
Healthcare professionals were often redeployed to emergency patterns of working, sometimes outside of their usual scope of practice. Thus, the urgent and routine care for millions of patients with non-COVID illnesses has been interrupted.
As the number of COVID-19 (coronavirus) cases continues to rise in the U.S., Russia, France, and Brazil, life-threatening and rare brain diseases are being linked to the infection. This has brought companies in the brain implants market into the picture since their assistance is crucial in the already stressed healthcare facilities. Neural implant technology is highly innovative and is expected to influence the existing treatment modalities of neuropathic disorders and chronic neuropathic pain. The introduction of neural implants has been a significant breakthrough because of their high potential in minimizing the occurrence of adverse events associated with Parkinson's disease, chronic pain, epilepsy, and other neural disorders. Therefore, the adoption of neural implants is likely to increase at a phenomenal rate in the coming years.
IMPACT ON SUPPLY
Due to the pertinacious COVID-19 lockdown in various countries, sanctions have been forced by administrations of different nations. These limitations and boundaries across the nation’s borders prompted a diminishing stockpile because of restricted materials and labor force and the halting of the assembly line.
It has been found that certain individuals in their late ’50s are at risk of developing acute necrotizing encephalitis, which is a rare complication of influenza and other viral infections. This has fueled the growth of brain implants to maintain steady supply chains to meet the demand.
Acute necrotizing encephalitis has the potential to cause seizures and confusion, and in serious cases, can lead to coma. This has triggered the need for developing strong research databases to address complications of COVID-19.

IMPACT ON DEMAND
The COVID-19 pandemic is expected to have a significant impact on the growth of the brain implants market globally, due to the suspension and postponement of most of the elective surgeries and treatment during the pandemic, to reserve the hospital infrastructure and staff in treating COVID-19, infected patients. According to the research article published in medRXiV, 2021, the prevalence of SARS-COV2 viral infection in patients with Parkinson's disease was found to be 11.28% and COVID-19 prevalence in Parkinson's disease patients with deep brain stimulation was found to be 18.18%. Additionally, as per the research study published in Frontiers in Neurology, 2020, the motor and psychiatric symptoms in Parkinson's Disease patients and dystonic patients treated with Deep Brain Stimulation was observed to have worsened during the lockdown restriction measure, and further, this had led to increased stress in the management of neurological disorders. Additionally, according to the research article published in JAMA Neurology, 2020, among 214 patients with COVID-19, neurologic symptoms were seen in 36.4% of patients. Thus, patients suffering from COVID-19 are prone to a high risk of developing neurological disorders during their hospital stays. Thus, owing to the strict lockdown restrictions and measures taken to contain the viral transmission, the chronic stress and burden of neurological disorders had increased, which required the urgent opening of the neurological outpatient services, and thus, the brain implants market is expected to have impacted significantly during the pandemic.
The increase in the number of cases of neurological disorders, such as Alzheimer’s, epilepsy, Parkinson’s, depression, and essential tremors, is anticipated to propel the demand for brain implants. Brain implants are likely to reduce the need for drugs that relieve chronic pain and improve body movement in patients suffering from Parkinson’s or any other neurological disease. The growing geriatric population is also prone to order surgical disorders and thus, aging is the major factor that is driving the market growth for brain implants. According to the United Nations, World Population Ageing 2019 report, more than 703 million people were aged 65 years and above in 2019 and are expected to reaching 1.5 billion by 2050.

STRATEGIC DECISIONS BY MANUFACTURERS
The presence of key players in the region and the increasing number of product approvals is expected to drive the studied market growth. For instance,
• In June 2020, US FDA approved Medtronic plc's Percept deep brain stimulation (DBS) for the treatment of Parkinson’s symptoms.
The major market players are focusing on technological advancement to acquire maximum market share. For instance,
• In January 2021, Abbott Laboratories launched its NeuroSphere my Path, a Digital Health app that was developed to track and report on pain relief in chronic pain patients and general well-being associated with spinal cord stimulation (SCS) or dorsal root ganglion (DRG) therapy.
• In March 2021, Abbott Laboratories announced the launch of NeuroSphere Virtual Clinic, which is a remote neuromodulation patient-care technology in the United States.
• In March 2020, LivaNova plc received CE Mark approval for its Vagus Nerve Stimulation Therapy (VNS Therapy) System, "Symmetry", for Difficult-to-Treat Depression (DTD).
• In June 2018, Medtronic plc announced that the US Food and Drug Administration approved Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) Clinician Programmer and Activa(TM) Programming Application. The Activa Programming Application has been uniquely designed with the input of over a hundred clinicians from around the world and is managed on the Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 tablet interface.
• In February 2016, ALEVA NEUROTHERAPEUTICS SA announced a collaboration with Greatbatch for a next-generation device for Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS). Under the terms of the development agreement, Greatbatch’s design and development team QiG Group, which is expected to be spun off as Nuvectra Corporation, will provide Aleva with access to its unique implantable neurostimulation platform.
• BrainCom— a collaborative research project that aims to develop a new generation of neuroprosthetic devices is being funded by the European Union under the FET Proactive funding scheme to advance speech neural prostheses.
Companies in the brain implants market are increasing the availability of solutions for people suffering from motor diseases and neurological conditions. Such implants are bolstering market growth, as they have the potential to eliminate the need for open brain surgeries.
• Dell Technologies— a U.S. multinational computer technology company is gaining strong business grounds in transformative technologies for brain implants by collaborating with think tanks and neuroscientists.
Companies in the brain implants market are increasing the availability of less invasive solutions since the brain is one of the most delicate and sensitive body organs. They are decoding the symphony of neural activity to stimulate brain function.

CONCLUSION
Since the COVID-19 virus outbreak in December 2019, the disease has spread to almost every country around the globe with the World Health Organization declaring it a public health emergency. The global impacts of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) are already starting to be felt, and will significantly affect the Brain Implants market in 2020.
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