A study of fatal COVID-19 patients found that DDX39B was significantly down regulated, which suggests this gene product may play a role in differentiating between mild and severe cases of COVID-19; particularly since the downregulation of DDX39B would be expected to trigger an inflammatory response that may get out of control in patients with severe COVID-19 (Wang et al., 2022). The gene discussed is DDX39B; the disease is COVID-19.