Besides several known mediators of COVID-19 pathogenesis, our spatial analysis unveiled the upregulation of several genes (SRRM2, HNRNPA2/B1, SMAP2, ARHGEF1, and TCIRG1) likely involved in the intracellular steps of viral metabolism [31, 32, 61, 65–72], providing additional support for them as potential targets for future molecular interventions in COVID-19 disease [72, 79–81]. Here, ARHGEF1 is linked to COVID-19.