If a patient with chronic anemia also develops a severe lung infection causing localized acidosis in the pulmonary capillaries, which consequence follows regarding hemoglobin's oxygen affinity?

💡 Explanation

Localized acidosis in the pulmonary capillaries induces the Bohr effect, decreasing hemoglobin's oxygen affinity because the lower pH stabilizes the deoxyhemoglobin form, promoting oxygen release to tissues. Therefore, oxygen affinity decreases, rather than increases or remaining constant, because of pH-dependent conformational changes in hemoglobin.

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