BALTIMORE – COVID-19 cases continue as the Omicron BA. 5 subvariant spreads across the country.
As President Joe Biden treated his positive diagnosis on Thursday, doctors from around the world gathered in Baltimore to share their latest findings on the long-running COVID.
Much of what they shared focuses on connecting the dots between acute infection and the long-term outcomes of the virus.
Dr Rubeshan Perumal, a pulmonologist at the University of Cape Town, said the long COVID is “really so complex that it is adequately described in an environment like this”.
Up to 30 of COVID patients have persistent and debilitating symptoms even after the initial infection, the researchers said Thursday.
Dr. PJ Utz, vice president of the Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery (or RECOVER) initiative at Stanford University, this statistic very well.
“COVID has been around for a long time and has affected my circle of relatives,” Dr. Utz said, referring to two members of the circle of relatives.
Lately there is no diagnosis available for prolonged COVID.
When asked if there is a link between patients with prolonged COVID symptoms and their vaccination status, Dr. Utz stopped before saying that vaccination is the answer.
“We don’t know if vaccination prevents that,” he said. I guess that’s the case. “
Studies so far suggest that the symptoms are primarily neurological. They come with brain fog, forgetfulness, lack of concentration, and even muscle fatigue.
Doctors are getting closer to identifying the parts of the brain responsible for those symptoms.
“There are a number of nuclei in the brainstem that can be affected and can contribute to prolonged COVID court cases,” said Dr. Lisa S. Tracy Fisher of Tulane School of Medicine.
While there are still studies to be done, scientists have begun to compare the biological processes in the brains of COVID patients for a long time with those of Alzheimer’s patients.
“I think it’s very attractive to see this loss of AB-42 in the CSF, which is very similar to what we’re seeing in Alzheimer’s disease and also in COVID,” said Professor Sofie Nystrom of Swedish Linkoping University.