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Medicine

Researchers Finally Link Long Covid 'Brain Fog' to Inflammation (thehill.com) 100

Posted by EditorDavid from the following-the-science dept.
An anonymous reader shared this report from The Hill: A new study indicates the debilitating "brain fog" suffered by millions of long COVID patients is linked to changes in the brain, including inflammation and an impaired ability to rewire itself following COVID-19 infection. United Press International reported this week that the small-scale study, conducted by researchers at Corewell Health in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Michigan State University, shows that altered levels of a pair of key brain chemicals could be the culprit.

The study marks the first time doctors have been able to provide scientific proof that validates the experiences of the approximately 12 million COVID "long-haulers" in the U.S. who have reported neurological symptoms. Researchers looked at biomarkers in study participants and found that those complaining of brain fog had higher levels of an anti-inflammatory protein that is crucial to regulating a person's immune system, UPI reported. They also showed lower serum levels of nerve growth factor, a protein vital to the brain's plasticity...

One of the biggest issues involving long COVID has been doctors' inability to find physical proof of the symptoms described by patients. The study has changed that, according to co-author Dr. Bengt Arnetz.

Researchers Finally Link Long Covid 'Brain Fog' to Inflammation More | Reply

Researchers Finally Link Long Covid 'Brain Fog' to Inflammation

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  • How about sense of smell? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by TheMiddleRoad ( 1153113 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @03:36PM (#65383577)

    My nose has felt inflamed ever since the first time I caught COVID, and my sense of smell is only maybe 1/4 to 1/3 of what it used to be. At least I don't smell farts so much anymore.

    • Mine is severely impaired too. Thankfully, no brain fog in my case.

    • Nerve and brain damage, it comes from Covid travelling up the nerves to get into your brain. Was a series of papers on it in 2022.
    • I never noticed a change in my sense of smell, but my face went numb a couple times. A few days later I noticed the music I was listening to and the sunset I watched were both unusually euphoric, probably indicating regrowth in my brain.
    • I woke up with tinnitus while having Covid. Several days in without any severe symptoms and then just woke up with some solid ringing around 12khz sound that never ends and is made worse by loud sounds like wind, or a shower, or engine. That was two years ago and I have still had it every day since then but my brain has gotten better at tuning it out. Guess that was the last time I’ll hear quiet again but at least it’s only shot out my high range hearing over 10kHz which is normal at my age I

      • Look into hypnotism for the tinnitis. It doesn't necessarily make the tinnitis away. Rather it makes it so you just don't care at all. Its just background nonsense.

        The guitarist in my old band was going out of his mind with his, and the hypnotherapy worked amazingly. He still had it, but he just didnt notice it unless he was reminded.

      • Yeah, tinnitus is PITA. I found that having background noise helps distract me from noticing it as much. I use a sound machine at night to help me get to sleep without the constant ringing keeping me on edge. Either a dedicated sound machine or an MP3 player and a looping stream sound are helpful. Other people like the sound of rain or the sound of a fan.

        Because tinnitus is so common for military members, the VA put out an informative guide on managing tinnitus. The information helps everyone, not just

      • Some can listen to 10 minute loops of crickets on Youtube to turn off tinnitus for up to an hour. Once you do that a bit, then rubbing your fingers near your ears to produce a similar noise can give you relieve for 15 to 25 minutes.

        I know... it works for me.

      • I woke up with tinnitus while having Covid. Several days in without any severe symptoms and then just woke up with some solid ringing around 12khz sound that never ends and is made worse by loud sounds like wind, or a shower, or engine. That was two years ago and I have still had it every day since then but my brain has gotten better at tuning it out. Guess that was the last time I’ll hear quiet again but at least it’s only shot out my high range hearing over 10kHz which is normal at my age I guess, just not the happening in a few hours. So basically It’s annoying but does not interfere with my hearing much. When I was tested the audiologist said they were getting multiple people a day every day with similar problems.

        I had something similar after catching mononucleosis when I was 18. I also had hearing damage from when I was. child and that came from the mumps.

        Anyhow, the tinnitus didn't happen until after the mono. At first it sounded like a million birds chirping, and now it has added either a lawnmower sound or a diesel truck idling outside the house. At this time, I don't hear much over 3 KHz. Other than the tinnitus which can be of any pitch.

    • Actually had the opposite and my sense of smell is way more sensitive now. As an ex-smoker, it is truly awful now. The smell of tobacco smoke was bad before but it is gag inducing now.

    • Re:How about sense of smell? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Mr. Dollar Ton ( 5495648 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @11:24PM (#65384205)

      The sense of smell loss isn't a covid-specific thing.

      We moved back to Europe from Japan a few years ago during one of those cold winters that are just a memory now and the whole family got sick with some "ordinary" flu.

      I had the usual symptoms - nothing serious - and recovered quickly. The family members that haven't lived here had it real bad though and on top of everything else all lost their sense of smell partly or completely.

      Medicine back then was very relaxed about it - "don't worry, you'll recover smell in a year or two". They did, but they had to re-learn the smell of things.

      For example, one of them loved coffee. Once the smell died, coffee became indistinguishable from tea, etc and they said everything "tastes like ash". Then, when the smell returned in two or three years, coffee smelled terrible to them for nearly a decade. Only now, after "re-learning" to smell it, they can drink it, but I keep hearing how it isn't the same.

      Another didn't have a complete loss, but lost sensitivity - and it wasn't an overall, uniform loss - some things still smell awful from far away, but for most they have to bring it close to smell it. Some things smelled "differently" or "weirdly" compared to memories from before. They can't eat beef anymore, and they loved it before that.

      So, from my observations of a very small sample, the loss of smell is not uniform, takes years to regain the function and then the interpretation that happens in your brain may never recover. So I learned that when sensor processing is involved, once broken even if repaired consequences will never be the same.

      Perhaps you're lucky that you only lost sensitivity.

      • It appears to have a different mechanism tho.

        Covid is cellular damage.

        Flu/Cold is "mucus blocks the olfactory nerve".

        I've had both types and noticed the difference personally.

      • Thanks for the info. My eldest lost sense of smell due to COVID, got the chance to enroll in a university hospital program, and now, over 4 years after the loss of smell still doesn't smell or taste much. Your descriptions were already described to us as potential situations / occurrences, but until now I've never had the story related from an affected person's side, only medical professionals. Indeed, they mentioned a plurality of potential causes, including clogging, tissue damage and such, and looked for

        • Sorry to hear that, it is a really unpleasant situation. Hope they get well. We eventually did, although it took a long time.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by CEC-P ( 10248912 )
      That just sounds like a secondary infection of bacteria causing that effect, possibly.

    • Could be evolution. I regularly fart in public to keep the maskless away from me. But in reality I don't care if they are maskless cause I have my mask.

    • For me it was new allergies. I never was allergic to anything, then after 1st (or maybe 2nd) covid sickness, my allergies were on fire. Still are, such a pain to deal with all the time.

  • A study on 17 people, 10 of which are symptomatic (Score:3, Insightful)

    by ffkom ( 3519199 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @03:43PM (#65383603)
    This is really only a very small pilot study, with groups of only 10 patients and 7 controls. There is still not a small chance that these results cannot be reproduced when looking at a larger group of people.

    • Re:A study on 17 people, 10 of which are symptomat (Score:5, Informative)

      by smap77 ( 1022907 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @04:09PM (#65383663)

      Yes, and... that's the point of a pilot study--to see if it's worth it to make a larger study.

      Some details from the paper on that point:
      While formal power calculations are not required for pilot studies [38], it was important to have a sufficient sample size to examine the feasibility of recruiting participants with and without long COVID, and whether differences could be detected between groups [39].

      (Limitations:) First and foremost is the small sample size, which makes generalizability to other populations difficult, although we used a rigorous assessment scheme. Small sample sizes have reduced statistical power to detect true effects and results may be affected by outliers.

      Serum levels of nerve growth factor (NGF), a biomarker of brain plasticity, were significantly lower in the long COVID group, which was significantly more likely than controls to have serum levels of inflammatory marker (interleukin (IL)-10) values greater than or equal to the median (p=0.015).

      https://journals.plos.org/plos... [plos.org]

      • Re:A study on 17 people, 10 of which are symptomat (Score:4, Interesting)

        by ffkom ( 3519199 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @04:30PM (#65383699)
        I'm not blaming the study text for exaggerated claims, but the statement:

        One of the biggest issues involving long COVID has been doctors' inability to find physical proof of the symptoms described by patients. The study has changed that, according to co-author Dr. Bengt Arnetz.

        is clearly overstating the results. The result of that study is indeed just an indication that it may be worth looking into this causality hypothesis some more.

        • It's not overstating the results. The inability to find physical proof objectively has changed when guidance has been provided on where to look. You're just overinterpreting the English.

  • Send this article (Score:3)

    by hcs_$reboot ( 1536101 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @04:00PM (#65383641)
    to the COVID anti-vaccine people.

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Why? They won't read it.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by HiThere ( 15173 )

      Sorry, while COVID vaccine decreases the chance of getting COVID, and decreases the severity of the disease, there are indications that it doesn't decrease the prevalence of long COVID (among those who do catch the disease).

      So this isn't additional evidence that vaccination isn't desirable. If you weren't already convinced, this won't convince you.

      FWIW, I'm relying of articles from Science News to make the assertions in the first paragraph. And they WEREN'T and assertion that there is no effect, merely th

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Anonymous Coward

        That is not how vaccines work. You still need to be exposed to the infection(s) for the antibodies to do their job.

        Stop talking to anti-vaxxers, they are making you stupid.

      • No.. that's misinformation.

        Several studies have shown that COVID-19 vaccination reduces the risk, severity, and duration of long COVID symptoms.
        Full citations at the bottom. I've validated them.

        ðY" Risk Reduction
        A systematic review by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) found that full vaccination before infection reduced the risk of developing long COVID by approximately 27% .
        ECDC
        CIDRAP

        Another meta-analysis encompassing over 14 million individuals reported that two doses of

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by HiThere ( 15173 )

          Well, I can't check your sources, as it's not my area of expertise. But anecdotally I'm quite well aware of one case that was both vaccinated and treated with paxlovid, but also ended up with long COVID. So I'm dubious. I quite accept that vaccination decreases the probability of a serious case, but since long COVID is already a minor probability, I'm much less convinced that it decreases the probability of long COVID *if* one catches a case of COVID anyway.

          I acknowledge that this is anecdotal informati

          • One person isn't data. It can be true that it reduces long COVID likelihood and severity AND someone you know got long COVID

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by HiThere ( 15173 )

              Your assertion doesn't exactly contradict my guess. It's a conditional probability that I'm questioning, and which (based on the titles) your sources don't address. (And my guess is not totally without basis...but the basis was a popular report, not a technical one. You could trace it down in, I think, Science News sometime a couple of years ago. (I don't really expect you to, and it might have been in New Scientist.)

              OTOH, that *was* a couple of years ago, and perhaps there have been studies done since.

          • Dude... "(8% in vaccinated vs. 27% in unvaccinated) " Tell me you didn't read my post without saying it.

            Yes, 1 in 4 people who are unvaccinated get long covid.
            Yes, 1 in 12 people who are vaccinated get long covid.

            Your statement of "I know a guy" who got long covid does not contradict the data and studies above.

            Regarding long covid, being vaccinated is like having an extra ace in your hand when playing poker. It's not like having a royal flush or four of a kind.

  • While the first finding of this particular type there have been numerous studies finding neural inflammation including glial cells as well as continued infection of the brain well after the acute infection has passed. Many have been much larger and more compelling than this small study. There are about 550,000 papers on Covid harms and Long Covid now, it's one of the most studied viruses of all time and it does a wide range of damage I know of no papers saying Covid is just a cold.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ffkom ( 3519199 )

      it's one of the most studied viruses of all time

      Which is certainly one reason why so many symptoms have been attributed to it, and why so many hypotheses exist on what it may cause. Just imagine infections with, for example, OC43, had been studied as intensely, accompanied by a big media campaign warning the population of all sorts of symptoms that might occur due to an OC43 infection. Then we would pretty likely have a similar number of people complaining about OC43 effects, and since infections with OC43 are currently considered a "common cold", that w

      • You are so unbelievably stupid, and as is typical it’s the idiots who think they’re the most intelligent.

        • They aren't entirely wrong, they just drew the wrong conclusion. We have plenty of evidence of autoimmune issues arising from various viruses. We haven't put enough research into them as a whole. We studied this one more and found more of the problems it causes. If we knew the entire gdp cost of the disease burden due to the common cold, or particularly mono, we would be devoting far more resources to stopping them all.

    • it's one of the most studied viruses of all time and it does a wide range of damage I know of no papers saying Covid is just a cold.

      The situation is more complicated and dumber than that, though. Saying "Covid is just a cold" true or not — it's not important for this argument how true this is or isn't, just bear with me — ignores the fact that there can be long-term effects from infection with other common infections which we take for granted. There are serious health risks associated with influenza infection [washu.edu], which are also a subject of study [nih.gov]. We can therefore reasonably mention them in the same breath [springer.com], if we retain the abi

  • The study marks the first time doctors have been able to provide scientific proof that validates the experiences of the approximately 12 million COVID “long-haulers” in the U.S. who have reported neurological symptoms.

    Where are all those people that kept saying, "it's just the flu" and therefore weren't going to abide safety guidelines or get vaccinated?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Local ID10T ( 790134 )

      Where are all those people that kept saying, "it's just the flu" and therefore weren't going to abide safety guidelines or get vaccinated?

      Dead.

      (...or they got vaccinated and/or sought medical assistance once infected while still complaining that it was all a hoax.)

      • Re:Hold up! (Score:4, Informative)

        by burtosis ( 1124179 ) on Saturday May 17, 2025 @06:20PM (#65383845)

        Dead.

        I was in the ER a few months ago with an injury to a finger and was hallwayed because all the rooms were filled. While I was waiting for service, they wheeled this perhaps 60 year old lady in who had collapsed near her apartment and took an ambulance in eventually getting into the hallway parking stall next to me. She started to rage when she was coming to her senses and the hospital staff told her and that she had the symptoms of a severe infection. She started saying the hospital staff was poisoning her and by then her denial rate was so bad if her O2 reading wasn’t in the 60s on oxygen security would have been needed but just cussing and trying to lift an arm was winding her out. The nurse finally came, took one look at the charts with a furrowed brow and sent her off to a room and one of the assistants was talking about some concerning test results. After seeing it first hand I can say it’s not hyperbole.

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by ffkom ( 3519199 )

        Where are all those people that kept saying, "it's just the flu" and therefore weren't going to abide safety guidelines or get vaccinated?

        Dead.

        (...or they got vaccinated and/or sought medical assistance once infected while still complaining that it was all a hoax.)

        I wonder who mods such a nonsense statement as "insightful", but the epidemiological numbers tell a different story. The majority of people infected with Sars-Cov-2 had no or mild symptoms, vaccinated or not. Just because vaccination has prevented severe outcomes in some patients does not change that fact.

        • Re:Hold up! (Score:5, Insightful)

          by shess ( 31691 ) on Sunday May 18, 2025 @12:52AM (#65384277) Homepage

          Where are all those people that kept saying, "it's just the flu" and therefore weren't going to abide safety guidelines or get vaccinated?

          Dead.

          (...or they got vaccinated and/or sought medical assistance once infected while still complaining that it was all a hoax.)

          I wonder who mods such a nonsense statement as "insightful", but the epidemiological numbers tell a different story. The majority of people infected with Sars-Cov-2 had no or mild symptoms, vaccinated or not. Just because vaccination has prevented severe outcomes in some patients does not change that fact.

          The same applies to basically anything we use the healthcare system to address. Life expectency of the population mostly doesn't increase due to heroic measures, it increases due to minor measures applied consistently over long periods of time.

          When doctors don't wash their hands before surgery, most patients survive just fine with no consequences. That doesn't mean doctors shouldn't bother washing their hands.

          • Well,
            all Covid infected I know had mild symptoms or none. I mostly had muscle cramps, 3 days long, extremely painful.
            On the other hand, all people around me who cad Covid, know/knew one or more who died to it.
            So I basically only know the dead ones "via one edge" ...

            • I personally know one person who died of it, and one who nearly died. In the second case not even old or ill. Going one relationship further adds another three or four to the death numbers.
    • Ha ha, "guidelines." Curious of your definition of "coercion?"

  • The protein and symptoms described could have occured from ANY viral infection. So is whole debacle REALLY unique to COVID, or are we just seeing more reporting of something already previously existing for certain individuals?

  • Let's cut to the chase: Should Trump resign now ?

  • Vaccinated, older white male, not type O.

    I avoided Covid until august 2024. I finally caught it then after spending an hour and a half in a crowded courthouse.

    Headache, Fever, Fatigue, Positive Test and Retest.
    I lost my sense of smell and taste after about 8 days for about 13 to 15 days.
    I was sick a total of about 2 weeks and tested negative after 3 weeks.

    I had fatigue and foggy thinking after my negative test for about 95 days when the severity of both reduced sharply. I thought I was okay.
    I believe this

  • Looks like NGF and herpesvirus interact (Score:3)

    by buck-yar ( 164658 ) on Sunday May 18, 2025 @12:45PM (#65385107)
    One prevailing theory of the cause is herpesvirus reactivation. There's more on Google Scholar for anyone interested (my first reply with more evidence got lost)

    "We ran EBV antibody tests on recovered COVID-19 patients, comparing EBV reactivation rates of those with long COVID symptoms to those without long COVID symptoms...The majority of those with long COVID symptoms were positive for EBV reactivation, yet only 10% of controls indicated reactivation." https://www.acsh.org/news/2021... [acsh.org]

    The top 5 predictors of affective symptoms due to long COVID were IgM-HHV-6-duTPase, IgG-HHV-6, CRP, education, IgA-activin-A (predictive accuracy of r = 0.636). The top 5 predictors of CFS due to long COVID were in descending order: CRP, IgG-HHV-6-duTPase, IgM-activin-A, IgM-SARS-CoV-2, and IgA-activin-A (predictive accuracy: r = 0.709). Conclusion: Reactivation of HHV-6, SARS-CoV-2 persistence, and autoimmune reactions to activin-A combined with activated immune-oxidative pathways play a major role in the pathophysiology of long COVID as well as the severity of its affective symptoms and CFS. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.go... [nih.gov]

    Nerve growth factor deprivation results in the reactivation of latent herpes simplex virus in vitro https://europepmc.org/article/... [europepmc.org]

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