covid 19
COVID-19 Could Increase Dementia, Other Brain Disorders for Decades to Come
Gabriel de Erausquin first began to worry about the long-term impact of COVID on the brain when he read early reports out of Wuhan, China last January that survivors had lost two of their give senses--smell and taste. Worry turned to alarm when one of his medical assistants, a young mother who had come down with COVID-19 and had to be quarantined for a month, told de Erausquin, a neuroscientist, that she "couldn't care less" about being separated from her children.
Loss of smell, emotional detachment and other cognitive disorders among COVID-19 survivors has in recent weeks become an urgent medical issue. Some patients experience psychotic breaks. Others report strange neurological symptoms—tremors, extreme fatigue, phantom smells, dizziness and bouts of profound confusion, a condition known as "brain fog." In one early study of more than 200 patients in Wuhan, neurological complications were identified in 36 percent of all cases and in 45 percent of severe cases. Another study in France in the New England Journal of Medicine reported neurological symptoms in 67 percent of patients.
Although it's too early to tell what the long-term effects of COVID-19 will be on the cognitive health of survivors, scientists now fear the disease could feed a spike in dementia and other neurodegenerative diseases in the decades ahead. In addition, a growing number of COVID long-haulers already meet the clinical criteria for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), a mysterious condition, also called myalgic encephalomyelitis, characterized by extreme fatigue, exercise intolerance and a whole host of other strange and debilitating neurological symptoms. Prior to COVID-19, CFS afflicted 2 million Americans.
If COVID long-haulers follow the trajectory of those who suffer from CFS, anywhere from 10-to-30 percent of those infected by SARS-CoV-2 may eventually experience long-term symptoms—a vast pool of additional millions with the condition who will place a new strain our healthcare burden, says Avindra Nath, clinical director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS).
In recent months, the medical establishment has belatedly begun to respond to the crisis. Whereas COVID-19 was in early months considered mainly a respiratory virus, there's now a growing appreciation for its effect on other organs, including the brain. In addition, the media has increasingly begun to draw attention to the plight of long-haulers and their cognitive symptoms.
newsweek
Gabriel de Erausquin first began to worry about the long-term impact of COVID on the brain when he read early reports out of Wuhan, China last January that survivors had lost two of their give senses--smell and taste. Worry turned to alarm when one of his medical assistants, a young mother who had come down with COVID-19 and had to be quarantined for a month, told de Erausquin, a neuroscientist, that she "couldn't care less" about being separated from her children.
Loss of smell, emotional detachment and other cognitive disorders among COVID-19 survivors has in recent weeks become an urgent medical issue. Some patients experience psychotic breaks. Others report strange neurological symptoms—tremors, extreme fatigue, phantom smells, dizziness and bouts of profound confusion, a condition known as "brain fog." In one early study of more than 200 patients in Wuhan, neurological complications were identified in 36 percent of all cases and in 45 percent of severe cases. Another study in France in the New England Journal of Medicine reported neurological symptoms in 67 percent of patients.
Although it's too early to tell what the long-term effects of COVID-19 will be on the cognitive health of survivors, scientists now fear the disease could feed a spike in dementia and other neurodegenerative diseases in the decades ahead. In addition, a growing number of COVID long-haulers already meet the clinical criteria for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS), a mysterious condition, also called myalgic encephalomyelitis, characterized by extreme fatigue, exercise intolerance and a whole host of other strange and debilitating neurological symptoms. Prior to COVID-19, CFS afflicted 2 million Americans.
If COVID long-haulers follow the trajectory of those who suffer from CFS, anywhere from 10-to-30 percent of those infected by SARS-CoV-2 may eventually experience long-term symptoms—a vast pool of additional millions with the condition who will place a new strain our healthcare burden, says Avindra Nath, clinical director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS).
In recent months, the medical establishment has belatedly begun to respond to the crisis. Whereas COVID-19 was in early months considered mainly a respiratory virus, there's now a growing appreciation for its effect on other organs, including the brain. In addition, the media has increasingly begun to draw attention to the plight of long-haulers and their cognitive symptoms.
newsweek
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