Scary long COVID symptom may be caused leaky blood-brain barrier: study

Health

By Andrew Court

Post-COVID “brain fog” could be caused by leaky blood vessels in the brain, a groundbreaking new study out of Ireland has determined.

Researchers from Trinity College Dublin recruited 32 patients who contracted COVID during the first wave of the pandemic, examining whether there was any disruption to the integrity of the brain’s blood vessels.

The results were published in the Nature Neuroscience journal on Thursday.

Ten of the analyzed patients had fully recovered from the coronavirus, while 22 were suffering from long-term effects associated with the disease.

Those classified as having long COVID reported symptoms that lasted more than 12 weeks, including chronic fatigue, shortness of breath and joint pain.

Eleven of the 22 long COVID sufferers suffered brain fog, experiencing forgetfulness and difficulty concentrating.

All participants underwent an MRI scan in which a dye was administered intravenously to examine the brain’s blood vessels.

The blood-brain barrier controls which substances or materials enter and exit the brain. A leaky barrier has been known to cause some of the symptoms of brain fog.

Sure enough, long COVID patients with brain fog all showed signs of a leaky blood-brain barrier, while long COVID patients without brain fog exhibited no such issue.

Similarly, the 10 patients who had fully recovered from COVID showed no signs of a leaky blood-brain barrier either.

“For the first time, we have been able to show that leaky blood vessels in the human brain, in tandem with a hyperactive immune system may be the key drivers of brain fog associated with long COVID,” Professor Matthew Campbell, one of the researchers, said in a statement.

“This is critically important, as understanding the underlying cause of these conditions will allow us to develop targeted therapies for patients in the future,” he added.

The team of scientists says more research needs to be done, given the analyzed participants contracted the original strain of COVID and were not vaccinated at the time.

It’s unclear whether later variants of the coronavirus could have affected the brain barrier in the same way.