Chuck DarwinMar 4, 2023

Hidden Viruses In Your Body Could Answer Why Long Covid Lingers

As the #Covid-19 scourge enters a fourth year, patients like one uncovered by tracing back through miles of waste pipes and drains are nudging researchers closer to answers for key questions: namely,

* where do worrisome new mutants come from?

*And what’s their role in #LongCovid, the mysterious post-infection ailment that afflicts more than 140 million people globally?

Scientists are exploring the possibility that some of the most infectious versions of the coronavirus — omicron and its descendants — came from #chronically #infected individuals whose immune systems were weakened by disease, drugs or both.

Research released in December shows the virus can #persist throughout the #body and #brain for #months. That suggests it may be able to hide out in human cells and tissues, not unlike the way HIV and the shingles-causing chickenpox virus do.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-03-01/hidden-viruses-in-your-body-could-answer-why-long-covid-lingers

Viruses Hiding Out in Patients Hold Long Covid Answers

Scientists track mutants from one manhole cover to the next; others scan patients’ bodies for signs of hidden infections.

Bloomberg
Show threadChuck DarwinMar 4, 2023

Intriguing Autopsies

Traces in the blood and stool of patients experiencing protracted symptoms suggest that SARS-CoV-2 might be holed up in the #gut, #fat or other tissues that give shelter from the body’s immune defenses.

Researchers at the US National Institutes of Health who conducted meticulous autopsies on the bodies of 44 #Covid victims found viral genetic material throughout patients’ #bodies and #brains for as long as 7 1/2 #months after symptoms began.

In one case, virus particles isolated from the brain were grown in a lab dish, proving they were fully functional and capable of replicating.

“The predominant damage continues to appear to be in the lungs,” said Daniel Chertow, who led the research at the NIH’s emerging pathogens section, “but oh boy, we really need to better understand what type of damage is done in all these other places

(2/n)

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-03-01/hidden-viruses-in-your-body-could-answer-why-long-covid-lingers?leadSource=uverify%20wall

Show threadChuck DarwinMar 4, 2023

Chertow’s research has already encouraged experimental use of antiviral medications such as Pfizer Inc.’s #Paxlovid to see if it can root out viral reservoirs and alleviate long-haul symptoms.

Even a relatively small number of infected cells could provoke the immune system to produce #inflammation, blood #clots and other problems associated with long #Covid, according to Amy Proal, co-founder of PolyBio Research Foundation, a non-profit in Boston that facilitates research into chronic, infection-associated conditions.

It’s “the most logical explanation because it accounts for pretty much everything else,” she said.

#Scanning #Hideouts

Henrich, who helped develop sophisticated imaging techniques that can pinpoint HIV within tissues, plans to use the same approach to find Covid’s hideouts.

Dozens of patients will undergo a series of whole-body scans that will look for signals of production or persistence of viral protein.

Those will be compared with symptoms to see how the lingering presence of the coronavirus correlates to long Covid.

The group has started scanning patients to look for protective T-cells that could indicate an #aberrant #immune #response to SARS-CoV-2. They’re examining biopsies of participants’ digestive tracts for viral vestiges, Henrich said.

(3/n)

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-03-01/hidden-viruses-in-your-body-could-answer-why-long-covid-lingers?leadSource=uverify%20wall

Viruses Hiding Out in Patients Hold Long Covid Answers

Scientists track mutants from one manhole cover to the next; others scan patients’ bodies for signs of hidden infections.

Bloomberg
Show threadChuck Darwin

A particular focus is #lymphoid tissues that produce, store and carry #Tcells that fight infection, and #antibody-making #Bcells.

The coronavirus may also be hiding out in long-lived #nerve cells and #heart muscle, where it may drive chest #pain, brain fog, #fatigue and other long-Covid symptoms, said Diane Griffin, a virologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore who has studied the body’s response to viral infections for more than 50 years.

“We have pretty good information from acute #RNA #virus infections that RNA does persist and that it does have consequences,” said Griffin, who is vice president of the US National Academy of Sciences. “Basically, it’s hard to get rid of viruses.”

Proving that persistent viral #infection causes long Covid will be difficult, Griffin said. Viruses in stealth mode suppress replication to avoid harming their host cells.

Despite extensive distribution of coronavirus RNA throughout patients’ bodies, Chertow’s team saw little evidence of inflammation or that the immune system had tried to destroy infected cells outside the respiratory tract.

(4/n)

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-03-01/hidden-viruses-in-your-body-could-answer-why-long-covid-lingers?leadSource=uverify%20wall

Viruses Hiding Out in Patients Hold Long Covid Answers

Scientists track mutants from one manhole cover to the next; others scan patients’ bodies for signs of hidden infections.

Bloomberg
Mar 4, 2023 at 2:17amWeb