According to the study authors, the virus has the potential to infect almost any organ and spread to all systems of the body, which may explain the ongoing symptoms seen in patients with long-standing COVID disease. The study, which is currently under review for publication in the journal Nature, is considered one of the most comprehensive reviews of how the virus replicates in human cells and persists for long periods of time in the human body. Eleni Koroboki and Thanos Dimopoulos (Dean of the Therapeutic Clinic) summarize the main findings of the study.
Asymptomatic people are also affected
According to the authors, including Ziyad Al-Aly, Director of the Center for Clinical Epidemiology at the St. Petersburg Veterans Health Care System (VHS), the study's main findings are as follows. Louis in Missouri, USA, this is an important study that explains why the virus can affect almost all systems and why long-standing COVID disease can also affect people who had asymptomatic disease or mild symptoms during the acute phase of COVID-19.
The researchers analysed biopsies of necropsy material from 44 patients who died due to COVID-19 in the first year of the pandemic. Small fragments of the virus were detected in various parts of the body including the heart and brain up to 230 days after the onset of symptoms. This could represent infection with "defective" virus fragments, which has been observed in other persistent infections among measles patients.
Heart failure or early dementia
Unlike other studies of post-mortem material after COVID-19, the NIH team had a more comprehensive post-mortem tissue collection process, which usually took place within a day of the patient's death. The researchers also used different ways of preserving the tissue for virus detection. In addition, they were able to grow the virus collected from various tissues, including the heart, lungs, small intestine and adrenal glands.
According to the authors, the overall results of the study show that while the highest load of SARS-CoV-2 virus is found in the airways and lungs, the virus can spread early in the early stages of infection and infect cells throughout the body, including the brain.
Raina MacIntyre, PhD, Professor of Global Biosecurity at the University of New South Wales, noted that the implications of the chronic burden of COVID-19 for years to come remain unknown. It is not unlikely that incidents of heart failure or early-onset dementia will occur in COVID-19 patients. The as yet unanswered questions about the long-term complications of the virus call for a proactive public health strategy to mitigate the spread of the virus.
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