NIHR funded study offers hope for targeted treatment of long COVID

An NIHR and UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) funded study has revealed that Long Covid leads to ongoing inflammation which can be detected in blood. 

This suggests that existing drugs which help treat conditions that affect the body’s immune system could be helpful in treating Long Covid, and should be investigated in future clinical trials. The study, which has been published in Nature Immunology, is from two collaborative UK-wide consortia, PHOSP-COVID and ISARIC-4C. These involve scientists and clinicians from universities across the UK, including Imperial College London and the Universities of Leicester, Edinburgh and Liverpool, among others.

The research compared 426 people who were experiencing symptoms consistent with Long Covid with 233 people who were also hospitalised for Covid-19 but had fully recovered. The researchers took samples of blood plasma and measured a total of 368 proteins known to be involved in inflammation and immune system modulation.

They found that, relative to patients who had fully recovered, those with Long Covid showed a pattern of immune system activation indicating inflammation of myeloid cells and activation of a family of immune system proteins called the complement system.

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Source: NIHR, 11 April 2024