Arthur T Knackerbracket has processed the following story:
Two new studies suggest that antibodies that attack people’s own tissues might cause ongoing neurological issues that afflict millions of people with the disease.
When scientists transferred these antibodies from people with long COVID into healthy mice, certain symptoms, including pain, transferred to the animals too, researchers reported May 31 on bioRxiv.org and June 19 on medRxiv.org.
Though scientists have previously implicated such antibodies, known as autoantibodies, as suspects in long COVID, the new studies are the first to offer direct evidence that they can do harm. “This is a big deal,” says Manali Mukherjee, a translational immunologist at McMaster University in Hamilton, Canada, who was not involved in the work. The papers make a good case for therapies that target autoantibodies, she says.
The work could also offer “peace of mind to some of the long-haulers,” Mukherjee says. As someone who has endured long COVID herself, she understands that when patients don’t know the cause of their suffering, it can add to their anxiety. They wonder, “What the hell is going wrong with me?” she says.
[...] Scientists have proposed many hypotheses for what causes long COVID, including SARS-CoV-2 virus lingering in the tissues and the reawakening of dormant herpes viruses (SN: 3/4/24). Those elements may still play a role in some people’s long COVID symptoms, but for pain, at least, rogue antibodies seem to be enough to kick-start the symptom all on their own. It’s not an out-of-the-blue role for autoantibodies; scientists suspect they may also be involved in other conditions that cause people pain, including fibromyalgia and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome.
But if doctors could identify which long COVID patients have pain-linked autoantibodies, they could try to reduce the amount circulating in the blood, says Iwasaki, who is also a Howard Hughes Medical Institute investigator. “I think that would really be a game changer for this particular set of patients.”
The work represents a “very strong level of evidence” that autoantibodies could cause harm in people with long COVID, says Ignacio Sanz, an immunologist at Emory University in Atlanta. Both he and Mukherjee would like to see the findings validated in larger sets of participants. And the real clincher, Sanz says, would come from longer-term studies. If scientists could show that patients’ symptoms ease as these rogue antibodies disappear over time, that’d be an even surer sign of their guilt.
References:
• K. S. Guedes de Sa et al. A causal link between autoantibodies and neurological symptoms in long COVID. medRxiv.org. Posted June 19, 2024. doi: 10.1101/2024.06.18.24309100.
• H-J Chen et al. Transfer of IgG from long COVID patients induces symptomology in mice. bioRxiv.org. Posted May 31, 2024. doi: 10.1101/2024.05.30.596590.
(Score: 3, Informative) by mhajicek on Tuesday July 23 2024, @01:56AM (1 child)
I just finished a week course of nicotine last week, and am feeling much stronger. I'm able to exercise without PEM now. Crossing fingers that it holds.
https://www.healthrising.org/blog/2023/12/07/nicotine-patch-long-covid-chronic-fatigue-fibromyalgia/ [healthrising.org]
The spacelike surfaces of time foliations can have a cusp at the surface of discontinuity. - P. Hajicek
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 23 2024, @06:40PM
Huh. Maybe that explains something. I smoke like a fish drinks. Been doing it since I was 14 back in the 60s.
Been around plenty of people with COVID. Never got the shot, never got COVID.
(Score: 2) by Barenflimski on Tuesday July 23 2024, @03:01AM
Here in Merica', when you go to the Dr. with this, they give you a script for anti-depressants and slap you on the ass while you're walking out the door.
Anymore I'm not even surprised when I walk past the front desk and they tell you they quit taking your insurance while you were in with the Doctor.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Beryllium Sphere (r) on Tuesday July 23 2024, @05:13AM (11 children)
Some people with long COVID improve after vaccination and some get worse. Maybe there is more than one cause that leads to similar symptoms.
(Score: 5, Informative) by choose another one on Tuesday July 23 2024, @07:08AM (10 children)
Very likely. It's been known for some time now that as well as Covid attacking almost every part of the body, it can cause huge immune system disruption including massive auto-antibody response (and sadly there is little "good" immune response - most people don't stay immune long-term). In fact immune response (esp. leading to clotting) is actually the way a lot of people die of it - https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adn1077 [science.org]
I think the interesting thing about TFA is that they are starting to identify which auto-antibodies may be triggering which symptoms.
Immune response will vary between people, both to virus and vaccine, so seeing some improve and some regress after vaccination isn't surprising either. I actually know (in wider family/friends circle) one severely Covid-vaccine-damaged individual - but I also know, in the same set, multiple people with severe long term damage from Covid infection, and probably an order of magnitude more who are dead from it. Vaccination (like most of medicine) is a percentages game, not an absolute, I've had four or five covid jabs, still got infected a year ago, still got infected _again_ recently - but based on how bad I've been I am very very very glad I didn't get infected when unvaccinated. [ Weeks/months to recover first time, second infection much worse (so much for natural immunity), ambulances, hospitals, multiple chest x-rays, maybe permanent breathing damage ].
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 23 2024, @10:03AM (9 children)
I find it weird so many US people consider it "just another flu" and think countries should have treated it lightly. Do they think the people working at morgues and hospitals are part of some conspiracy too? They're making up dead bodies from nowhere or going about kidnapping and killing people?
It's more like "Just another pandemic flu" that kills millions. In my country the deaths dropped by two magnitudes after vaccinations. The workload on the hospitals dropped too. So obviously the vaccines help.
As for whether the vaccines are safe. I'm sure they're not 100% safe. There's no 100% safe - just injecting saline into billions of people would probably cause at least thousands to die.
Peanuts are safe for billions of people, but very unsafe for an increasingly significant minority.
But for most people getting the vaccine is safer than getting covid-19 unvaccinated. How dangerous are the vaccines and what are the long term effects? The test is ongoing... ;)
FWIW I felt some heart discomfort after getting the booster. So I'm not surprised some people got heart attacks after getting the vaccine or booster (especially after engaging in strenuous exercise).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Tuesday July 23 2024, @04:33PM (5 children)
At what age is the crossover? I'm guessing around 75-90, so that would not be "most people".
Citation needed
(Score: 5, Touché) by sjames on Tuesday July 23 2024, @05:03PM (1 child)
Citation needed on there being a crossover point as well.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday July 24 2024, @12:48PM
I have to admit you're correct. Some historical vaccines like polio and a couple others have historically been staggeringly effective. More recent adventures, vastly less.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday July 24 2024, @04:54AM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 24 2024, @06:12AM (1 child)
Click a suitable country for yourself to prove you're right or prove you're wrong. Up to you.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ [worldometers.info]
Nobody is paying me to convince you, so I don't care if you don't believe me.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday July 24 2024, @12:45PM
No problem. There seems to be no data in support of your claim at that site.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DadaDoofy on Tuesday July 23 2024, @06:16PM (2 children)
"In my country the deaths dropped by two magnitudes after vaccinations. The workload on the hospitals dropped too"
Citation please.
"So obviously the vaccines help."
No. No, they don't. Not according to the UK's Office for National Statistics. The vaccinated population in England accounted for 95% of COVID-19 deaths between 1st June 2022 and 31st May 2023. Whereas the unvaccinated population accounted for just 5%.
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/deathsbyvaccinationstatusengland [ons.gov.uk]
(Score: 5, Informative) by sjames on Tuesday July 23 2024, @09:30PM
Unless you also state what portion of the population was vaccinated and if that vaccination was concentrated on the most vulnerable and frail, your stat doesn't mean much. "Vaccinate" 95% of the population with saline and note that 95% of all deaths that year were vaccinated and you would conclude saline is deadly.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 24 2024, @06:09AM
Click a suitable country for yourself to prove you're right or prove you're wrong. Up to you.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ [worldometers.info]