![]() ![]() They did not see the same changes, confirming they are related to COVID.ĭecreases in brain volume are common to many brain diseases and disorders associated with degeneration, and have been found in people with mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer’s disease, depression and traumatic brain injury, among others. To show these changes were specific to COVID and not just related to having a respiratory illness, the scientists also looked at a group of people who had pneumonia. How does COVID affect the brain? Two neuroscientists explain They performed worse in a test for attention and mental flexibility, a finding that was associated with volume reductions within a part of the cerebellum related to smell and social relationships.įurther research is needed to see if COVID affects the brains of younger people in the same way. The post-COVID group also showed a reduction in overall brain size between their MRI scans that wasn’t seen in the non-COVID group, and had altered connections between different brain regions in the olfactory cortex, an area related to smell. Affected brain regions included the parahippocampal gyrus (an area related to memory) and the orbitofrontal cortex, which is located at the front of the brain and is important for smell and taste. This is equivalent to between one and six years of normal brain ageing. The group who had mild COVID an average of five months beforehand had thinning of brain tissue in several brain regions, ranging from 0.2% to around 2% compared to their pre-COVID scan. This allowed the scientists to determine the specific effects of mild COVID infection on brain structure and function. They then compared this to the same data collected three years later, when about half of those participants had mild COVID infection, and the other half had not caught COVID. They looked at brain magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans and tests of brain function in 785 volunteers who were assessed before the pandemic. Scientists collected data as part of the massive UK Biobank database. Long COVID is very common, and may affect more than half of the people who catch COVID, even if they have a mild case. ![]()
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