Early this year, leading researchers discussed what we knew — and didn’t know — about COVID-19 and the brainopens in a new tab or window. Since then, new findings have emerged about SARS-CoV-2 and the nervous system, including the results of an autopsy study that showed the presence of the virus throughout the body and brain.
How can a respiratory pathogen like SARS-CoV-2 cause the nervous system to go haywire? That’s the question researchers posed in January, and it’s still being asked nearly a year later. Neurologic complications of COVID are diverse and can be long-lasting, noted Avindra Nath, MD, of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, at the time. “They are largely immune-mediated, the brain endothelial cells being a major target,” he told MedPage Today.
Research throughout the year supported this view. In July, an autopsy study of nine COVID patientsopens in a new tab or window showed vascular damage with serum proteins leaking into the brain parenchyma, accompanied by widespread endothelial cell activation. Consistent with other studiesopens in a new tab or window, SARS-CoV-2 virus was not detected in the brain.But in December, an autopsy report of 44 peopleopens in a new tab or window who died with COVID-19 in the first year of the pandemic showed that SARS-CoV-2 virus had spread throughout the body — including the brain — and persisted in tissue for months.
Editor’s Note: Again, the study implies the virus was found in the brain without having been isolated and proven to be what is being called ‘covid’. The article even admits the results were a fabricated culture that uses Vero cells to replicate virus, i.e. in monkey kidney cells. These patients were said to be 44 patients who died in the first year of the pandemic with numerous co-morbidities. “We never found the virus,” Nath told MedPage Today. “We found the viral protein, but no RNA.” — mmd