14 ms·
Covid infections are causing IQ drops and years of brain aging, studies suggest
- aayala 3y agoIdiocracy
- zjp 3y agoI felt much sharper before I had COVID last December and I still don't feel like I've fully recovered from the fog.
- decremental 3y ago[flagged]
- resolutebat 3y agoI'm genuinely curious about what mechanism would make this possible.
- yieldcrv 3y agowhat I find the most humorous from people that base their whole identity around a problem with mRNA vaccines is that everything they identify as a problem is caused by a natural covid infection too and in vast greater quantities and severity, and they amusingly don’t seem to know that
- decremental 3y ago[dead]
- logicchains 3y agoThey were presumably referring to https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36548397/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36548397/ , where repeated vaccination with the mRNA vaccines was associated with antibody class switching towards IgG4 "tolerance" antibodies. In theory, this class switching could allow the spike proteins from the virus to persist longer in the body, causing more damage. The same phenomenon wasn't observed with non-mrna vaccines or covid infection, which has been hypothesized to be because they don't make the body's own cells produce the spike protein, so don't invoke that same immune tolerance mechanism.
- zer00eyz 3y agoTo bring in some actual research: https://www.cureus.com/articles/196275-increased-age-adjusted-cancer#!/ https://www.cureus.com/articles/196275-increased-age-adjuste... A study of more than 50,000 employees at a medical institution in the United States observed the incidence of the Omicron variant epidemic based on the number of vaccine doses received (0, 1, 2, 3, and 4 or more doses) over a period of 26 weeks and showed that the number of vaccines received was positively correlated with the cumulative incidence rate of COVID-19 [46]. Susceptibility to COVID-19 infection after multiple vaccinations may be enhanced by antibody-dependent enhancement [47], immune imprinting [39,48], and immunosuppression [25-27]. This can result in a risk of exposure to viral S-protein in addition to vaccine S-protein for the multiple-vaccinated. That whole paper is... interesting. I will be curios to see if any one else finds corroborating data or if it gets toss to the side and forgotten.
- frereubu 3y agoOn what basis?
- reaperman 3y agoNone. The studies show that COVID infections cause this in a significant fraction of those affected by them. Studies do not show the vaccine causes these symptoms.
- CapeTheory 3y agoMaybe Covid will be The End of the Whole Mess after all.
- ggm 3y agoA reading of Oliver Sach's pop-sci books on encephalitis & PVS suggests we've actually been here before in the 19th and 20th century with cognitive and other effects down to post viral conditions. It's just another instance of something we probably know happens.
- henrikschroder 3y agoIf this is true, you should expect results to be the same across countries, and the measurable drops in IQ should correlate to infection rates. Five bucks says you won't find that.
- danielheath 3y agoIt's almost impossible to compare IQ tests across countries, because cognition test results are really only valid for people from the cultural context the test was written for.
- pjerem 3y agoI suppose you can’t compare the absolute results but you can see if there is a similar trend.
- logicchains 3y agoThat's why Raven's progressive matrices were invented. And in spite of it being developed by westerners, East Asian countries tend to score highest on it.
- resonious 3y agoIf true, this seems quite damning for IQ as a metric. If the kilogram varied across countries, we would be in big trouble.
- DoreenMichele 3y agoIt's true, fwiw.
- seanmcdirmid 3y agoIQ metrics are continually damned. There is still no real consensus that they are useful at all. But the social sciences is filled with a lot of soft metrics like IQ because studying complex human behavior with hard science is very hard, and probably impossible.
- eru 3y ago> There are studies that have been done comparing people who had COVID-19, versus people who didn't, and then gave them cognitive testing to measure their ability to cognitively process information and test their IQ. And there's very clear differences in the IQ of people who had been infected with COVID-19 versus people who did not. Even mild COVID can give people about a three-point loss of IQ. That sounds like an observational study. It's hard to get from that correlation to the causation in the headline. The article does not mention this problem at all as far as I can tell.
- nostrebored 3y agoYet another observational study with no real comparison. The REACT dataset used by the study relies mostly on self reported surveys and data from people sick enough to go to the doctor. This has obvious problems. The idea that there is a control arm of people who haven’t gotten Covid large enough to power a real control here is farcical. Again, a problem of self selection for people committed enough to maintain a large level of isolation for multiple years. Any causal study here should be looking at a differential in pre and post covid cognitive scores with a control of known uninfected participants in the same time window.
- Animats 3y ago> The idea that there is a control arm of people who haven’t gotten Covid large enough to power a real control here is farcical. Why? Whether someone has ever been infected is testable. About 20% of the US population had not had COVID as of some point in 2023.
- nostrebored 3y agowhich tests are you talking about? Antibody titers only work for a few months, and as far as I understand they’re the standard test. Why do you believe that 20% of the U.S. population hasn’t had covid?
- feverzsj 3y agoI thought tiktok caused that.
- senectus1 3y agotiktok was doing this before covid was around.
- jonathanstrange 3y agoThere was a massive increase in TikTok's user base between 2020 to now, though, so it's worth investigating.
- fransje26 3y agoDouble whammy!
- alsaaro 3y agoI wonder if covid infections, perhaps in rare cases the vaccines themselves, is to blame for the post-pandemic phenomena of ADHD medication shortages, the crime wave, school discipline (lack of), the so-called college enrollment crises (precipitous decline), and record low OECD test scores.All of these can be explained by dopamine dysregulation.
- logicchains 3y agoMost of those can be explained by the lockdowns and school closures, which made millions of lower class people even poorer and worsened their children's educational outcomes. More poverty + missed schooling = more crime, less college enrollment and worse test scores.
- shrubble 3y agoI definitely feel 'less sharp' at times, however in my case I may have other factors going on. I did have Omicron and possibly something very weird about the time Covid started to show up in the USA
- DoreenMichele 3y ago[flagged]
- croes 3y agoMilllions of people worldwide suddenly have Zinc deficiency in the same year and now it's gone?
- DoreenMichele 3y agoI have no idea what you are trying to say.
- croes 3y agoWouldn't it be a strange coincidence that people have a Zinc deficiency just at the time the are infected with Corona? Why only the infected?
- DoreenMichele 3y agoThe infection causes zinc deficiency.
- croes 3y agoDeficiency symptoms are slow, loss of smell was an early infection symptom. How could Corona cause a body wide deficiency if it was still early on? And where did the Zinc go?
- DoreenMichele 3y agoI don't know the answers to that. I'm not a medical professional. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22845133 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22845133 That comment is by a researcher. We talked. I was realizing I had covid and was recovering and we had been eating a lot of zinc rich foods and this helped mitigate our symptoms. I don't really understand why people feel so compelled to gang up on me on HN about really mild observations supported with citations that "x and y could be related." I have a serious medical condition which explains my interest in medical topics on hn. But after 14 years, I still cannot fathom why I get such hostility on hn for that interest. I'm probably done with trying to defend my really mild comment on this forum that other people are reacting so rabidly to. It's pointless to engage with this garbage.
- max_ 3y agoIs there any real world test where higher IQ people do better than anyone else deterministically? I am not talking about correlations. I am talking about people with higher IQ can solve X problem that people with lower IQs can't. Not the ability to spot back & white patterns on a screen. The riches people are not the highest IQ people The Noble Prize Winners are not the highest IQ people The best sports players are not the highest IQ people The best mathematicians are not the highest IQ people The best musicians are not the highest IQ people. None of the these have excellence that can be deterministically determined by IQ. So what exactly is it good for?
- leovingi 3y agoMaintaining a high level of civilization
- max_ 3y agoSo when civilizations collapse like a Ancient Egyptian, Rome, Ancient China & Ancient Greece. What it the IQ that also dropped to cause the civilization collapse?
- mirekrusin 3y agoThey probably got covid.
- leovingi 3y agoThe inability to recognise how an intelligence trait that correlates with pattern recognition might have an effect on being able to predict the long-term outcome of one's actions and provides the ability to work well with others in a very large group, which a civilization is, and instead defaulting to an ad absurdum argument shows where you might fall on the IQ spectrum.
- shiroiushi 3y agoI think I read that most ancient civilizations collapsed because of environmental factors. The environment changed, and they couldn't cope with it for some reason (lack of technology was probably a big part). As for China, I don't think that one ever "collapsed". It withdrew, but I don't think you can call it a "collapse" the way many other ancient civilizations did. Even Rome is a bit hard to call a full collapse: it degraded over the course of centuries, and eventually Europe turned to feudalism. The Roman Empire itself split apart, with the eastern part (in Constantinople) continuing for another 1000 years after the western side fell apart. I think civilizations like the Assyrians and Hittites are better examples of civilizations that truly "collapsed": there's basically nothing left of them today, except some ruins.
- skrebbel 3y agoMy wife has postcovid and this is a profound effect. Yesterday she tried to add up a series of numbers by heart, and she simply couldn’t. For context, she’s pretty mathy and used to mock me for taking out a calculator or a spreadsheet for stuff like that. She also forgets everything, which is another thing she used to be great at. It’s pretty confronting, especially now that the idea that maybe this isn’t temporary is taking shape.
- TheFreim 3y agoCould it be that she's simply out of practice?
- skrebbel 3y agoI doubt it. It’s not like you ever stop practicing remembering things or doing everyday math tasks. Look, this is anecdata. I’m not making a claim about this article. I just know that my wife got substantially stupider overnight 2 years ago (plus lots of other symptoms). Via a postcovid support group organized by a semi government club here in NL she knows a bunch more people with long-term postcovid and this is the one symptom they all share. Might well still be some weird sort of selection bias etc; again, I’m not saying this is generalizable science, I’m saying that my wife got noticeably less smart and it started at the same time as all her other postcovid symptoms.
- cjk2 3y agoI would be careful with some of the self-help groups. They can reinforce symptoms rather than improve them. A case in point is a friend of mine who thought she had post-covid symptoms and cognitive decline. She went to a similar group and found a lot of very miserable people with depression. When talking to them they had similar stories of lost relatives, lost jobs and general social decline. But all had a common thing which was they weren't dealing with those issues in a healthy ways. It was turning into a drinking club pretty much after the event was over. Even if you had problems this would exacerbate them over time. There was a hefty dividing line among my friendship group after covid which was people who went down that route and people who went down the health and fitness route. The latter seem to be doing much better in all aspects even if they started in the former group. I was running 10km once a week before. It knocked me off my feet entirely and I don't run often now which got to me for a few months. But I fought it and can do that again now if I need to. It hurt that it did that to me but it taught me how fragile things are. Also to note I'm a qualified mathematician but some days to months I can't add numbers together and this turns out mostly to be I'm tired or not in the right state of mind rather than anything persistent. Lots of causes - best to look for the obvious ones first.
- KingOfLechia 3y ago[dead]
- jl6 3y agoThe title is misleading, at least on the IQ claim. The underlying study was observational and did not claim causation. Medical journals and their associated media summaries are awash with low-certainty studies that get de-nuanced and overhyped. These studies are relatively easy to do - not to denigrate the work put in by the original study authors (it’s not their fault the press sensationalize their work). But for strong causative claims you ideally would have blinded controlled randomized trials. Sometimes such trials are not feasible, but that doesn’t mean you get to claim causation anyway just because the work to prove it is too hard.
- p0w3n3d 3y agoI experienced some limitations of cognitive abilities but not sure was it due to COVID or some sort of depression
- shutupnerd0000 3y agoThat settles it then. Causation proved.
- varjag 3y agoI too have lost solid 20 points immediately after infection. Took the test precisely because the fall was so sharp and deep. Scoff all you want but for me it's settled.
- kelipso 3y agoYeah, same thing here. Pretty significant drop in cognitive abilities I feel like.
- camgunz 3y agoIt says "studies suggest"; how much more hedging do you want?
- eru 3y agoThe studies don't actually 'suggest' any causality. Just like the studies in question don't suggest that the moon is made of cheese. So you wouldn't want to write either in a headline. 'Covid infections associated with IQ drops and years of brain aging, studies suggest'. You can even remove the 'studies suggest' part in that case to get just 'Covid infections associated with IQ drops and years of brain aging'
- 8note 3y agoI think I'd attribute my newfound slowness to lockdowns, rather than COVID? Lack of practicing talking and remembering stuff is bad for talking and remembering stuff, and it definitely happened long before I caught COVID, because I caught COVID super late
- robocat 3y ago> it definitely happened long before I caught COVID Why do you assume that you weren't asymptomatic? 40.5% of people who contract the virus have no symptoms.
- aaron695 3y ago[dead]
- npunt 3y agoNeuroinflammation is a poorly studied area and one likely cause of brain fog and mecfs/long covid symptoms. Jarred Younger [1] is a researcher studying this and has a youtube channel [2] where he discusses his latest work. If you're interested in this it's worth watching! Also please ignore anyone that posts 'oh its just X' or 'just do X', whatever X may be. This is a complicated medical mystery that millions of patients have suffered from for decades if you include mecfs and postviral conditions. There is no X, patients have tried every possible X. Anyone who tells you its just X is revealing their lack of understanding of the issue (this happens every time this subject shows up on HN and elsewhere). [1] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Jarred_Younger https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Jarred_Younger [2] https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoVoOvIX90IMEZCbBf_ycEA https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCoVoOvIX90IMEZCbBf_ycEA
- ImHereToVote 3y agoWasn't there a paper that proposed the idea that long Covid is actual replicating virus that replicates in very low numbers.
- npunt 3y agoViral persistence is one theory that may explain a subset of long covid and other postviral cases (mecfs example [1]). There's lots of theories including itaconate shunt [2] and metabolic trap [3], glutamate toxicity [4], cranio-cervical instability and infections causing breakdown of tendons [5], gut biome imbalances [6][7], endothelial damage, and others. I'm not sure what the most promising ones are but the search for biomarkers continues. What we call long covid or mecfs or chronic lyme or fibromyalgia etc etc are all umbrella terms for symptom clusters so they lack some specificity and are likely multi-causal. There are many overlaps in LC and mecfs patient populations in studies (vs controls), so its likely a fair-to-significant amount of LC is actually what we call mecfs. Much of the mystery and suffering of long covid would have been avoided if we'd invested anything in investigating these conditions pre-covid (mecfs has the least funding to disease burden and the worst quality of life of all major diseases), but the medical community generally didn't want to believe these diseases were real. Same thing happened with autoimmune conditions like lupus and MS before their mechanisms were discovered. All of these conditions predominately affect women. [1] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Persistent_infection_hypothesis https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Persistent_infection_hypothesis [2] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Itaconate_shunt_hypothesis https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Itaconate_shunt_hypothesis [3] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_trap https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Metabolic_trap [4] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Glutamate https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Glutamate [5] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Craniocervical_instability https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Craniocervical_instability [6] https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Microbiome https://me-pedia.org/wiki/Microbiome [7] https://www.remissionbiome.org/ https://www.remissionbiome.org/
- peter_retief 3y agoI had brain fog with COVID but it does get better with time. Still sometimes struggle to find the right word. There is also Alzheimer's in my family so that is something additional to worry about
- bayindirh 3y agoI went through a mild COVID-19 infection, and felt the sluggishness in my brain for quite some time. I think I recovered, but it was a jarring experience.
- fransje26 3y agoSame here. And the random days where I wouldn't be able to concentrate, even a few months later after feeling better, were really unpleasant.
- NotGMan 3y ago[flagged]
- timeon 3y agoSeems like you had COVID.
- senectus1 3y agocould they express their findings in a way that doesn't include "IQ" in it? I really dont think we know what Intelligence is, let alone how to define it universally enough to make a quotient of it.
- gn4d 3y agopeak midwit take
- maaaaattttt 3y agoThe symptoms of tingling in the extremities resemble what my wife experienced after her chemo when the treatment damaged her neurons' myelin sheath. This causes 'noisy' neuron signals to be transmitted (tingles, lack of sensation, etc.). If the same thing happened in the brain, I bet the noisy signals would lead to brain fogginess, forgetfulness, etc. Back then, she was taking omega-3 supplements and received shots of vitamin B12. After a year, it removed almost all the tingling, but some sensations never fully came back. This is not medical advice (and check with your doctor beforehand), but it feels like taking vitamin B12 and omega-3 supplements should be a pretty low-risk bet to try to improve your situation if you're experiencing the long COVID symptoms described in the article.
- bratbag 3y agoI had similar symptoms. In my case it was just a vitimin D deficiency caused by working from home. I don't doubt some people have suffered neurological damage, but I wouldn't be surprised if many are suffering the same as I was.
- prmoustache 3y agoAre you working in the cellar at home? Why would you have less vitamin D working from home than say, an office?
- danparsonson 3y agoUnless you're teleporting or living there, getting from home to the office normally involves at least some exposure to sunlight.
- prmoustache 3y agoWorking from home doesn't mean you are forced or even have any incentive to stay at home all day long.
- danparsonson 3y agoOK but the OP didn't say all people get vitamin D deficiency from working at home, they were only describing their own experience.
- bratbag 3y agoWhen did I say I was forced? Are you actually responding to what I said, or are you just preemptively attacking what you (incorrectly) assume is an anti wfh statement?
- prmoustache 3y agoI am just disputing the causality of that deficiency of vitamin D. WFH has nothing to do with the fact one doesn't spend some time outside every day.
- madballster 3y ago2015 observational study suggests these results are not unique to Covid: ""Our research shows a correlation between hospitalisation due to infection and impaired cognition corresponding to an IQ score of 1.76 lower than the average. People with five or more hospital contacts with infections had an IQ score of 9.44 lower than the average. The study thus shows a clear dose-response relationship between the number of infections, and the effect on cognitive ability increased with the temporal proximity of the last infection and with the severity of the infection." Source: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150521095016.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150521095016.h...
- throwing_away 3y agoI feel like this is a messaging roll out? https://www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/faustfiles/109672 https://www.medpagetoday.com/opinion/faustfiles/109672 -- an interview from 2 days ago where the NIH leader says covid is persistent for months or years in people and the MD interviewer did a double take. Not sure why there's a shift happening, maybe some new publication? This has been shaping up for years now.
- greyface- 3y agoThe relevant bit of transcript: Faust: I just want to follow up on something you said a moment ago about where this virus can be found in tissues. Are you suggesting that long COVID is actually, the mechanism of that, is persistent live virus in humans? Bertagnolli: We see evidence of persistent live virus in humans in various tissue reservoirs, including surrounding nerves, the brain, the GI [gastrointestinal] tract, to the lung. Faust: OK. And you're saying this goes beyond the PCR's [polymerase chain reaction test] ability to get it in a regular swab so that we are missing chronic cases of SARS‑CoV‑2? Bertagnolli: Correct. The virus can persist in tissues for months, perhaps even years. Faust: OK. I think that's certainly one theory, but I'm not sure that that's settled. Is that fair? I mean, there's one thing between people who are autopsy, they died of viral sepsis, as opposed to people walking around. Is there a distinction there? Bertagnolli: Our emerging data shows that the virus can persist into tissues in the long term, and I think that's really critical because it does help us think about possible ways to combat it, one being better antivirals. I think there's a lot of focus on developing new antivirals as a possible way of preventing long COVID, and the other might be more aggressive treatment with antiviral therapy upon initial diagnosis. Faust: If that's the case, then it could be reactivated just like herpes is and shingles. Are we going to start seeing people get COVID not from infection, but from themselves in reactivation? Bertagnolli: I don't believe I've seen or heard of any instance of that, and I don't think you can ever assume that one virus is going to act like another. Certainly every virus that we know of seems to have a different effect in the body long term.
- sorwin 3y ago> There are studies that have been done comparing people who had COVID-19, versus people who didn't, and then gave them cognitive testing to measure their ability to cognitively process information and test their IQ. And there's very clear differences in the IQ of people who had been infected with COVID-19 versus people who did not. Even mild COVID can give people about a three-point loss of IQ. Hasn't pretty much the entire population of earth been infected by COVID at least once at this point?
- solumunus 3y agoThe people reporting not to have been infected would have had extremely mild, non symptomatic infections, such that they didn’t notice them. I assume the symptoms are what cause the long term damage.
- timeon 3y agoI had no symptoms and was not tested for COVID. I have been testing my self regularly during pandemic, however not always with PCR.
- tunn3l 3y agoI am suffering from LC myself for 2 years now. The Brainfog is intense, the fatigue tiring. I'm mentally really low. It's nice to see some news regarding COVID. My story is on my blog https://tunn3l.pro https://tunn3l.pro
- michael9423 3y agoThat's not exlusive to covid, but happens with all acute infections. It has long been known that the number of infections correlate with IQ loss. "People with five or more hospital contacts with infections had an IQ score of 9.44 lower than the average." https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150521095016.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150521095016.h...
- Aardwolf 3y agoPermanent impairment or temporary? Brain cells / connections permanently gone forever, or a temporary loss of some nutrients in the brain that can be recovered later on?
- michael9423 3y agoProbably depends on the individual, whether the immune system is able to fully go back to baseline, or remains activated chronically.
- dukeyukey 3y agoI've been hospitalised three times with severe infections, and sent to the minor injuries unit once with an infection that would've gotten severe, but caught early with oral antibiotic. Makes me wonder what I'd be like if I never got hit by anything.
- dominojab 3y ago[dead]
- negamax 3y agoThe cognitive decline can also be attributed to extreme isolation that everyone was subjected to. My super enriched, flow like heavenly water life came to a complete standstill. All future plans and timelines thrown in disarray. Covid has ended but my life trajectory has completely changed
- jug 3y agoYes, I mean it's been shown how people with a loss of hearing have an increased risk of dementia and it's natural that this would apply here as well. It's just another form of lost stimuli. But there might also be medical reasons behind this and this serves to show how complex this is to research.
- jonathanstrange 3y agoI'm dismayed by the number of people who apparently don't subscribe to evidence-based medicine using proper statistical methodology and instead rely on anecdotal evidence whenever Covid comes up. It's very irrational, though some of this behavior can probably be explained by the extreme politicization of the topic in the US.
- woopwoop24 3y agoi did pure oxygen in a pressure chamber for about 4 weeks, it got significantly better after that, at least in my perception. Could be also just the time after the infection
- Satam 3y agoI've noticed my memory and math skills getting worse as well. Can't say it's covid for sure though as there are other likely explanations too: getting fatter and out of shape, finishing uni and going out of practice, long-term sleep deprivation, etc. Either way, if not covid, then I think at least the lockdowns did have an impact on my health and ability to stay fit.
- pvaldes 3y agoMy bet is that trolls in government, fake news and anti-scientific facts injected in vein 24/7/365, helped a lot to grease that piggy. Accelerated brain decay with the last and current politics in the planet is basically guaranteed.
- ETH_start 3y agoThe studies cited do not prove any causative association. They lack controls and other design elements that would account for misattribution and the impact of COVID-related psychosocial factors on observed symptoms. In general, there is an extreme lack of rigor seen in claims about long COVID. The best evidence available suggests most cases of "long COVID" are misattribution: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullarticle/2785832 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/fullar...
- atleastoptimal 3y agoA Chinese researcher speculated this would be a major source of worldwide cognitive decline. Perhaps the Chinese knew something about the disease we don't leading to their extreme lockdowns.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- vekker 3y agoI wonder if the study segmented the participants according to vaccination status (before/after infection, or none at all)?
- sagebird 3y agoI'd be interested in if there was a gene that significantly reduced covid infection likelihood - but somehow didn't affect much else, like other viral infection rates. That would almost be a natural sort of experiment, to compare the IQ of these and other population. Though, you would have to have enough people in this group, not be too rare. And it would help if there was already a large population that was IQ measured prior to Covid, and could be re-measured. It seems unlikely that such a scenario exists.
- aayala 3y ago[flagged]
- eleveriven 3y agoI think we still have yet to learn about how else COVID could have affected us