ME/CFS and Long COVID share similar symptoms and biological abnormalities
“In this review, we first compare the symptoms of ME/CFS and Long COVID, noting the considerable similarities and the few differences. We then compare in extensive detail the underlying pathophysiology of these two conditions, focusing on abnormalities of the central and autonomic nervous system, lungs, heart, vasculature, immune system, gut microbiome, energy metabolism and redox balance.”
ME/CFS and Long COVID share similar symptoms
ME/CFS and Long COVID share similar symptoms and biological abnormalities: road map to the literature, by Anthony L Komaroff and W Ian Lipkin in Front. Med., 02 June 2023; Sec. Infectious Diseases: Pathogenesis and Therapy, Vol 10 – 2023 [doi.org/10.3389/fmed.2023.1187163]
Some patients remain unwell for months after “recovering” from acute COVID-19. They develop persistent fatigue, cognitive problems, headaches, disrupted sleep, myalgias and arthralgias, post-exertional malaise, orthostatic intolerance and other symptoms that greatly interfere with their ability to function and that can leave some people housebound and disabled.
The illness (Long COVID) is similar to myalgic encephalomyelitis/ chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS) as well as to persisting illnesses that can follow a wide variety of other infectious agents and following major traumatic injury. Together, these illnesses are projected to cost the U.S. trillions of dollars.
In this review, we first compare the symptoms of ME/CFS and Long COVID, noting the considerable similarities and the few differences. We then compare in extensive detail the underlying pathophysiology of these two conditions, focusing on abnormalities of the central and autonomic nervous system, lungs, heart, vasculature, immune system, gut microbiome, energy metabolism and redox balance. This comparison highlights how strong the evidence is for each abnormality, in each illness, and helps to set priorities for future investigation.
The review provides a current road map to the extensive literature on the underlying biology of both illnesses.
Conclusion
We urge that investigators studying the underlying biology of Long COVID take note of the robust findings in ME/CFS that have not yet been investigated in Long COVID: given the many similarities in the underlying biology of the two illnesses, it is likely that pursuing such abnormalities in Long COVID will prove instructive.
Research into the pathophysiology of these responses has the potential to lead to new strategies for reducing the morbidity of ME/CFS and Long COVID, and of similar illnesses that can follow a variety of infections and non-infectious traumatic injury.
