BTN News: A new study by Austrian scientists shows that a Covid-19 infection can weaken the immune system for a long time. This happens because the infection reduces the number of immune cells in the blood. The study was done by a team from the Medical University of Vienna (UniMed) and published in the journal Allergy. It shows that the bone marrow, which makes immune cells, does not work as well after a Covid-19 infection.
Researchers found that the immune systems of patients who recovered from Covid-19 might not work as well as before. This discovery, highlighted in a UniMed press release, shows that the effects of the SARS-CoV-2 virus were seen even in mild cases. This will help with more studies on long Covid.
“Our results give a possible reason why some long-term effects of Covid-19 could be due to damage to the immune system,” explained Professor Winfried Pickl, the lead researcher. The cause seems to be the “lower growth and movement of immune cells from the bone marrow,” he added.
In the study, started in 2020, scientists looked at the immune systems of 133 people who had recovered from Covid-19 and 98 people who had not been infected. They studied the number and types of immune cells and growth factors in the blood. These factors are important for cell growth. The patients were checked ten weeks and ten months after getting sick.
Since vaccines were not available at the start of the study, all participants were not vaccinated. “Not surprisingly, ten weeks after infection, recovered patients showed clear signs of immune activity in both T cells and B cells (white blood cells), unlike healthy people,” noted Pickl.
However, the samples taken ten months after the illness surprised the scientists. These samples showed a “big drop in immune cells.” This long-term drop could mean that even those who had mild Covid-19 might face lasting impacts on their immune systems.
The findings of this study are important. They suggest that the immune system’s ability to fight future infections could be hurt long after recovering from Covid-19. This knowledge is key to understanding the long-term health effects of the virus. It could lead to new treatments and ways to manage long Covid.
The study’s results stress the need for ongoing research into the long-term effects of Covid-19 on the immune system. Learning how the virus affects immune cell production and function could be key to developing new treatments for those affected by long Covid.
As scientists continue to study Covid-19, this research offers important information. It highlights the virus’s potential to cause long-term harm to the body’s defense systems. This study shows the need for careful study and ongoing research into the widespread effects of this global pandemic.
