r/science • u/Wagamaga • Feb 03 '25

Neuroscience Scientists discover that even mild COVID-19 can alter brain proteins linked to Alzheimer’s disease, potentially increasing dementia risk—raising urgent public health concerns.

https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/260553/covid-19-linked-increase-biomarkers-abnormal-brain/
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105

u/MadroxKran MS | Public Administration Feb 03 '25

I really wonder what we're going to see pop up related to Covid in like 20 years.

98

u/Yuyu_hockey_show Feb 03 '25

You should look into long covid. Lots of people are disabled and some have even died of it.

23

u/BacRedr Feb 04 '25

Yep, I've got a friend that's bedridden for two years now with it and needs home care. One of the most athletic people I knew, trapped in a malfunctioning shell.

A more public example would be Physics Girl. Was unable to do virtually anything for a long time. Thankfully she's made real progress in the last couple of months it seems.

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u/BearStrangler Feb 05 '25

Is your friend vaccinated?

2

u/BacRedr Feb 05 '25

To the best of my knowledge, yes. My understanding is that its suspected that covid either activated or otherwise allowed some other latent infection to flare-up, and the one-two punch was more than her immune system could take.

22

u/apcolleen Feb 04 '25

I've been trying to get into a dysautonimia clinic for 2 years now and finally have an appt IN DECEMBER. They are full up because of long covid patients.

9

u/MonkAndCanatella Feb 03 '25

it'll be seen as as bad if not worse than aids mark my words

4

u/RubiiJee Feb 04 '25

I think that's a tad extreme. It was a bad pandemic, but it was handled relatively well in comparison to AIDS, which was ignored for years and then blamed on gays, causing a decade plus of homophobic abuse. So bad it made its way into legislation. I hope and pray nothing is as bad as AIDS, but it became so horrifically linked due to media, government and public stigma. AIDS continues to be a death sentence to this day. COVID is survivable. I don't think the two are remotely comparable.

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u/fadingsignal Feb 04 '25 edited Feb 04 '25

was

Well, there's that word again. WHO says we're still in a pandemic. This whole thing isn't in the rear view mirror yet which is why it's so bad. It's still unfolding, now wholly unmitigated. People are causing grave harm with repeat infections which have tremendously high downstream effects.

CDC and WHO both said that 1 in 5 infections develop serious secondary conditions, and that list was massive, from musculoskeletal to neurological to heart to kidneys.

But because everyone is fixated on quick death being the only outcome, letting it rip is wearing everyone down one infection at a time. And the effects are delayed just long enough (weeks, months) that no connection is made because everybody is in a hurry to move on.

That's not even factoring in the impact on the immune system. Last year Yale School of Public Health published a study (one of many on this topic) showing how COVID infections impact the immune system for potentially several years, which gives rise to opportunistic infections. These record waves of tuberculosis, pneumonia and sharp increases in otherwise controlled illnesses is a pretty heavy gesture toward the consequences of repeat COVID infections.

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u/MonkAndCanatella Feb 04 '25

AIDS continues to be a death sentence to this day. COVID is survivable.

both of these are relatively contextual at this point - AIDS can be reversed, and COVID can kill.

And there's been nonstop propaganda to make covid a moral or genetic failure very similar to the playbook they used on aids. There's a lot of "only ____ people die from or get long covid"

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u/RubiiJee Feb 04 '25

AIDS can be reversed, but not cured. Not yet anyway, although promising trials. I don't believe there's non stop propaganda around COVID. There were literally television adverts and pamphlets posted through your door about the risk of AIDS and it was regular front page headlines about it for years and years. COVID suffered misinformation, and I agree, similarly, some denial. But not to the same extent for the same duration of time.

I think COVID is bad, but I think it lacks perspective to compare it to the societal damage that the AIDS pandemic had. I would argue COVID is more like Spanish Flu, and unlike AIDS, has the chance to decimate large swaths of the population over an extended period of time. I think the dangers are extremely different and we should be mindful of that when we discuss them. AIDS should stay in a category of its own as it was a disease propagated through transmission as well as discrimination.

6

u/zekeweasel Feb 04 '25

HIV is a lot more... well it's entirely avoidable.

I think that is the most glaring difference.

0

u/MonkAndCanatella Feb 04 '25

Well... yes, and covid is too if you're going to be pedantic about it (mask up!). It's certainly orders of magnitudes easier to contract covid though. I mean, it'd be hard to catch HIV by riding the bus, unlike covid.