https://www.managedhealthcareexecutive.com/view/the-path-to-shortening-long-covid-may-go-through-gut
For reasons that aren’t entirely clear,
long COVID is associated with diminished microbial diversity in the gut and a decrease in several healthful strains of bacteria, such as Bifidobacterium adolescentis. Researchers are now exploring whether therapies that aimed at reviving a beleaguered gut microbiome’s profile might be an avenue for treating long COVID.
Last week researchers at The Chinese University of Hong Kong reported positive results for microbiome-modifying therapy in the journal
The Lancet Infectious Diseases. Although randomized and double blinded, the study was conducted at a single center and so must be interpreted with some caution.
Long COVID is also called long-haul COVID, post-COVID-19 conditions and chronic COVID. The technical term is post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC). Some research suggests that the proportion of people who develop long COVID after the initial infection has decreased. The National Center for Health Statistics reported in September 2023 that 6.9% of those who have had COVID-19 had had long COVID, according to the 2022 National Health Interview Survey.
Joint first authors
Raphaela I. Lau, Ph.D., and
Qi Su and colleagues tested a preparation that included three strains of bacteria —
Bifidobacterium adolescentis, Bifidobacterium bifidum and Bifidobacterium longum — and three compounds that encourage the growth of healthful bacteria: galacto-oligosaccharides, xylo-oligosaccharides and resistant dextrin. The study subjects were people had at least one of 14 long COVID symptoms for four weeks or more after a confirmed infection with SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19) by either a PCR test or a rapid antigen test. Between June 2021 and August 2022, the researchers randomly assigned 463 patients to either take a placebo (vitamin C) twice daily or the bacteria-prebiotic preparation. The primary end point was the alleviation of long COVID symptoms by six months; alleviation was defined as a reduction in the severity of symptoms leading to an improvement The symptoms were measured by responses to a questionnaire commonly used in the research long COVID symptoms. After drop outs, withdrawals and loss to follow-up, the study had 204 people in the treatment group and 199 in the placebo group.
Results reported by Lau and Su and colleagues showed that those assigned to the treatment group fared than those assigned to the placebo group on all 14 long COVID symptoms.