Long COVID Linked to Lasting Damage in The Brain's Dopamine System
A Canadian study has linked long COVID to lasting damage in the brain's dopamine system, specifically affecting nerve endings in the striatum. This damage correlates with persistent symptoms like apathy, depression, memory decline, and slowed movement.
Why it matters
It provides biological evidence for the neurological symptoms of long COVID, potentially opening new avenues for treating cognitive dysfunction in patients.
Add ScienceAlert on Google (Guedj et al., eBioMedicine , 2026) COVID-19 can cause brain injuries that are still visible on scans years later in people with neurological symptoms related to long COVID.
Existing research shows that cognitive dysfunction in long COVID is associated with blood-brain barrier disruption , an enlarged hippocampus , elevated brain injury markers , and reduced brain volume on MRI scans.
Now, researchers in Canada have shown that people who experienced persistent apathy and depression for the first time in their lives a few months after a COVID-19 infection have around 18 percent fewer dopamine nerve endings in their brain than healthy people.
Dopamine is a neurotransmitter that helps control movement and motivation, and the loss of nerve endings that signal with dopamine affects cognitive function and can drive the development of neurodegenerative diseases .
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