Blood vessels, keys to long Covid? Science is progressing, despite a lack of funding – Libération

A study carried out by hematologist David Smadja shows that this form of the disease, a real headache for the medical world, finds its origin in the alteration of blood vessels.

“There is not one long Covid but long Covids.” David Smadja is professor of hematology at Paris-Cité University and Georges-Pompidou Hospital. Since the Covid-19 epidemic, he has been following 137 patients suffering from long Covid, that is to say still feeling symptoms more than three months after infection with the coronavirus. «In our latest study [parue dans la revue Angiogenesis, le 20 décembre, ndlr], we have identified a blood marker specific to patients suffering from chronic fatigue. This marker is different from the one we identified last year in patients with respiratory symptoms”explains the researcher.

In patients suffering from chronic fatigue, doctors have noticed an increase in circulating endothelial cells. These are the cells that form the inside of the blood vessel wall. If many of them are found free in the blood, this means that vessels are damaged somewhere. “This is a sign found in children with pulmonary arterial hypertension. In their case, it is often the pulmonary artery that is affected.