How Long COVID and ME/CFS Exhaust the Body
“Researchers have also found evidence that Covid may trigger a lasting and damaging autoimmune response. Studies have found surprisingly high levels of autoantibodies, which mistakenly attack a patient’s own tissues, many months after an initial infection.” Keller
How Long COVID and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (ME/CFS) Exhaust the Body
Autoimmunity provides a tantalizing way to explain the remarkable diversity of symptoms, the gender imbalance, and the infectious trigger found in ME/CFS.The autoantibody explorations in long COVID already surpass those in ME/CFS in their size and complexity and suggest that a broad range of autoantibodies are unleashed by the coronavirus infection. Several ME/CFS studies have found evidence of increased levels of autoantibodies to receptors (beta-adrenergic (AdR), muscarinic acetylcholine receptors (M-AChR)) which, among other things, affect sympathetic nervous system functioning and the blood vessels. Small studies suggest that targeted therapies that remove those autoantibodies may be helpful as well and at least one is under investigation in long COVID.