Brain Size Reduction after Mild Covid

There is a very interesting paper that has been published regarding research by Oxford University, about and the worrying fact that even a mild case of Covid shrinks your brain.

This data was gained by accessing information randomly collected by Biomed UK.  Part of an ongoing general study of what happens in an ageing brain, a group of 785 people between the ages of 51 and 81 brains are scanned periodically.

One of these regular scans was done during the Covid outbreak and the group were split into two.  401 of them had had a Covid infection (only 15 of these required hospitalisation) and the 384 who did not get Covid and were treated as the control group.

The first brain scan was done before Covid, and the second brain scan was taken on average 104 days after the test group recovered from Covid and so it allowed plenty of time for the brain to recover.

What the scientists found was marked, there was a greater reduction in the whole brain size and the ability to perform complex executive tasks was between 0.2% and 2% worse in the patients that had recovered from mild Covid and for this calculation the 15 hospital cases were excluded.  This can be seen in the pictures above and the graphs.  This information was peer reviewed and allowed to be published.

The changes seem to occur in two key areas the Orbitofrontal and the Para hippocampus and in both grey matter (brain cells) and white matter (nerves and receptors).  These areas of the brain are used for olfactory processing which simply put is the determination of taste and smell and in executive decision making, memory, thinking and personality.

To summarise it was found was that people who had mild Covid could expect to experience the same as the people in the study, which is that the brain will shrink at that time in your life by up to 2% more than a person who did not catch mild Covid.

What we don’t know at this time is if the brain can recover and if it can, to what degree.  In the meantime, I am going to continue to look after my brain as well as I can.  I feel a little bit that with the menopause and Covid that my brain needs a little extra love.