Brain regions related to smell show decline following mild COVID-19

3D rendering of coronavirus Credit: Shutterstock - Researchers from the University of Oxford have used data from UK Biobank participants to look at changes to the brain on average 4.5 months after mild SARS-CoV-2 infection. This new insight into the damaging effects of COVID-19 will contribute to our overall understanding of how the disease spreads through the central nervous system. Whether these effects persist in the long term, or are partially reversed, requires further investigation. Research has already shown that COVID-19 may cause brain-related abnormalities, but most studies have focused on hospitalized patients with severe disease, and have been limited to post-infection data. The effects of SARS-CoV-2 on the brain in milder (and more common) cases were unknown until now, and investigating these cases could reveal possible mechanisms that contribute to brain disease or damage. Professor Gwenaëlle Douaud and colleagues investigated changes in the brains of 785 participants in UK Biobank, a large-scale biomedical database and research resource. Participants were aged 51-81 and underwent two brain scans, on average 38 months apart, as well as cognitive tests.