It seems that the epidemic has accelerated the brain’s aging, even in people who never have covid
More than five Years after the COVID-19 epidemic begins, we are still discovering post-virus complications but for a long time stress, isolation, loss and uncertainty that this epidemic causes. A new scientific study, published this month in nature communication, has shown that the epidemic may accelerate the aging of the brain, even if they have never been contaminated with chronavirus.
Researchers at the University of Nottingham in the UK analyzed brain images recorded before and after the health crisis began. Scientists found that the brains of those who lived through this epidemic disease were faster than those whose brains were scanned only before March 2020.
“What made me surprised most of all was that even people who did not have COVID have shown a significant increase in brain aging.” “This really shows that the epidemic experience, everything from isolation to uncertainty, may affect our brain health.”
The team uses longitudinal data from Biobank UK, a massive data collection that periodically collects biological information from approximately half a million people over a long period of time and includes MRI scans of nearly 1,000 adults. From these people, some had received two scans before the epidemic (control group), while others were executed before and one after imprisonment and health restrictions in response to the spread of viral (“epidemic” group).
Stamatios Sotiropoulos, a professor of computational neural imaging at the University of Nottingham and a colleague of the study, said in a statement: “MRI data obtained before and after the UK’s biobank illness gave us a rare window to see how such an important life event can affect the brain.”
To estimate each person’s “age”, the researchers taught a machine learning model on more than 15,000 healthy volunteers without chronic illness to allow them to determine how older or younger a brain looks younger than its age. They then used this tool to evaluate the age of MRI brain scanning in two groups of Biobank. When looking at the second scans in each group, the mean difference between age and age measured was 5.5 months in the epidemic group compared to the control group.
The researchers also found that this acceleration of brain aging in the elderly, men and those who are deprived of economic and economic backgrounds, such as those with low education, inappropriate jobs or housing and health problems, have been identified.
“This study reminds us that brain health is formed not only because of the disease but also by our everyday environment,” said Dorothee Auer, the main author of the study. “This epidemic causes pressure on people’s lives, especially those who are already suffering.”
Although the aging of the brain was universally seen among those who lived through epidemic, only contaminated them showed measurable cognitive impairment, a sign of Coveid that was documented in the past. The study showed that people who had COVID between the two scans experienced a decline in mental flexibility tests and processing speed. In contrast, those who were not infected did not show any significant cognitive change, indicating that structural aging is not always translated into visible functional signs.
However, the authors acknowledge that there are important limitations in this observation study, which can biased results. These include the time gap between the scans between the two groups as well as the UK biobank, which lacks representation of the most marginalized parts of the British population.
The researchers also highlighted the possibility of reversibility because only the brain scanning was analyzed from two points, meaning that there may be neurological recovery in the following years. “We still don’t know if the changes observed are reversible, but this is an encouraging idea,” Or said.
This story appeared first Wired en español And translated from Spanish.
