ΤΗΕ RACE TO CONQUER LONG COVID

There's an all-out, multifront push to determine the causes of-and treatments for this potentially life-altering post-viral syndrome, which may have affected as many as 23 million Americans (and counting).

- GINNY GRAVES

By the time Kristin B Hill, an interior designer in Baltimore, was diagnosed with COVID-19, she'd felt crummy for several weeks, but she wasn't terribly worried. Though vaccinations were not yet widely available then, in September 2020, Kristin says, "I was 48 and healthy. I figured it wouldn't be long before I returned to my usual busy life." (Prevention has changed her name to protect her privacy.)

Two years later, she wonders whether she'll ever be well again. "I used to spend hours rehabbing houses," she says. "Now I need to rest for a day or two before and after going to the grocery store, and I have scary cognitive glitches I can't do simple math, and I'll put food that belongs in the fridge in the pantry. I can't work at all. I'm seeing a pulmonologist and a cardiologist, but so far no one has been able to help me."

Between 8 million and 23 million people in the U.S. are now struggling with long-term health issues after a bout of COVID-19. Their multiple, mystifying symptoms, from inexplicable rashes to crushing fatigue, have defied explanation. But that may soon change.

In April the Biden administration launched a massive, all-hands-on deck interagency research and policy program designed in part to uncover the causes of and potential cures for long COVID. Last year the National Institutes of Health began enrolling participants across the country in the Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery Initiative (RECOVER), a multipronged $1.15 billion study that will follow thousands of patients for four years, examine millions of medical records, and scrutinize tissue from people who died of COVID-19 to discover where the virus might linger. "It's designed to leave no stone unturned in terms of getting to the cause of the problem," says Walter Koroshetz, M.D., director of the NIH National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and cochair of the RECOVER Initiative.