COVIDcon

The coronavirus disease (COVID)-19 pandemic is the first worldwide infectious disease crisis of the millennium. Fortunately, most people survive COVID-19 but many of the recovered patients report long-term impairments of various sorts, for instance chronic fatigue, difficulties to concentrate or decreased physical performance. This phenomenon (that includes a lot different symptoms) is today commonly referred to as Long COVID. Our immune system is very important for fighting infectious microbes, such as the SARS-corona virus 2 (SARS- CoV-2), which causes COVID-19. The immune system can remember previous infections and this allows it to protect us more efficiently when we are infected the next time. However, we know today that infections can also have a sustained effect on cells that are not at all or not directly involved in clearing the infection. However, such changes can have a great impact on situations where these cells actually do play important roles. The COVIDcon project will investigate whether and how SARS-CoV-2 infections have a long-term influence on cells in the lungs in recovered individuals and whether such changes can impact future immune responses and diseases that are not connected to COVID-19.