Oral Bacteriotherapy Reduces the Occurrence of Chronic Fatigue in COVID-19 Patients, 2022, Santinelli et al

[Andy]

Long COVID refers to patients with symptoms as fatigue, “brain fog,” pain, suggesting the chronic involvement of the central nervous system (CNS) in COVID-19. The supplementation with probiotic (OB) would have a positive effect on metabolic homeostasis, negatively impacting the occurrence of symptoms related to the CNS after hospital discharge. On a total of 58 patients hospitalized for COVID-19, 24 (41.4%) received OB during hospitalization (OB+) while 34 (58.6%) taken only the standard treatment (OB–). Serum metabolomic profiling of patients has been performed at both hospital acceptance (T0) and discharge (T1). Six months after discharge, fatigue perceived by participants was assessed by administrating the Fatigue Assessment Scale. 70.7% of participants reported fatigue while 29.3% were negative for such condition. The OB+ group showed a significantly lower proportion of subjects reporting fatigue than the OB– one (p < 0.01). Furthermore, OB+ subjects were characterized by significantly increased concentrations of serum Arginine, Asparagine, Lactate opposite to lower levels of 3-Hydroxyisobutirate than those not treated with probiotics. Our results strongly suggest that in COVID-19, the administration of probiotics during hospitalization may prevent the development of chronic fatigue by impacting key metabolites involved in the utilization of glucose as well as in energy pathways.

Open access, https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnut.2021.756177/full

 

[shak8]

Uh...sounds highly improbable.

 

[Trish]

It seems oral bacteriotherapy is just a fancy way of saying taking probiotics. Sounds interesting but unlikely. I notice the abstract avoids giving much relevant data and the sample size was small.

Edit: I have had a quick look through the paper. I think it actually looks pretty good as an exploratory study, and the authors recognise the limitations of the small sample size etc. It looks to me like it's worth replicating on a larger scale.

 

[Forbin]

There have been a couple papers indicating that respiratory infection (in mice) alters the gut microbiome.

2018 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5816042/
2020 https://journals.asm.org/doi/10.1128/mBio.03236-19

The more recent paper found that this alteration was actually caused by the decrease in food consumption by the mice as a result of the infection.

Here, we show that weight loss during respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) or influenza virus infection was due to decreased food consumption, and that the fasting of mice altered gut microbiota composition independently of infection.

The earlier paper had found that the new composition of at least one component of the microbiome was was a matter of chance.

Our observation that different families within the Bacteroidetes phylum increase in abundance suggests that rather than the specific targeting of certain microbiota members by the immune system, respiratory infection causes a change in the gut environment, favoring the expansion of Bacteroidetes, and whichever Bacteroidetes family gains the advantage first increases in abundance.

In the more recent paper, increasing the appetite of the mice reversed [or perhaps prevented?] these changes.

However, the depletion of CD8+ cells increased food intake and prevented weight loss, resulting in a reversal of the gut microbiota changes normally observed during RSV infection.

I realize it would be a long shot, but it would be strange if an alteration in the gut microbiome following an infection had something to do with the development of ME/CFS or Long Covid. It would be even stranger if that alteration were caused by something as simple as a loss of appetite during infection.

 

[Mithriel]

Over the course of my illness the British diet and the availability of foodstuffs has changed dramatically but it has had no effect on how I have been. In fact I am much worse now, though that is probably due to age and the consequences of serious disease rather than diet.

I ate more vegetables yesterday than I could have afforded for a week in 1975.

 

[Arnie Pye]

I thought that the best probiotics had to be "live".

Covid, which would (as far as I know) usually be accompanied by a fever, would probably kill off any "good" bacteria swallowed by the patient.