Covid Causes Brain Damage
In exactly the manner President Biden is currently displaying
There’s a brilliant bit in History of the World Part I where Mel Brooks imagines some missing Commandments:
Here’s a Commandment I think might have been on the dropped tablet:
15. Thou shalt not self-deceive
Wishful thinking may feel comforting while you’re doing it, but it invites disaster in the long run - and not just for you, but also for the people you love. In my book, refusing to be clear-eyed is among the gravest of sins.
During his 2020 presidential campaign, Joe Biden had some bad days where he seemed halting and befuddled in ways that reminded me of my grandfather just prior to his Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Segments of this speech so strongly reminded me of the year before Granddad’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis it made me cry. Biden’s performance at last week’s debate reminded me of Granddad after he moved into the memory care facility. One of the most horrible things that can possibly happen to a human being appears to be happening to President Biden right now.
On my morning walk the Zola Blood song “Eyes Open” came up, and the lyrics brought such an intense stab of sympathy for the Biden family I ended up briefly walking around in public with tears streaming down my face like a crazy person. Honoring the 15th Commandment is no walk in the park. I understand that looking at this horrifying truth with clear eyes is incredibly painful, but it’s no excuse. When Biden’s family and advisors urge him to “get back up again,” it’s a cruel form of sin1.
I admire
and ’s strength in being clear-eyed about the plausible connection between Biden’s precipitous decline over the past couple years and the large and growing body of scientific literature showing that Covid often causes neurocognitive impairment. As Bear notes, Biden has had two Covid infections (that we know of), and news coverage seems to leave open the possibility that he’s currently suffering an undisclosed third Covid infection.I imagine many readers will defensively flinch into asking “yes, but how do we really know Biden’s apparent decline in mental acuity was caused by Covid.” We don’t. What we know for sure is that Covid causes significant declines in mental acuity in a significant fraction of survivors.
has been offering great coverage of the scientific literature on this topic, but to briefly reiterate: we’ve known for quite awhile now that SARS-CoV-2 can persist in the brain long after acute symptoms have resolved. Since the early days of the pandemic, we’ve known that Covid sometimes causes psychosis and other psychiatric conditions. Covid accelerates the progression of dementia and Parkinson’s disease. Children exposed to Covid in utero are at increased risk of developmental delays. So-called “mild” Covid infection comes with an average cognitive loss equivalent to about 3 IQ points. More severe Covid comes with a loss of 9 IQ points. Each round of repeat Covid infection shaves off 2 additional IQ points.Media silence about this large and growing body of scientific literature is deafening. Two years ago, Saturday Night Live ran a darkly hilarious sketch about a study documenting shrinkage in brain volume after Covid. I don’t understand how these solidly established scientific facts could have disappeared so far down a memory hole at NYT, except in light of grave sin against the 15th Commandment.
We have to be clear-eyed about the plausible possibility that Covid has done irreversible damage to President Biden’s brain. Because Covid definitely does that sometimes. Even more soberingly, this type of brain damage could theoretically be impairing other leaders worldwide. Am I the only man on Earth who noticed Vladimir Putin’s violent coughing fits just prior his psychotic decision to invade Ukraine? Friends laughed at me when I pointed it out, but scientific evidence in support of the hypothesis has only gotten more convincing.
Part of the problem is that pretty much everybody has now had Covid, and inside my own mind I can feel how hard it is to confront the idea that one of the most horrible things that can possibly happen to a human being could be coming for me or my loved ones next. Maybe that’s what the tears running down my face this morning were really about.
Wishful thinking is a deadly sin. For the love of science, we have to stop doing it.
•Update 1: It’s belatedly occurring to me that the covidbrain hypothesis offers an easily testable prediction. Biden’s cognition might improve if he takes ordinary over-the-counter antihistamines, such as Pepcid or Astepro: “What I’ll Do the Next Time Covid Darkens My Door”
•Update 2: Finally! “New Hampshire Lawmaker Suggests Biden May Have Long COVID”
•Update 3: Now can we please start thinking about the geopolitical implications of brain fog? “President Joe Biden tests positive for Covid-19 at pivotal moment in reelection campaign”
•Update 4: It makes exactly zero sense to argue that a few months of remote learning in 2020 caused low test scores in 2024: “Nearly 5 years after schools closed, the nation gets a new report card.” Alternative hypothesis: Covid-induced brain damage is making kids stupid?
•Update 5: I commute on foot, and after noticing a spike in covidbrained driving behaviors in 2021 I took up the habit of wearing a yellow reflector vest and flashing bike lights for the walk home. The idea that lockdowns in 2020 are still causing traffic accidents in 2024 makes exactly zero sense: “So Far, 2024 Is Deadliest Year for Traffic Deaths in a Decade”
•Update 6: In 2021, Elon Musk’s publicly observable behaviors made me think he was experiencing a sudden precipitous loss of executive function.
seems to agree. Hypothesis: repeated Covid infections are turning Elon Musk into Dr. Strangelove:•Update 7: Some recent work raises the fascinating hypothesis that Covid may be causing brain damage, at least in part, by re-awakening other viruses (such as the viruses that cause cold sores and genital herpes) from their latent slumber. This hypothesis offers the testable prediction that an effective vaccine against herpes simplex viruses (or antivirals like Valtrex) could help mitigate covidbrain.
Granddad was a nuclear physicist. Seeing his passion for work that made the world a better place is a big part of why I decided to become a scientist. Alzheimer’s is sad for anybody, but it somehow feels especially tragic when it strikes down an exceptionally brilliant mind. Tragic in a way that would have made it abusive to advise Granddad that he should get back up on the horse and return to his work judging which nuclear reactors should be granted operating licenses. That type of wishful thinking might have felt like it was coming from a place of love, but it would actually have been a form of cruelty. Not to mention terrifying for the civilization at large.