Fauci says new data suggests “long” Covid symptoms can last up to 9 months

New data suggests that people with Covid-19 may continue to have symptoms for up to nine months after the initial infection, Dr. Anthony Fauci, chief medical adviser to the White House.

Researchers at the University of Washington recently found that 30% of patients reported symptoms for nine months, Fauci told reporters during a White House briefing on Covid-19. People reported fatigue, shortness of breath, sleep disorders and other symptoms that lasted for months, he said.

Symptoms of “long covid”, which researchers now call post-acute sequelae of covid-19, or PASC, can develop “long after infection” and the severity can range from mild to “disabling,” he said. Fauci, also director of the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases.

“The magnitude of the problem is not entirely known,” he said, adding that PASC was also reported in people who did not need hospitalization and in people who had symptoms that were not part of their initial infection.

The update comes as global medical experts work to better diagnose and treat people with persistent symptoms of Covid-19.

To date, there have been a limited number of studies that discerned what are the most common symptoms of long-term covida or how long they can last. Most of the attention has been focused on people with serious or fatal illnesses, not on those people who have recovered, but who still report persistent side effects, sometimes called “long carriers”.

Fauci said the National Institutes of Health have launched an initiative to study Covid at length and identify the causes and possible treatments for people. “What makes some people vulnerable while others recover quickly and have no sequelae?” he asked.

– CNBC’s Noah Higgins-Dunn contributed to this report.