Researchers worldwide, including many at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and the University of Washington, are working to understand long COVID-19, the long-lasting effects of COVID-19 infection that can affect adults, teens and children. Hutch and UW investigators are building on deep expertise in immunology and infectious diseases like HIV to figure out what causes long COVID-19, who is at risk, and how to treat it. To do so, they’re tackling challenges that range from basic questions about how best to measure symptoms to uncovering the complex immunological interplay that may drive symptoms.
‘Something is different’
In March 2020, Julie Czartoski, a nurse practitioner working with Fred Hutch virology expert and Joel D. Meyers Endowed Chair holder Dr. Julie McElrath, helped McElrath quickly put together a study, the Seattle COVID Cohort Study, to look at COVID-19 in first responders and those infected with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19. They wanted to know who was getting it, and how badly. Soon they opened the study to others in the community. Luckily, few participants who contracted the coronavirus had symptoms that warranted hospitalization. Most had relatively mild infections that cleared up quickly.
