Thursday 30th December 2021: A new study has revealed that coronavirus can spread to the heart and brain within days.

As reported online by Dailymail, the study also indicated that the virus can survive in body organs for several months.

The study conducted by researchers from the US National Institutes of Health noted that the virus can spread to the heart and brain within days, and survive in organs for months.

According to the study, which is under review for publication in Nature, the researchers studied tissues taken during autopsies of 44 patients who had died after contracting COVID-19.

The researchers said they found evidence that the virus had spread well beyond the respiratory tract, and was present in several other organs, including the heart and brain, as much as 230 days after infection.

“Our results collectively show that while the highest-burden of SARS-CoV-2 is in the airways and lung, the virus can disseminate early during infection and infect cells throughout the entire body, including widely throughout the brain,” the team, led by Daniel Chertow wrote.

In the new study, undertaken at the NIH in Bethesda, Maryland, the researchers carried out an extensive sampling of tissues taken during autopsies on 44 patients.

Their analysis, the Dailymail report stated further revealed persistent SARS-CoV-2 in multiple organs, for as long as 230 days following the onset of symptoms.

“We show that SARS-CoV-2 is widely distributed, even among patients who died with asymptomatic to mild COVID-19, and that virus replication is present in multiple pulmonary and extrapulmonary tissues early in infection.

“Further, we detected persistent SARS-CoV-2 RNA in multiple anatomic sites, including regions throughout the brain, for up to 230 days following symptom onset,” the researchers wrote.

While the reason for this effect remains unclear, the researchers suggest that non-respiratory organs may have less efficient immune responses to the virus.

“This less efficient viral clearance in extrapulmonary tissues is perhaps related to a less robust innate and adaptive immune response outside the respiratory tract,” they explained.

The study is, however, not yet peer-reviewed. It is also focused mainly on fatal cases and not current COVID-19 patients.

Experts say the study findings may help provide fresh insights on why long COVID occurs in people with mild or asymptomatic acute COVID-19 infection.