BY JAMIE DUCHARME
GOOD QUESTION
RECENT PRELIMINARY RESEARCH HAS found that certain medications may reduce the chance of developing Long COVID if taken shortly after catching COVID-19.
One of the most promising is Paxlovid, an antiviral authorized to treat COVID-19 for people at high risk of severe disease, including elderly adults and people with underlying conditions. In a March 23 study of more than 280,000 people, researchers found that people in this category who took Paxlovid within five days of testing positive were 26% less likely to have Long COVID symptoms six months later.
The other intriguing drug is metformin, a Type 2 diabetes drug approved in the 1990s. Research suggests it may have antiviral properties too. In one recent study (which has not yet been peer-reviewed), overweight or obese adults who took metformin when they had COVID-19 cut their risk of Long COVID by more than 40%, compared with those who didn’t take the drug.
Should the general population consider taking these drugs to prevent Long COVID? Experts agree that it’s too soon to recommend that. Even the most promising study results need to be confirmed before they influence medical decisions. “We zig and we zag on evidence all the time,” says Dr. Harlan Krumholz, a professor at the Yale School of Medicine who is studying Paxlovid’s effects on Long COVID. “To simply start telling everybody to start taking a medication” is overzealous, he says.
Studies have shown that Paxlovid doesn’t impact COVID-19 severity and symptoms much for lower-risk people up to 28 days after their illnesses begin. Krumholz says it’s worth tracking the drug’s effects for longer, but as of now, no strong data suggest that younger, healthy people should be taking it.
Since metformin was studied among overweight or obese U.S. adults—a category that includes most of the population—it may be more broadly useful, argues Dr. David Boulware, a professor at the University of Minnesota Medical School and co-author of the recent study. Boulware took metformin when he caught COVID-19 last summer, based on the positive data coming from
