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Is there an association between long Covid and Covid vaccinations?

Dr Paul Zollinger-Read, the Medical Director of Medical Imaging Partnership and Prime Health investigates a research study published in June looking at whether there is an association between long Covid and Covid vaccinations.

The British Medical Journal (BMJ) have published a paper by Ayoubkhani et al. looking at whether there is an association between the development of long Covid symptoms and Covid vaccination, reports our Medical Director, Dr Paul Zollinger-Read.

How was the study conducted?

The team studied just over 28,000 adults between 18 and 69 who received at least one dose of a Covid vaccine after testing positive for Covid. They then reviewed these individuals to determine if any developed long covid symptoms at least twelve weeks after they tested positive for covid.

What did the study find?

They found that 23% of the group reported long covid symptoms of any degree of severity. However, those who had had a vaccination experienced a 13% reduction in reporting long covid symptoms. Those who had a second dose of the vaccine also reported fewer symptoms of long Covid than those who had no vaccines, or just one dose.

Conclusion

Although this is an observational study and not as ‘robust’ as a randomised control trial in deterring causation, this study does indicate that those who received vaccination reported fewer symptoms of long Covid and in those with two vaccinations, the numbers were even lower.

This study hints at the vaccine providing a degree of protection against long Covid, but further studies are needed to determine causation.