Science
Opinion: Long COVID is solvable, but we need more clinical trials
We are living in an epidemic of chronic disease, with a growing number of pesticides, chemicals and food additives implicated in the declining health of Americans. Since 2019, another factor has been at play as well: The SARS-CoV-2 virus has driven a huge increase in chronic health consequences, broadly referred to as long COVID.
Infection by the COVID-19 virus is a consequential new variable in our nation’s health that can substantially increase the incidence of serious conditions such as neurological disease, heart attack and stroke. Approximately 6% of U.S. adults suffer from long COVID — at a cost to our economy estimated at $3.7 trillion a year.
Contrary to what is often portrayed in the media, long COVID is not a mystery. There is a straightforward reason at least some people may remain ill “after COVID”: They still have the SARS-CoV-2 virus — or parts of the virus — in their bodies. For example, one team found that almost two years after infection, long COVID patients had not yet cleared the virus from their gut tissue. These persistent viral reservoirs appear to leak spike protein — the part of the virus that gives coronaviruses their distinctive “crown” appearance — into blood circulation, potentially driving inflammation of the brain and other organs, and increasing health consequences such as heart disease.
While early efforts are underway to help clear persistent viral reservoirs, more well-designed clinical trials are desperately needed to help the millions suffering from long COVID return to normal life. To address this emergency, we formed a global consortium of scientists to accelerate research, including by publishing a recent roadmap for testing medications aimed at clearing persistent SARS-CoV-2. Our proposal draws on successful approaches from cancer research and treatment strategies used against other viral infections such as HIV and hepatitis C; these histories offer lessons about trial design, drug candidates and how to develop tests for persistent viral reservoirs.
The most promising trials may also be among the most complex to carry out, because they may combine medications targeting the virus — such as antiviral drugs and monoclonal antibodies — with treatments to activate immune cells. It may also be important to simultaneously address other problems associated with long COVID, such as immune dysfunction and microbiome changes.
To add another variable to these complex trials we do not yet know the duration of treatment each type of medication might need. For example, current long COVID clinical trials are testing 5 to 15 days of antivirals like Paxlovid. But treatment of persistent hepatitis C virus requires 8 to 12 weeks of antiviral therapy. In cats with feline infectious peritonitis — also caused by a persistent coronavirus — 12 weeks of antiviral treatment is required for effective treatment. Such an extended approach may require careful studies to test the safety of potential long COVID medications when given for longer periods of time.
All of this will be an interdisciplinary global undertaking. But the effort is worth it.
The looming question now is: Who will pay for drug development and trials? Big pharmaceutical companies can afford to run trials, and they should. But small biotech companies do not have the same resources. Already, because of this limitation, multiple antivirals and monoclonal antibodies with the potential to help long COVID patients are sitting on shelves rather than being studied in patients who urgently need more options.
Government and private funding should solve that by helping smaller companies run early-stage trials. These programs, which must be agile and adaptive and continually incorporate the real-world experience of patients into their design, are ideal for “high-risk, high-reward” agencies like the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health, which is part of Health and Human Services. It was therefore encouraging to hear Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is now the secretary of Health and Human Services, say during his recent confirmation hearing that he would enthusiastically work with Congress to direct long COVID funding toward much-need clinical trials.
If public funding supports the development of any new long COVID drug, the data and resulting therapies should be open source and available to manufacturers of generics, which will increase trust in the treatments and will benefit patients across the globe.
The world has been in this position before, when facing HIV in the late 1980s and early 1990s. A combination of rapid government and private funding made multiple companies more willing to engage in drug development. There are now more than 25 approved drugs for HIV infection. The development of these treatments transformed HIV from a life-threatening infection to a manageable chronic condition — for those with access to the medications. In some cases, public support compelled otherwise-competing drug companies to work together for a greater good.
Lessons learned from fighting SARS-CoV-2 could also help scientists in the battles against other conditions, because long COVID is just one of many chronic disease states that start with an infection. Others include chronic or post-treatment Lyme disease, myalgic encephalomyelitis and post-dengue fatigue syndrome. Persistent viral infection is also increasingly being documented among Alzheimer’s and multiple sclerosis patients.
The urgency of long COVID is a call to arms for government and private funders to help bring medications and protocols to the people who need them. Ultimately, far more may benefit from the knowledge gained.
Amy D. Proal, a microbiologist, is a founder of the PolyBio Research Foundation, a nonprofit that supports research into the root cause drivers of chronic disease.
Our universe might be chock-full of cosmic wonder, but you can observe only a fraction of astronomical phenomena with the naked eye. Meteor showers, natural fireworks that streak brightly across the night sky, are one of them.
The latest observable meteor shower will be the Lyrids, which has been active since April 14 and is forecast to continue through April 30. The shower reaches its peak April 21 to 22, or Tuesday night into Wednesday morning.
According to NASA, the Lyrids are one of the oldest known meteor showers, and have been enjoyed by stargazers for nearly 3,000 years. Their bright, speedy streaks are caused by the dusty debris from a comet named Thatcher. They appear to spring from the constellation Lyra, which right now can be seen in the eastern sky at night in the Northern Hemisphere.
The moon will be about 27 percent full tonight, appearing as a thick crescent in the sky, according to the American Meteor Society.
To get a hint at when to best watch for the Lyrids, you can use this tool, which relies on data from the Global Meteor Network. It shows fireball activity levels in real time.
And while you gaze at the heavens, keep an eye out for other stray meteors streaking across the night sky. Skywatchers are reporting that the amount of fireballs is double what is usually seen by this point in the year.
Where meteor showers come from
There is a chance you might see a meteor on any given night, but you are most likely to catch one during a shower. Meteor showers are caused by Earth passing through the rubble trailing a comet or asteroid as it swings around the sun. This debris, which can be as small as a grain of sand, leaves behind a glowing stream of light as it burns up in Earth’s atmosphere.
Meteor showers occur around the same time every year and can last for days or weeks. But there is only a small window when each shower is at its peak, which happens when Earth reaches the densest part of the cosmic debris. The peak is the best time to look for a shower. From our point of view on Earth, the meteors will appear to come from the same point in the sky.
The Perseid meteor shower, for example, peaks in mid-August from the constellation Perseus. The Geminids, which occur every December, radiate from the constellation Gemini.
How to watch a meteor shower
Michelle Nichols, the director of public observing at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, recommends forgoing the use of telescopes or binoculars while watching a meteor shower.
“You just need your eyes and, ideally, a dark sky,” she said.
That’s because meteors can shoot across large swaths of the sky, so observing equipment can limit your field of view.
Some showers are strong enough to produce up to 100 streaks an hour, according to the American Meteor Society, though you probably won’t see that many.
“Almost everybody is under a light-polluted sky,” Ms. Nichols said. “You may think you’re under a dark sky, but in reality, even in a small town, you can have bright lights nearby.”
Planetariums, local astronomy clubs or even maps like this one can help you figure out where to go to escape excessive light. The best conditions for catching a meteor shower are a clear sky with no moon or cloud cover, sometime between midnight and sunrise. (Moonlight affects visibility in the same way as light pollution, washing out fainter sources of light in the sky.) Make sure to give your eyes at least 30 minutes to adjust to seeing in the dark.
Ms. Nichols also recommends wearing layers, even during the summer. “You’re going to be sitting there for quite a while, watching,” she said. “It’s going to get chilly, even in August.”
Bring a cup of cocoa or tea for even more warmth. Then lie back, scan the sky and enjoy the show.
Where weather is least likely to affect your view
Storm systems sweep across the country in early spring, and some will be obscuring skies tonight. But there will still be plenty of areas with clear skies, particularly in parts of the central United States.
“The best spot is going to be in the Upper Midwest,” said Rich Bann, a meteorologist with the Weather Prediction Center.
Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa will offer especially good sky-viewing weather and a beach on the Great Lakes could be a nice spot to look up at the stars.
But don’t expect to view the show from Chicago, as Illinois could see some thunderstorms. The weather will be better in the Northern and Central Plains, particularly the eastern Dakotas.
High, wispy clouds are expected over the Ohio and Tennessee Valleys and into parts of the Mid-Atlantic. But, Mr. Bann said, “you may be able to see some shooting stars through thin clouds.”
Clouds will be draped across much of the Southeast and the Northeast, though there could be some clearing in Florida, Georgia, the Carolinas and Virginia. Remember, the meteors could be visible all night long. If you look outside and see clouds, try again later.
Catching the spectacle will be challenging across much of the West, particularly from Washington into Northern California, where a storm system is bringing rain and snow. That system will move east overnight.
There are likely to be some pockets of clear skies at times across southern Nevada, northwest Arizona and southwest Utah, Mr. Bann said.
Amy Graff contributed reporting.
WASHINGTON — Amid growing national security concerns, the FBI said Tuesday that it has launched a broad investigation in the deaths or disappearances of at least 10 scientists and staff connected to highly sensitive research, including four from the Los Angeles area.
“The FBI is spearheading the effort to look for connections into the missing and deceased scientists. We are working with the Department of Energy, Department of War, and with our state and state and local law enforcement partners to find answers,” the agency said in a statement.
The FBI’s announcement comes after the House Oversight Committee announced that it would investigate reports of the disappearance and deaths of the scientists, sending letters seeking information from the agencies involved in the federal inquiry as well as NASA, which owns the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in La Cañada Flintridge, where three of the missing or dead scientists worked.
“If the reports are accurate, these deaths and disappearances may represent a grave threat to U.S. national security and to U.S. personnel with access to scientific secrets,” Reps. James Comer (R-Ky.), chairman of the committee, and Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) wrote in the letters.
President Trump told reporters last week that he had been briefed on the missing and dead scientists, which he described as “pretty serious stuff.” He said at the time that he expected answers on whether the deaths were connected “in the next week and a half.”
Michael David Hicks, who studied comets and asteroids at JPL, was the first of the scientists who disappeared or died. He died on July 30, 2023, at the age of 59. No cause of death was disclosed.
A year later, JPL physicist Frank Maiwald died at 61, with no cause of death disclosed.
Two other Los Angeles scientists are part of the string of deaths and disappearances.
On June 22, 2025, Monica Jacinto Reza, a materials scientist at JPL, disappeared while on a hike near Mt. Waterman in the San Gabriel Mountains.
On Feb. 16, Caltech astrophysicist Carl Grillmair was fatally shot on the porch of his Llano home. The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s department arrested Freddy Snyder, 29, in connection with the shooting. Snyder had been arrested in December on suspicion of trespassing on Grillmair’s property.
Snyder has been charged with murder.
There is no evidence at this point that the deaths and disappearances, which occurred over a span of four years, are connected.
A spokesperson for NASA, which owns JPL, said in a statement on X that the agency is “coordinating and cooperating with the relevant agencies in relation to the missing scientists.
“At this time, nothing related to NASA indicates a national security threat,” agency spokesperson Bethany Stevens wrote. “The agency is committed to transparency and will provide more information as able.”
Representatives from Caltech, which manages JPL, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The sun had barely risen over the Pacific Ocean when a small motorboat carrying a team of Indigenous artisans and Mexican biologists dropped anchor in a rocky cove near Bahías de Huatulco.
Mauro Habacuc Avendaño Luis, one of the craftsmen, was the first to wade to shore. With an agility belying his age, he struck out over the boulders exposed by low tide. Crouching on a slippery ledge pounded by surf, he reached inside a crevice between two rocks. There, lodged among the urchins, was a snail with a knobby gray shell the size of a walnut. The sight might not dazzle tourists who travel here to see humpback whales, but for Mr. Avendaño, 85, these drab little mollusks represent a way of life.
Marine snails in the genus Plicopurpura are sacred to the Mixtec people of Pinotepa de Don Luis, a small town in southwestern Oaxaca. Men like Mr. Avendaño have been sustainably “milking” them for radiant purple dye for at least 1,500 years. The color suffuses Mixtec textiles and spiritual beliefs. Called tixinda, it symbolizes fertility and death, as well as mythic ties between lunar cycles, women and the sea.
The future of these traditions — and the fate of the snails — are uncertain. The mollusks are subject to intense poaching pressure despite federal protections intended to protect them. Fishermen break them (and the other mollusks they eat) open and sell the meat to local restaurants. Tourists who comb the beaches pluck snails off the rocks and toss them aside.
A severe earthquake in 2020 thrust formerly submerged parts of their habitat above sea level, fatally tossing other mollusks in the snail’s food web to the air, and making once inaccessible places more available to poachers.
Decades ago, dense clusters of snails the size of doorknobs were easy to find, according to Mr. Avendaño. “Full of snails,” he said, sweeping a calloused, violet-stained hand across the coves. Now, most of the snails he finds are small, just over an inch, and yield only a few milliliters of dye.
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