In the past two years, many people with Long Covid have reported symptoms that are often grouped as “brain fog.” with coronavirus.But there are other causes of these symptoms, including a deficiency of a nutrient that, experts say, sometimes does not receive the attention it deserves.
Cobalamin, better known as vitamin B12, plays a key role in many essential processes in the body, and its lack can cause anything from fatigue to mood swings and “brain fog”.
“It affects some of the brain’s ability to function properly,” says Professor Martin Warren, who leads a vitamin B12 research group at the Quadram Institute, a food and health research center in Norwich, UK.
“Many of the symptoms associated with B12 deficiency are similar to those seen in Long Covid. Obviously, they are not the same, but they are similar.”
B12 deficiencies are common in patients receiving metformin, a treatment for type 2 diabetes, according to the UK Medicines and Health Products Regulatory Agency.
When it comes to the “brain fog” sometimes seen with B12 deficiency, symptoms can include confusion and memory problems, while depression can occur.
“Vitamin B12, which is more common in meat, fish and dairy products, plays two key roles in metabolism, and one of these roles is to help produce agents in the brain that we use as neurotransmitters and also affects the nerve endings and how they are put together, ”said Professor Warren.
“The effect is that if you don’t have enough vitamin B12, some of these things don’t work properly and cause neurological problems.”
The essential role of the vitamin in many processes – from the production of amino acids, the constituents of proteins, to the synthesis of DNA, genetic material – means that the effects of deficiencies are widespread.
Anemia is another consequence, with B12 deficiency leading to the production of larger-than-normal red blood cells that cannot function properly. Despite being potentially serious, symptoms do not appear quickly, so they are often not recognized.
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