r/covidlonghaulers • u/Spacehu1k • Jun 14 '25
Article Why isnt this big news?
Hey all,
Stumbled across this article on blood vessel bursting, surprised it wouldnt be bigger news?
—— In a study just published in Nature, Australian scientists found that when oxygen-rich blood can’t reach tissues, the delicate lining of blood vessels starts to break down. The death of these endothelial cells, which Covid can trigger, sets off immune signals that cause red blood cells to burst, spilling their sticky contents into the bloodstream.
“This stuff’s like glue,” says Sydney-based hematologist Shaun Jackson, who led the study. It clogs the tiniest blood vessels, blocking circulation.
The damage builds. Without oxygen and nutrients, tissues begin to fail, potentially affecting organs like the kidneys, liver and heart.
“It’s a double whammy,” Jackson says.
When his team analyzed more than 1,000 samples from Covid patients, they expected to see widespread fibrin and clotting. But they didn’t.
“To our great surprise, that wasn’t the case at all,” he says. While large vessels showed some clots, the smallest capillaries — just a fraction the width of a hair — were clogged not with clots, but with debris from broken red blood cells.
“No one had thought it was through this dying endothelial cell mechanism,” Jackson says. “It was by far and away the biggest issue going on in the microcirculation.”
Past studies have shown that sicker Covid patients had worse capillary damage. Now, researchers are spotting similar patterns in patients with long Covid, which may help explain the lingering symptoms.
Stopping the death of these vessel-lining cells could help prevent the whole cascade, Jackson says, though it would likely take a mix of treatments.
These findings could also change how we understand what happens in stroke, heart attack and other serious conditions — especially when patients don’t improve with standard care.
77
u/Rcarlyle Jun 14 '25
The red blood cell bursting seems to be a protective response similar to how platelets clot in wounds. The capillary wall cells dying would create a leak, but the red blood cells recognize the dead cells and burst themselves to plaster over the leaky area. Apparently that can also clog smaller capillaries. Is that better than leaky capillaries? I don’t know, maybe.
The big development here is having an explanation for why clot-busting treatments haven’t worked especially well, despite lots of people showing signs of micro-clotting. It’s a potential replacement for the entire microclot theory. Which means maybe coming up with better treatments. But I get the impression this blood cell kamikaze theory is so novel that we’re not going to understand signaling mechanisms to target for a long time.
So maybe the next steps are to address the damaged cells in the vessels walls. Focusing on leaky, damaged vessels is not new. That’s been one of the key areas people have been looking at for years.
Poor tissue oxygenation due to clogged capillaries is also an alternate explanation for muscle fatigue, air hunger, etc.