Miracle cures for obesity Wegovy and Zepbound have already shown they can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease and chronic kidney disease, as well as aid people lose weight. Now, a U.S.-wide study will test whether tirzepatid, the dynamic ingredient in Zepbound, could be an effective treatment for people with long-term Covid-19.
Belonging to a class of drugs known as GLP-1, tirzepatid acts on receptors in the gut and brain to regulate appetite. As a result, people lose weight by eating less. However, reduced body weight does not fully explain the positive effects on the heart and kidneys. Growing evidence suggests that these drugs work broad anti-inflammatory effect on the body – a mechanism of interest in the treatment of long-term Covid-19.
As much as 20 million people in the US you have experienced long-term Covid-19 illness that lasts at least three months after initial infection. While over 200 symptoms of long Covid have been documented, some of the most common include cough, shortness of breath, brain fog, fatigue, mood swings, sleep problems and body aches.
Scientists still don’t fully understand how and why Covid occurs over long periods of time, but they have found persistent inflammation in many patients. This chronic inflammation may be caused by lingering traces of the virus in the body or by misdirected antibodies, called autoantibodies, that attack a person’s own cells and tissues. The hope is that tirzepatid will be able to reduce inflammation and relieve symptoms in patients.
“The rationale for GLP-1 is its powerful anti-inflammatory properties that affect the entire body and brain,” says Eric Topol, a cardiologist and director of the Scripps Research Translational Institute in La Jolla, California, which is sponsoring the study.
Scripps researchers are recruitment people across the country who are over 18 years of age and have medical documentation of long-term Covid-19. Unlike most medical examinations, which typically require multiple in-person visits, the Scripps examination is fully remote. Participants will be randomly assigned to receive tirzepatid or placebo by mail and will take them for a year. They will be given a fitness tracker so researchers can measure step counts, an essential indicator of fatigue. Participants will also be provided with a shrewd scale and will weigh themselves regularly. Because GLP-1 is used to control body weight, researchers want to make sure study participants don’t lose too much weight during the study.
Julia Moore Vogel, co-principal investigator on the trial and a long-time Covid veteran herself, says scheduling the trial remotely was intentional. “In the long Covid-19 population, this is extremely important because if you require people to come to the clinic, you systematically exclude the most severely affected people who are homebound or bedridden. It was very important for us to make sure these people were included.”