Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • NEWS FEATURE

Do vaccines protect against long COVID? What the data say

Vaccines reduce the risk of developing COVID-19 — but studies disagree on their protective effect against long COVID.
  1. Heidi Ledford
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed  Google Scholar

Physiotherapist David Putrino’s neurological rehabilitation clinics used to treat about 50 people each week with conditions such as chronic pain, Parkinson’s disease and sports injuries. Then came long COVID.

Access options

Rent or buy this article

Prices vary by article type

from$1.95

to$39.95

Learn more

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Nature 599, 546-548 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-03495-2

References

  1. Antonelli, M. et al. Lancet Infect. Dis. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1473-3099(21)00460-6 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Taquet, M., Dercon, Q. & Harrison, P. J. Preprint at medRxiv https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.10.26.21265508 (2021).

  3. Office for National Statistics. Updated estimates of the prevalence of post-acute symptoms among people with coronavirus (COVID-19) in the UK: 16 September 2021 (ONS, 2021).

    Google Scholar 

  4. Massey, D., Berrent, D. & Krumholz, H. Preprint at medRxiv https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.07.23.21261030 (2021).

  5. Bergwerk, M. et al. N. Engl. J. Med. 385, 1474–1484 (2021).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  6. Cohn, B. A., Cirillo, P. M., Murphy, C. C., Krigbaum, N. Y. & Wallace, A. W. Science https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abm0620 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Office for National Statistics. Coronavirus (COVID-19) vaccination and self-reported long COVID in the UK: 25 October 2021 (ONS, 2021).

    Google Scholar 

  8. Massey, D. et al. Preprint at medRxiv https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.07.21.21260391 (2021).

  9. Stephenson, T. et al. Preprint at Research Square https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-798316/v1 (2021).

Download references

Subjects

Latest on:

Nature Careers

Jobs

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing

Search

Advanced search

Quick links