Myopathy as a cause of fatigue in long‐term <scp>post‐COVID</scp>‐19 symptoms: Evidence of skeletal muscle histopathology

Abstract

The wide variety of histological changes in this study suggests that skeletal muscles may be a major target of SARS-CoV-2, causing muscular post-COVID-19 symptoms. The mitochondrial changes, inflammation, and capillary injury in muscle biopsies can cause fatigue in part due to reduced energy supply. Because most patients had mild-moderate acute affection, the new variants that might cause less severe acute disease could still have the ability to cause long-term myopathy.