Author(s)

Zongzheng Xue

Corresponding Author

Zongzheng Xue

ABSTRACT

SARS-CoV-2 is the novel coronavirus that has caused the global coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic for more than two years, primarily invading the respiratory symptom and inducing pneumonia. However, emerging evidence suggested a neurological manifestation of COVID-19, resulting in long-term sequelae. Numerous previous papers highlighted the involvement of neuroinflammation in these sequelae, indicating that neuroinflammation might be the central mechanism at the cellular level. Thus, this paper aimed to discuss the various neurological disorders associated with COVID-19 infections, mainly focusing on the involvement of neuroinflammation in each disorder and reveal some underlying key factors, including glial cells, innate immune cells, mitochondria, blood-brain-barrier (BBB) and cytokine storm. Neuroinflammation is initiated both indirectly via the global effect of COVID-19 infection and directly via neuronal infections. The initial immune response of innate immune cells within CNS induces a cytokine storm with various pro-inflammatory immune mediators, which promote neuroinflammation and alter the glial cells to their pro-inflammatory reactive form, resulting in more cytokine release as a vicious cycle. This paper discussed such a process in various disorders and brought out several therapeutical advances, and highlighted their relative advantages and disadvantages were briefly discussed.

KEYWORDS

COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, neuroinflammation, neuro-COVID, microglia, cytokine storm