Jones, Ansley E, Khan, Zain, McGroder, Claire F et al. · Critical care explorations · 2026 · DOI
This study followed people who were hospitalized with severe COVID-19 for 3 years after they left the hospital. About one-quarter of them continued to experience long COVID symptoms like fatigue, brain fog, and difficulty with physical activity. Surprisingly, when researchers measured inflammation and blood vessel markers in their blood, these markers were not elevated and did not explain why some people had ongoing symptoms.
This study is relevant to ME/CFS because it demonstrates that post-viral long-term illness can persist for years without detectable persistent inflammation or endothelial dysfunction, suggesting similar mechanisms may underlie ME/CFS and PASC. The finding that standard inflammatory biomarkers do not explain long COVID symptoms highlights the need for novel approaches to understand post-viral disease mechanisms, which may apply to ME/CFS research and treatment development.
This study does not prove that inflammation plays no role in PASC or ME/CFS—it only shows that the specific inflammatory and endothelial markers measured were not elevated at the timepoints tested. The absence of detectable biomarker abnormalities does not exclude occult inflammation, mitochondrial dysfunction, autonomic dysfunction, or other mechanisms. Cross-sectional associations between frailty and PASC cannot establish causality or identify which symptoms drive physical decline.
About the PEM badge: “PEM required” means post-exertional malaise was an explicit required diagnostic criterion for participant inclusion in this study — not that PEM was studied, observed, or discussed. Studies using criteria that do not require PEM (e.g. Fukuda, Oxford) are tagged “PEM not required”. How the atlas works →
The first block is for the primary paper and is the citation you should use in research work. The atlas-snapshot line only applies if you are specifically referring to this atlas’s reading of the paper on the date shown.
Primary citation
Jones, Ansley E, Khan, Zain, McGroder, Claire F, Murphy, Scarlett O, Depender, Christopher, Mira-Sanchez, Margarita, et al. (2026). Post-Acute Sequelae of COVID-19 Persist Over 3 Years in Acute Lung Injury/Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome Survivors But Are Not Associated With Persistent Thromboinflammation or Endothelial Dysfunction.. Critical care explorations. https://doi.org/10.1097/CCE.0000000000001390
BibTeX
@article{mecfsatlas-jones-2026-post-acute,
author = {Jones, Ansley E and Khan, Zain and McGroder, Claire F and Murphy, Scarlett O and Depender, Christopher and Mira-Sanchez, Margarita and Ogunlusi, Charity O and Wei, Ying and Garcia, Christine K and Baldwin, Matthew R},
title = {Post-Acute Sequelae of COVID-19 Persist Over 3 Years in Acute Lung Injury/Acute Respiratory Distress Syndrome Survivors But Are Not Associated With Persistent Thromboinflammation or Endothelial Dysfunction.},
journal = {Critical care explorations},
year = {2026},
doi = {10.1097/CCE.0000000000001390},
note = {PubMed: 41824803},
url = {https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/jones-2026-post-acute},
}Atlas snapshot reference
ME/CFS Atlas. Generator v1 / Scanner v1.4 / policy v0.1. Accessed 2026-05-30. https://www.mecfsatlas.com/evidence/jones-2026-post-acute
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