英国研究：严重新冠感染可使大脑老化20年，智商降低10个点

剑桥大学的科学家评估了新冠病毒感染可能对人类认知能力造成的损害。研究结果显示，患者认知能力丧失的程度相当于“衰老20年”。

英国剑桥大学的科学家评估了新冠病毒感染可能对人类认知能力造成的损害。研究结果显示，患者认知能力丧失的程度相当于“衰老20年”。这项研究的结果发表在《临床医学》杂志上，研究人员在对阿登布鲁克医院接受住院治疗的46名新冠肺炎患者进行研究后得出了相关数据。

In a study comparing 46 severe COVID-19 patients with 460 matched controls, researchers found the mental impacts of severe COVID-19 six months later can be the equivalent to aging 20 years – going from 50 to 70 years old – or losing 10 IQ points.在一项将46名新冠肺炎重症患者与460人的匹配对照组进行比较的研究中，研究人员发现，这些患者在感染新冠病毒6个月后受到的认知影响相当于衰老20年（从50岁到70岁），或智商降低10个点。

The specific mental changes were also distinct to those seen in early dementia or general aging.这种特殊的认知变化与早期痴呆症或常规衰老明显不同。

"Cognitive impairment is common to a wide range of neurological disorders, including dementia, and even routine aging, but the patterns we saw – the cognitive 'fingerprint' of COVID-19 – was distinct from all of these," says neuroscientist David Menon from the University of Cambridge in the UK, who was senior author of the study.英国剑桥大学的神经科学家大卫·梅农是该研究论文的资深作者，他称：“神经系统疾病都会导致认知能力下降，包括痴呆，甚至是常规衰老也会如此，但我们看到的新冠病毒对认知能力的影响与所有这些有所不同。”

The experiment involved 46 people who'd gone to Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge as a result of COVID-19 between March and July 2020. Sixteen of them were put on mechanical ventilation during their stay.这项实验涉及46名在2020年3月至7月期间在剑桥阿登布鲁克医院接受治疗的新冠肺炎患者。其中16人在住院期间使用了呼吸机。

An average of six months after their infection, researchers supervised them using a testing tool called Cognitron to see how they were doing in areas such as memory, attention, reasoning, as well as anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder.感染后平均六个月，研究人员使用测试工具Cognitron对他们进行监测，了解他们在记忆力、注意力、推理、焦虑、抑郁和创伤后应激障碍等方面的表现。

The researchers didn't have test results from before these individuals fell ill with COVID to compare to. Instead they did the next best thing, and compared their results against a matched control group of 460 people.研究人员没有这些患者在感染新冠之前的检测结果可比较，于是退而求其次，将他们的检测结果与460人的匹配对照组进行比较。

These results were then mapped to see how far they deviated from expected scores for their age and demographic, based on 66,008 members of the general public.然后，根据66008名普通大众的情况，对这些结果进行测绘，看他们与自己所在年龄段的预期分数有多大偏差。

The results showed that those who'd survived severe COVID were less accurate and had slower response times than the general public.结果显示，与普通人相比，这些患者的检测结果准确率更低，反应时间也更慢。

The magnitude of cognitive loss was similar to the effects of aging between 50 and 70 years of age – and equivalent to losing 10 IQ points.他们的认知能力丧失程度与从50岁到70岁的认知能力丧失程度相似，也相当于失去10个智商点。

The somewhat good news is that, upon follow up, there were some signs of recovery – but it was gradual at best.好消息是，在后续的跟踪调查中，这些患者的认知能力有一些恢复的迹象，但最好的情况也只是逐步的。