{"id":638905,"date":"2026-10-23T08:56:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-23T08:56:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/638905\/"},"modified":"2026-10-23T08:56:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-23T08:56:11","slug":"could-dormant-viruses-help-explain-long-covid-short-wave-npr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/638905\/","title":{"rendered":"Could dormant viruses help explain long covid? : Short Wave : NPR"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>            <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/1792745771_433_.jpeg\" data-template=\"https:\/\/npr.brightspotcdn.com\/dims3\/default\/strip\/false\/crop\/3377x1900+0+0\/resize\/{width}\/quality\/{quality}\/format\/{format}\/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fnpr-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com%2F41%2Fca%2Fc543865847c1ac505836f0b7a291%2Fa3229543-b435-4d80-b3b6-65267b6877c4.jpeg\" class=\"img\" alt=\"Abstract covid viruses surround the silhouette of a man standing alone against a blue background.\" fetchpriority=\"high\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n                Most people have dormant viruses inside of them.<\/p>\n<p>                    Mustafa Hacalaki\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>                hide caption\n            <\/p>\n<p>              toggle caption<br \/>\n                i<\/p>\n<p>        Mustafa Hacalaki\/Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>Virtually every human on Earth has a slew of different types of dormant viruses in our bodies. They are remnants of past infections and are\u2014generally\u2014harmless. Unless they wake up, which can be triggered by extreme stress or something that severely compromises the immune system. But now, through a unique study on the immune systems of astronauts, scientists are considering broadening their ideas about what can wake up our dormant viruses\u2026and learning what all this has to do with long COVID.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>If you liked this episode, check out our episodes on a <a href=\"http:\/\/lnk.to\/K3HMKr\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">universal flu vaccine<\/a> and what <a href=\"http:\/\/lnk.to\/oRdSAL\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">scientists got wrong about covid<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Support public media with NPR+ and enjoy perks for over 25 podcasts like this one. This show\u2019s perks include sponsor-free listening. Learn more at <a href=\"http:\/\/plus.npr.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">plus.npr.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Most people have dormant viruses inside of them. Mustafa Hacalaki\/Getty Images hide caption toggle caption i Mustafa Hacalaki\/Getty&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":638906,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[134,111,139,69],"class_list":["post-638905","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health","tag-health","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638905","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=638905"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/638905\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/638906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=638905"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=638905"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=638905"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}