Dr Anthony Fauci, America’s top infectious disease expert, has warned against prematurely declaring victory over the pandemic, not only due to short-term needs but because long Covid represents an “insidious” public health emergency for millions of people.

In an interview with the Guardian, Fauci urged US Congress to avoid complacency and resume funding to combat the virus as well as long Covid, a chronic and prolonged illness that continues to elude scientists and healthcare providers.

The data is clear: long Covid is devastating people’s lives and livelihoods

“It’s a very insidious beneath-the-radar-screen public health emergency,” Fauci said via Zoom. “It isn’t that you have people who are hospitalized or dying, but their function is being considerably impaired. For reasons that are obvious, that doesn’t attract as much attention as a death rate.”

The cold fact that Covid-19 still kills 400 people a day in the US catches public attention more acutely than estimates of the millions suffering from long Covid, Fauci added. “People say, well, what does that mean? It’s not very concrete. And yet for the individual patient, it could be debilitating.”

The World Health Organization believes that between 10% and 20% of Covid-19 survivors have been left with lasting symptoms including breathlessness, fatigue and cognitive dysfunction that can persist long after the acute infection has resolved.