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Adrian Black remembers when he got the news from the neurologist: “We definitely think there's something wrong with your brain,” the specialist said. It was 2022, and Black, who worked as a mediator in Brighton in the U.K., had been to doctors for unusual fatigue, brain fog, and a peculiar stutter that had crept into his speech. In the end, he was diagnosed with Long Covid, the umbrella diagnosis for symptoms that arise or persist long after an initial Covid infection and that has affected hundreds of millions worldwide.  

There is no lab test for Long Covid yet, nor are there widely accepted treatments. A small clinical trial published July 1 in JAMA Network Open explores whether cognitive rehabilitation, a technique used to help people recover from strokes and other neurological injuries, can help Long Covid patients—like Black, who was a participant in the trial—with some of their symptoms. Although the treatment didn’t affect people’s scores on cognitive tests, the team found that it positively affected their ability to achieve their goals.

What is cognitive rehabilitation?

Cognitive rehabilitation therapy involves learning new strategies for achieving tasks, says Martina Vanova, a researcher at Kingston University London and lead author of the new paper. For people with Long Covid symptoms that include having difficulty completing tasks—like cooking dinner, for instance—that can mean dividing them up into small chunks, taking frequent short breaks, and narrating each step to themselves as they go, a technique called “self instruction” that can help minimize distraction. 

“We usually tell them, ‘Talk to yourself, describe to yourself what you're doing,’” Vanova says. “If, for example, if they are cooking, we say, ‘Pretend that you are in a cooking show, and talk yourself through the instructions, so you stay in touch with what you're actually doing.’” It’s also important to learn how to take a cognitive break, which can be focused breathing for a period of 5 minutes for every 10 minutes of activity, for instance, says Vanova. 

To be included in the study, Long Covid patients had to have objective cognitive impairment. Vanova or a colleague met with about 40 people for one hour a week for ten weeks, helping them set a series of personalized goals (like writing a report for 30 minutes without needing to stop), and teaching them strategies to try out to achieve them. A separate control group received no treatment.

Can cognitive rehab make a difference for Long Covid?

Three months after the study began, and again at six months, the researchers ran a series of tests on the participants. While there was no difference between the two groups on most measures, the group that had received treatment scored higher on a measure called “goal attainment,” which is used in assessing treatment effectiveness in Alzheimer’s patients. People who’d had rehabilitative therapy made more progress toward their goals than those who hadn’t, and they sustained that difference over time. 

That might sound like not much of an effect. But a larger study published in 2025 found that Long Covid patients who received cognitive rehabilitation performed no better than patients in the control group who were told to work on computer games instead of receiving therapy. This discrepancy in findings might in part be due to the fact that patients in the 2025 study did not have to have a cognitive abnormality to participate, so the patients in the new study may have been more severely affected to start with, says Dr. David Knopman, a clinical neurologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, and an author of that study. 

The new study also gave people in the control group no treatment at all, a difference from the 2025 study. “The fact that their active treatment had human contact and the control group had zip could explain the findings that they observed,” says Knopman, “because in our study, where we had what we thought was a comparison that had no therapeutic benefit, the participants benefited from it to the same degree.” In other words, everybody gradually got better regardless of the treatment.

These investigations are just the beginning

Beyond the context of clinical trials, doctors have been testing similar treatment approaches to Long Covid for some time, says Dr. Lindsay McAlpine, a neurologist at Yale School of Medicine who was not involved in the new study. “Overall, the findings are not surprising, but they are extremely encouraging because they validate what many of us have observed clinically,” she wrote in an email, noting that such therapies must be tailored to the individual patients and should take care to avoid triggering post-exertional malaise, where exertion, either cognitive or physical, can have negative aftereffects for patients. “These findings support the concept that the Long COVID brain retains substantial neuroplasticity and capacity for recovery, even in the setting of an ongoing disease process, similar to what we observe after stroke or in multiple sclerosis.” 

However, Hannah Davis, a Long Covid researcher and co-founder of the Patient-Led Research Collaborative (PLRC), says that while positive results can gain attention, there are larger questions that need to be answered about the illness. “In the broader landscape of Long COVID treatment, cognitive rehabilitation falls well short of what is needed,” she wrote in an email. “The Long COVID patient community wants resources directed toward more curious and promising treatments and trials.” She points to a recent symposium where research on molecular tests for Long Covid and insights into the syndrome’s biology were presented.

For Adrian Black, the trial marked the beginning of a substantial improvement in his cognitive symptoms. “I was willing to try anything,” he recalls. His goals involved being able to give a short presentation without having to stop and being able to remember where he was in an activity after being distracted. After the sessions, “I thought, ‘Actually, that would have been really useful if I'd done that at age 20,’” he reflects—at that age, you take your cognitive abilities for granted. “But if you [lose that], you have to relearn.”

United States President Donald Trump’s interference in the FIFA World Cup is stirring backlash around the world. 

Several organizations, world leaders, soccer players, and coaches have expressed their disapproval after Trump called on FIFA President Gianni Infantino—who awarded him the inaugural FIFA Peace Prize in 2025—to review striker Folarin Balogun’s red card ban. It was ultimately suspended following Trump’s request. 

Balogun was given a red card after a video review determined that he stepped on an opponent’s ankle while chasing a ball against Bosnia and Herzegovina. 

The red card would have automatically put Balogun, the lead goal scorer for USMNT, out for an additional match, leaving the team absent a key player as they face off against Belgium on Monday night in the Round of 16. The stakes are especially high: The U.S. team hasn’t advanced past this round since defeating Mexico in 2002. 

Read More: Common Sense Prevails at the FIFA World Cup

"Yes, I asked for a review by FIFA,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Monday. "It's one thing to penalize somebody for the game, but how do you penalize them for a game that hasn't been played yet? It's very unfair, you can't do that.” 

Trump went on to say that he didn’t think the original red card constituted a foul and called the referee who made the call “a little bit suspect.” 

After FIFA reversed the ban on Sunday, Trump praised the organization. 

“Thank you to FIFA for doing what was right, and reversing a great injustice!” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post. 

FIFA invoked a part of its disciplinary code that states its “judicial body may decide to fully or partially suspend the implementation of a disciplinary measure.” 

Suspending a disciplinary measure is extremely rare for FIFA. In another controversial case from 2025, Portuguese soccer-star Cristiano Ronaldo received a three-game ban after receiving a red card, but the organization suspended the two added games of the ban, allowing him to compete earlier.  

Widespread condemnation

The Union of European Football Associations, the governing body of soccer in Europe, said that FIFA’s decision “crossed a red line,” and expressed its “disbelief at such an unprecedented, incomprehensible and unjustifiable decision.”

“When the certainty of rules is no longer guaranteed by its guardians, the integrity of the game is at stake and the credibility of a competition is undermined,” the organization wrote in a statement Monday. 

The Royal Belgian Football Association (RBFA) also released a statement saying it was “astonished” by the decision and was “investigating all potential options.” The RBFA then issued a second response, explaining that FIFA “refused to respond to the RBFA’s legitimate requests” to review the decision. 

“Regardless of the sporting outcome of this match, the RBFA is deeply concerned by the course of events and will continue to fight in the coming hours, days and months in defence of the fundamental principles of ethics, fair competition, and the interests of football as a whole,” the organization wrote. 

Read More: America's World Cup Dreams Fueled By 'Pretty' Soccer

Belgium’s coach, Rudi Garcia, compared the FIFA decision to an April Fool’s Day joke, and pointed to his federation’s statement.

Belgium’s Foreign Minister Maxime Prévot also reacted to FIFA’s decision. 

“As a former football referee, I have always been committed to upholding the rules and ensuring decisions are fair. This decision clearly raises many questions,” Prévot told POLITICO in a statement.

The European Commissioner for Sport Glenn Micallef criticized both the suspension and the political interference, calling it “the wrong decision.”

“Decisions on sporting rules and sporting matters belong to sporting bodies, not politicians,” Micallef wrote in a post on X. “Influencing sporting decisions would undermine the autonomy of sport.”

Even United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Starmer commented on the controversial suspension.

Starmer’s official spokesperson, when asked about FIFA’s decision, said: “Those decisions are a matter for the football World Cup governing body and should stay that way, and we are clear in that position.”

“The Prime Minister supports the integrity of competition in all sports,” he added.

The U.S. team celebrated FIFA’s choice to allow Balogun to play in Monday’s match against Belgium, but opposed political influence in sports.

“Everyone that really loves the sport and trusts ethics and integrity, I think we celebrate all that decision,” head coach Mauricio Pochettino said, adding that his team was “punished” after Balogun was ejected from the game and the team played with a man down in the round of 32. He said that “99.9% of people agree there was an unfair red card.”

Those in agreement include Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who said last week that the U.S. “got screwed over with that red card” and called for an “appeal process” to the decision. 

According to FIFA’s disciplinary code, “Decisions taken by the referee on the field of play are final and may not be reviewed by the FIFA judicial bodies.” The consequences of those decisions, however, including suspensions, may be modified under Article 27, which FIFA cited in reversing Balogun's ban. While national federations typically handle disciplinary matters with FIFA, there is no public evidence that a formal request to suspend Balogun's automatic one-match ban was submitted before Trump's intervention.

When asked about Trump’s impact on the outcome, Pochettino said: “No, we cannot mix that. We cannot mix that.” 

Trump similarly downplayed his influence on Monday while addressing reporters in the Oval Office, saying of Infantino, “I didn’t tell him what to do. I can’t tell him what to do.”

Infantino issued a statement Monday saying that he informed Trump on their call that FIFA disciplinary bodies were responsible for any decision. 

“FIFA’s judicial bodies are independent,” Infantino said, noting that he “always” respects their authority. “They operate autonomously, apply the FIFA Disciplinary Code, and decide cases based on the applicable regulations and the specific facts before them.”

The U.S. Soccer Federation approved of the decision, issuing a statement in which it said, “We accept the decision of the Disciplinary Committee and are pleased that Folarin Balogun is eligible to compete tomorrow.”