Skip to main content

Long Covid - Postcovid Syndrome may be common and serious.

At the beginning of this outbreak there was concern in some quarters that a few COVID19 victims might suffer long term consequences.  This happens with some other viruses and even, in a few cases, with flu.  Initial studies are showing very disturbing results for a prolonged illness after recovery from COVID19 infection.

Broad, but unscientific, surveys of large numbers of people seem to show persistent symptoms in 5-10% of those who have recovered from COVID19. Fatigue and breathlessness being the most common problems.  The Kings College tracking app showed that 10% people had symptoms at 25 days and 5% were still ill one month later.

A patient led group of 640 people has been set up to report on symptoms (An Analysis of the Prolonged COVID-19 Symptoms Survey by Patient-Led Research Team ) and their results are disturbing. At the time their participants took the survey, 90.6% of the respondents had not recovered.  For the 60 respondents who had recovered, the average length of time spent being symptomatic was 27 days. The respondents who had not recovered had been experiencing symptoms for an average of 40 days, with a majority experiencing symptoms for 5-7 weeks. In principle the virus should have been cleared by 4 weeks so the symptoms imply Postcovid Syndrome in 90% of respondents.  These results are in line with the findings of medical/academic researchers below.

The few more controlled studies seem to show more severe long term effects.  A study published in July examined 100 patients who had recovered from COVID19.  Some of these patients had had a mild infection and around half were under 49 years old.  Of these "recovered" patients 78% had some heart damage and 60% had ongoing inflammation of the heart, 17% had atypical chest pain and 20% had palpitations, 36% reported ongoing shortness of breath and general exhaustion and 25% had these symptoms during less-than-ordinary daily activities, such as a household chore, only 4 of these patients were previously hospitalized.  (This paper was subject to amendment but the amendments were of a technical nature).

In another study, of more severe cases who had been hospitalised, 143 patients who had been discharged from hospital after being treated for COVID19 were rated for persistent symptoms.  The results are shown in the graph below:

Again fatigue and breathlessness (Dyspnea) were very common. 87.4% of patients reported at least one symptom.

At present it is difficult to distinguish illness that occurs after the virus has been cleared from the body (postcovid symptoms) and a persisting infection (long covid).

It is also becoming apparent that COVID19 affects mental health, a study found that the figures for mental distress after COVID19 are similar to those found in patients who have recovered from SARS.

These preliminary results and surveys show that whatever your age and health it is very important not to catch COVID19.  It is worrying that the news media are covering this disease as harmless for young adults.  The truth is that for some young adults, perhaps a large number, it could blight the rest of their lives.  This may be the case for between 5% to 60% of victims with my current best guess that we should expect that over 10% of those adults of all ages who have had COVID19 will be intermittently ill for years.

25/9/2020




Comments

Popular posts from this blog

The Falklands have always been Argentine - Las Malvinas son Argentinas

"The Falklands have always been Argentine" is taught to every Argentine child as a matter of faith.  What was Argentina during the time when it "always" possessed Las Malvinas?  In this article I will trace the history of Argentina in the context of its physical and political relationship with "Las Malvinas", the Falkland Islands.  The Argentine claim to the Falkland Islands dates from a brief episode in 1831-32 so it is like Canada claiming the USA despite two centuries of separate development. This might sound like ancient history but Argentina has gone to war for this ancient claim so the following article is well worth reading. For a summary of the legal case see: Las Malvinas: The Legal Case Argentina traces its origins to Spanish South America when it was part of the Viceroyalty of the Rio del Plata.  The Falklands lay off the Viceroyalty of Peru, controlled by the Captain General of Chile.  In 1810 the Falklands were far from the geographical b

Practical Idealism by Richard Nicolaus Coudenhove-Kalergi

Coudenhove-Kalergi was a pioneer of European integration. He was the founder and President for 49 years of the Paneuropean Union. His parents were Heinrich von Coudenhove-Kalergi, an Austro-Hungarian diplomat, and Mitsuko Aoyama, the daughter of an oil merchant, antiques-dealer, and huge landowner family in Tokyo. His "Pan-Europa" was published in 1923 and contained a membership form for the Pan-Europa movement. Coudenhove-Kalergi's movement held its first Congress in Vienna in 1926. In 1927 the French Prime Minister, Aristide Briand was elected honorary president.  Personalities attending included: Albert Einstein, Thomas Mann and Sigmund Freud. Figures who later became central to founding the EU, such as Konrad Adenauer became members . His basic idea was that democracy was a transitional stage that leads to rule by a new aristocracy that is largely taken from the Jewish "master race" (Kalergi's terminology). His movement was reviled by Hitler and H

Membership of the EU: pros and cons

5th December 2013, update May 2016 Nigel Lawson, ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer,  recently criticised the UK membership of the EU , the media has covered his mainstream view as if he is a bad boy starting a fight in the school playground, but is he right about the EU? What has changed that makes EU membership a burning issue?  What has changed is that the 19 countries of the Eurozone are now seeking political union to escape their financial problems.   Seven further EU countries have signed up to join the Euro but the British and Danish have opted out.  The EU is rapidly becoming two blocks - the 26 and Britain and Denmark.   Lawson's fear was that if Britain stays in the EU it will be isolated and dominated by a Eurozone bloc that uses "unified representation of the euro area" , so acting like a single country which controls 90% of the vote in the EU with no vetoes available to the UK in most decisions.  The full plans for Eurozone political union ( EMU Stage