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Coronavirus doctor's diary: Why are people remaining ill for so long?

141 points by open-source-ux 6y ago

known 6y ago
Sounds like Cancer symptoms
StevenWaterman 6y ago
My wife got covid in march. She wasn't hospitalised, but we did have to call an ambulance multiple times. She 'recovered' and was fine for about a week before developing most of these symptoms. The most infuriating part is how little help there is from medical professionals. She's now 4 months in with what can only be seen as a chronic health problem, but the only medical advice doctors will give her is to rest. After she recovered and came down with the post-covid symptoms, we went to a doctor whose best guess was that she had somehow got another viral infection (despite not leaving the house). My only hope is that as these symptoms become more widespread and well-known, long-term support is made available. It's incredibly frustrating that we've known about these issues for a couple of months (and so have many others, old.reddit.com/r/covid19positive was full of similar stories in march). Meanwhile it seems like medical professionals are only just starting to consider that it can affect you for more than a couple of weeks.
- _nalply 6y ago
  Sorry for your experience. Because I am also the husband of a sick wife, I can relate to you. My own feelings swing between hope and despair and a dread of future is emerging. Realistically, what do you expect from medical professionals?
  - StevenWaterman 6y ago
    I certainly don't expect a magic bullet that solves everything, but I would like it to be treated like any other chronic illness. A single point of contact to help track and manage her symptoms, a care plan to ease her back into life with the expectation that some symptoms will be here forever, and the hope that they won't.
- H8crilA 6y ago
  > The most infuriating part is how little help there is from medical professionals (...) the only medical advice doctors will give her is to rest I don't think it's bad will, they simply have no idea what to do. Just see what the research looks like: "they" are still busy categorising symptoms. Understanding of this disease is still in early stages. It will improve. Mind boggling how just a few months ago all my friends were throwing the 0.x% CFR numbers for our age group, implying that there is nothing to be afraid of. There's much so more complexity and many unknown unknowns in health!
  - StevenWaterman 6y ago
    Yeah absolutely, they're doing their best with the information available to them. That's why I'm hopeful that all the recent news around persistent symptoms will improve awareness and make more resources available. It's a nightmare situation all-round and I have full sympathy for the situation doctors are in.
    - kijin 6y ago
      Another problem is that most of the world is still too busy trying (and failing) to control the spread of infection. They don't have much attention to spare for people who aren't deemed infectious anymore.
      - annamargot 6y ago
        On top of that, downplaying the severity of covid is critical to the arguments of those who want this to be over for political, economic, or any reasons. The focus by many has been deaths. Mortality rate can be spun to make covid seem not so bad. If we start talking about the percentage of people whose lives are significantly affected, we create a much bigger percentage. If you’re trying to paint the opposite picture, it’s not in your interest to acknowledge or increase awareness of that percentage.
        ThomPete 6y ago
        well tell that to the cancer, diabetes and high blood pressure ,depression victims who don't get diagnosed in time or havent gotten the proper treatment. Tell that to the people who's lifework have been destroyed and I could go on with people being significantly affected. Its not that simple.
- script3r 6y ago
  You should research Chronic Fatigue Syndrome / Myalgic encephalomyelitis. The medical community, from my experience, does not handle this type of diagnosis well. I’ve experienced post-viral fatigue symptoms that lasted well over 8 months, and almost all doctors I visited (ranging from primary care to neurologists) suggested simply rest and/or believed it was depression related (even though I have never suffered from depression before). I hope your wife gets better. Remission from these symptoms is possible, but sadly, I don’t think you’ll get more information out of the doctors.
  - hh3k0 6y ago
    > The medical community, from my experience, does not handle this type of diagnosis well. I've read some time ago that Stanford scientists developed a blood test. It'll be harder for docs to ignore once there's a proper diagnostic tool.
    - H_Pylori 6y ago
      >It'll be harder for docs to ignore once there's a proper diagnostic tool. Simon Wessely is already trying to cover is ass [0]. What a wonderful guy, he richly deserves his reputation. [0] https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-study-investigating-a-potential-biomarker-for-chronic-fatigue-syndrome-me/ https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-study-...
    - rtp 6y ago
      Yeah, in its initial study, the nanoneedle had a 100% specificity and selectivity, and according to Ron Davis - main author - the results have held up as they've increased the number of tested people. That said it might also give a positive result for other illnesses. Hopefully a follow-up will be published soon.
      - dm319 6y ago
        Be wary of anything that claims a 100% sensitivity and specificity. It usually indicates the wrong gold standard or poor methods.
- jessriedel 6y ago
  I don't think we have any non-trivial treatments that are safe and effective enough to use on non-hospitalized folks. Until a patient's condition gets bad enough to justify risky/unpleasant interventions, rest and hydration seem like the proper prescription.
- scawf 6y ago
  I have the exact same experience. It took about 100 days before my wife could start working again, and she is still experiencing chest pain, breathlessness and fatigue (at first symptoms + 115 days). She was told to endure and rest. What a great plan.
  - watwut 6y ago
    There is no other known treatment. Or basically no known treatment.
  - tenken 6y ago
    I'm not a doctor, but I would argue against rest. By that I mean, endure ... sure, but focus hopefully on calisthenics, breathing exercises, yoga, taking supplemental vitamins and improving physical fitness. Typically post surgery doctors recommend PT ... I'm just saying start some regular PT post illness -- not "rest".
- garganzol 6y ago
  Based on my humble experience, I would suggest her to take the walks in the open air. Start from small, then gradually increase. Once she reaches at least 3 km per day, the walking activities should fully rejuvenate her ability to breathe. This should totally work out. The moderate activities and safe relaxed walks do the miracles for the usual post-pneumonia as well. Note of caution: avoid walking in masks. A mask impairs the natural ventilation and you would not get the recovery effect. This means you should keep a healthy distance and avoid getting into crowded places.
  - rbinv 6y ago
    > Once she reaches at least 3 km per day, the walking activities should fully rejuvenate her ability to breathe. And you base that on what? Seems completely arbitrary. You don't know any details of her issues.
    - garganzol 6y ago
      Experimentation. Medicine is my life-long interest. Yes, the exact details are missing. But I gave a solid general advice. Not sure everybody can grasp it being blinded by their own cultural expectations (which are not 100% true after all).
      - michaelcampbell 6y ago
        How many double blind experiments did you do with a control group with/without masks? O2 sat levels from any tests I've seen aren't affected by masks, so I'm more than a bit skeptical here.
        garganzol 6y ago
        No tests, sorry. I would gladly make some statistically significant experiments, but I am not in professional medicine. I am more math/computer/physics guy by trade. From math/physics perspective: mask has a porous structure and stands in a way of the air. So it is clearly adds some resistance to overcome with an additional suction. Healthy people can provide that suction, so their O2 remains untouched. Not-so-healthy people may hit the physical limit of their suction and this is the situation when adding an additional barrier (the mask) will lead to O2 decrease.
- loopz 6y ago
  Just wait until the professionals start referring to psychological help. Chronic health problems from previous infections do not exist in modern medicine. Besides there's very little professional help to get. I believe we can reasonably expect this to develop into massive amounts of people unable to work due to ME/CFS. The effects may last for life. There are courses where they tell you to lie to yourself and say you're healthy ("lightning process"). The breaking of personal boundaries can unfortunately for sufferers lead to permanent health and capacity reduction, so take with big grains of salt wether it's worth the risk. What may work, if it's ME/CFS-like, is to find personal limitations and avoid too much toll, ie. less or no stressful exercise. Then find ways to live healthier and gently up those boundaries without exertion, avoiding possible permanent regressions for life. Of course also seek professional medical help, but always evaluate what kind of help one is getting where and what the consequences are. Life can and should be joyful and one should shed fear and anger, but be sceptical of claims (even this one), and do due R&D.
  - PaulKeeble 6y ago
    Since they classed the first known outbreak of ME as mass hysteria its been constant gaslighting for sufferers for 70 odd years. Even now this article is written as if ME/CFS doesn't exist, as if doctors in the UK are completely baffled, but we know what this is and it will have the same hallmark Post Exertional Malaise but its not even mentioned in the article. The NHS doesn't recognise the international definition of the disease and continues to harm patients that show up with it every day. The Chinese after SARS didn't have issues calling it ME/CFS, around 10% of the SARs sufferers still suffer with ME/CFS to this day, they had papers calling it what it was very early on. The NHS however is going with "no clue". We do know a lot more than we knew 2 years ago. We know the condition swells the brain in the central and front regions and that explains the memory problems, headaches and coordination issues. We know that sufferers have virus RNA in their body and in their brains, so its possible its just an ongoing infection but it also appears to be partially replicated in cells. We know that patients cells produce down to about 25% of the energy that a normal persons cells do in their mitochondria and it is at least partially to do with the Calcium ion channel being turned off with a gene switch. A sufferers plasma will shut down someone else's cell too so its probably a signal of some description in the immune system soup. What we don't know is if any of this is the root cause of the condition and there is frighteningly small amounts of research being done for a disease that can be as debilitating as MS. We know a lot about how its not Psychological now and research is getting funded at last. But its been 70 years of "its all in your head", nothing about this condition paints doctors and researchers at all in a good light.
- hellofunk 6y ago
  You’ve pretty much exactly described someone I know who caught the virus at the end of March as well. Approximately 40 years old, and healthy, and currently is exhausted from climbing one flight of stairs. She finally started leaving the house just a couple weeks ago. It’s been a very very gradual improvement over time, so I suspect that eventually it will go away. She’s been getting some physical therapy to help get her body moving and gradually become more active.
- amalcon 6y ago
  So sorry to hear about your wife. This is an incredibly scary disease for a lot of reasons. Adding the frustration of a chronic condition to that is not what anyone needs. The basic problem is: What do you do about a chronic condition for which there is no proven treatment? I have a few people in my life with one such condition or another. There are three responses, mostly unhelpful. The most common response is to essentially suggest things at random. Both rest and (generic) exercise are common suggestions. This can make the patient happy, but it's often actively harmful -- obviously, both rest and exercise won't help the same thing, unless it's a specific exercise chosen with the condition in mind. The other common response is to not suggest anything, and basically try to get the patient to go away. If you're lucky, they'll try to sympathize, but mostly you'll just get brushed off. This makes the patient feel bad, but at least it won't actively make the condition worse. The response you'll get if you're really lucky, is that they'll refer you to participate in a study of some kind. This is lucky because it's very high variance: it could kill you, but it also could significantly improve things. Obviously that risk isn't for everyone, but it's lucky to even have the choice. Unfortunately, without a proven treatment, there isn't a lot else for doctors to do.
  - Aeolun 6y ago
    > Unfortunately, without a proven treatment, there isn't a lot else for doctors to do. Figure out a treatment? Or at least establish what is actually wrong?
    - t_von_doom 6y ago
      I'm fairly certain that people are indeed working on a treatment, but until it's ready what do you propose?
    - yencabulator 6y ago
      > Figure out a treatment? That'd be the "refer you to participate in a study" part. Your average medical practitioner does not do research. > Or at least establish what is actually wrong? How? Based on what? That's the whole point for something like this; the medical consensus does not know how to diagnose it.
- sjg007 6y ago
  Post viral syndrome is a thing and may be a covid thing too.
- DanBC 6y ago
  > The most infuriating part is how little help there is from medical professionals. She's now 4 months in with what can only be seen as a chronic health problem, but the only medical advice doctors will give her is to rest. They're still trying to understand what's best. You could try looking into the type of rehab that some sepsis patients go through, because that's an emerging treatment in the UK. See for example this comment from a UK doctor: https://twitter.com/SepsisUK/status/1283316617615683584?s=20 https://twitter.com/SepsisUK/status/1283316617615683584?s=20
  - DanBC 6y ago
    Here's more information for people looking for help with long term recovery from covid or sepsis, from the UK Sepsis Trust. https://www.youtube.com/user/TheUKSepsisTrust/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/TheUKSepsisTrust/videos
- dennis_jeeves 6y ago
  StevenWaterman , 2 questions: - I assume that you yourself never became sick during this period, despite being in close proximity to her? -Did you wife have other preexisting conditions?
  - StevenWaterman 6y ago
    I was essentially asymptomatic. I had a tiny bit of vertigo and stomach problems for a couple of days, but I only noticed when looking back. She had incredibly mild asthma but didn't need an inhaler (and does now). Other than that, nothing.
- wolco 6y ago
  When the answer is not simple or require new thinking your local gp doctors are not the group to ask.
- spanktheuser 6y ago
  My sense is medicine has for some time neglected chronic symptoms from acute viral infection. During my lifetime, chronic fatigue syndrome went from a psychological malady confined to malingerers and depressed women to a physical malady associated with infection... but maybe also malingerers / depressed women. Which was where things stood when I contracted mononucleosis in my 40s. Weeks / months long fatigue and multi-organ involvement is characteristic of mono. In my case as the other symptoms slowly abated the fatigue remained, lingering over six months with some intervening flare-ups of fever etc. I learned that that this progression is considerably more common in older patients. Beyond that, little was known and my doctors reacted with a shrug and symptom management. There was no know cause to these symptoms. And seemingly to me considerably less medical interest. Perhaps Covid will yield a greater focus and fundamental understanding of chronic conditions resulting from viruses. However, given the contrast between the prevalence of CFS and attention paid... and the medical reaction to Lyme Disease I’m not entirely optimistic.
  - perl4ever 6y ago
    I didn't know what to think of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, but in the one specific instance of diagnosis I know of first hand, it preceded a diagnosis of terminal pancreatic cancer a bit later. Made me wonder if there could be a viral factor or something that leads to immune system problems that gradually develop over years.
zby 6y ago
OK - but what are the stats here? Worldometer shows that there are more than 8 million Covid survivors, how many of them have the prolonged symptoms? 8 million is really many people - so I would not be surprised if there are a few strange stories (https://www.gwern.net/Littlewood https://www.gwern.net/Littlewood as always).
- Al-Khwarizmi 6y ago
  The post has a figure with rather scary stats. Although I suppose it comes from a followup of severe cases, not from a random sample of cases? Otherwise it's really, really scary.
  - zby 6y ago
    Ah - yeah - I though the graph was about patients who report persistent symptoms not the whole population. If indeed 60% of all Covid patients have fatigue and 40% breathlessness after more than 60 days - than it is scary indeed. But we don't know how the 143 patients where found - are they random people with Covid or are they only hospitalized Covid patients? With 8 millions we should really have better stats.
    - r721 6y ago
      Quote from another story (by Der Spiegel): >Long-term* symptoms reported by COVID-19 patients >47% general fatigue >24% prolonged respiratory problems >*longer than 30 days; analysis of a study of COVID-19 symptoms from King's College London; >8,065 people who tested positive, of whom 857 had long-term symptoms https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/covid-19-many-people-stay-sick-after-recovering-from-coronavirus-a-d814c20b-fb3d-47b1-bd2b-d6fd65e0ef33 https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/covid-19-many-peo...
      - zby 6y ago
        OK - that would be compatible with the theory that the original article were about those who had long-term symptoms. Journalism is a mess. But the 10% is still scary.
pgt 6y ago
(IANAD) I wonder if any of the neurological symptoms like depression and memory-loss are caused by chronic inflammation following infection. Virus reservoirs are mentioned in the article. Could it be that there are bits of broken up, deactivated virus floating around triggering auto-immune conditions?
- philjohn 6y ago
  They mention that in the article. The other interesting point is - chest x-ray and sound are both normal, but someone is still getting breathless which could point to it being more about vascular involvement in many cases - perhaps the blood vessels that are responsible for uptake of oxygen from the lungs are inflamed and not working as effectively.
- sradman 6y ago
  > I wonder if any of the neurological symptoms like depression and memory-loss are caused by chronic inflammation following infection. Changes in sleep and stress patterns seem like a simpler explanation. The sensation of not being able to breathe can not be positive for either. All of these things, including inflammation, are measurable though a good baseline for what is normal for any given individual is probably rare.
echelon 6y ago
There are numerous studies coming out that report immunity against coronavirus does not last long: https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/06/chinese-study-antibodies-covid-19-patients-fade-quickly https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/06/chinese-... https://theconversation.com/immunity-to-covid-19-may-not-last-this-threatens-a-vaccine-and-herd-immunity-142556 https://theconversation.com/immunity-to-covid-19-may-not-las... > Finally, the researchers measured how long the antibody response lasted. This is the most important data. Unfortunately, antibodies levels began falling after day 20 and only 17% of patients retained a potent level at day 57. Some patients completely lost their antibodies after two months. It's terrifying to think that our adaptive immune system might not be good at learning Covid-19. I don't know that this is the case, but our immune system evolved to fight the things we deal with regularly over many centuries. Just like HIV, this thing is relatively new on the evolutionary scale. Perhaps those that remain sick aren't clearing the virus completely? It may be this in some combination with vascular/organ damage and immune system depletion.
- matwood 6y ago
  Antibodies may not stay around, but it's hard to know for sure about immunity without also looking at t-cell response. At least that's my non-biologist reading of the many articles on this topic.
kesor 6y ago
The more important question is why people are being sick for so many years with "modern medicine" doing absolutely nothing to get them out of their sickness state. Diabetes type II, heart problems, autoimmune problems, all these chronic diseases plaguing most of the human population on planet earth for the last several hundred years (when "modern" medicine existed) and none of them going away. Covid mostly takes the people who are already sick, and kills them. Would be nice to figure out how to not have so many people sick in the first place.
- lm28469 6y ago
  > them out of their sickness state. Diabetes type II, heart problems, autoimmune problems, all these chronic diseases plaguing most of the human population You mean all these diseases that are almost exclusively due to lifestyle, ie. lack of physical activity, poor diet choices, &c. ? People knew 2000 years ago that gluttony and sloth weren't good things, it's not "modern medicine"'s role to cure our lack of will.
  - DangitBobby 6y ago
    I'm interested to know where you got the idea that autoimmune disorders are due to lifestyle?
    - MrRiddle 6y ago
      Please read the site guidelines and refrain from ill intentioned comments.
      - jlokier 6y ago
        In my opinion DangitBobby's comment is reasonable and interesting, not ill-intentioned. lm28469 quoted a list which includes "autoimmune problems" and linked all of them to gluttony, sloth and lack of will. That strikes me as nonsense. To the best of my knowledge, people suffering with autoimmune problems can't just fix it with a bit of will, and life's hard enough without people making it worse by telling them their disease is their own fault. But regardless of what I think it is perfectly reasonable to question that link.
LatteLazy 6y ago
This should be a huge wake up call for people to look after their health. We are going to see this sort of pandemic more and more regularly, so it's time to make those lifestyle changes you've been putting off! Lose that weight, cut back on the sugar, get some exercise and sleep more.
- danparsonson 6y ago
  The article features a picture of one of the patients squating with 105kg before she got sick - she was extremely fit and healthy and now she gets breathless walking up stairs.
- maxerickson 6y ago
  It's quite likely another pandemic will be quite a lot worse. I see people taking the wrong lesson from this pandemic, that trying to control it was an over-reaction. So if we face a disease that kills a larger percentage of people, that lesson will not serve us well (it's not doing us any good this time around!).
- paulcole 6y ago
  > We are going to see this sort of pandemic more and more regularly What is this based on?
  - loopz 6y ago
    Eradication of wildlife.
    - indymike 6y ago
      Please explain?
      - loopz 6y ago
        Deserves much more than that: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=virus+pandemic+wildlife+destruction https://duckduckgo.com/?q=virus+pandemic+wildlife+destructio...
throwaway84774 6y ago
Something that has been striking about COVID-19 is that it seems to have been consistently underestimated by experts, especially in western nations. With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response), Asian countries that were hit hard by SARS or MERS responded swiftly and decisively: Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and China crushed the virus. Other countries seemed to dither, and react slowly. Australia, which was the exception, seems poised to squander its gains. Is it because of limited mortality in the young (which doesn't seem to translate to limited morbidity)? Is it the fact that "coronavirus" meant "common cold" to medical experts? Arrogance? Complacency? To a non-expert, a rapidly spreading novel virus with unknown long-term effects would be something to be eradicated, but the emphasis from western governments in particular seems to be reactive and ambivalent and hinging on the hope of a vaccine.
- kinghtown 6y ago
  I live in Taiwan. Simple answer is that it’s a cultural difference which has a positive impact on health. Wearing a mask was normal behaviour before covid so it’s a non issue to wear one during the peak. There is no one screaming about their independence being taken away by being “forced” to wear a mask. All the homeschooler supermom Karens and anti vax types protesting about their right to choose a mask or whatever looks really really bad over here and Taiwanese people generally think westerners are retarded in regards to covid. Also, asians are healthier, slimmer with Well rounded diets (on average.) Tons of smokers here though. A lot of Taiwanese people are happy homebodies too.
  - gremlinsinc 6y ago
    Many westerners think anti-mask westerners are retarded as well, lol. I can't even imagine how insane we must look to other cultures right now.
- MHordecki 6y ago
  > With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response) Both Lawrence Wong and Gan Kim Yong are Singaporeans. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Singapore
jkhaui 6y ago
To everyone who throws around the argument that "only x% of people infected with COVID die", please consider that many survivors are still experiencing major relapses 4 months later [0]. If you're guided only by selfish motives (as I suspect most of us are), at least consider the following: - You'll likely experience internal organ pain so excruciating it feels like you're dying. - There's rapidly growing evidence that significant damage occurs not just to the lungs but also the penis(!!!), heart, and brain. This occurs EVEN in asymptomatic cases. - Organ damage may be permanent. - There's a good chance you'll be so sick you can't work for a good chunk of the year. And based on the literature + anecdotal experiences I've read, this stuff is happening to some of the fittest people in society (regular gym goers, triathlon participants, people in their teens/20s/30s, etc). [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19positive/ https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19positive/
- nicc 6y ago
  Nice try.
- amelius 6y ago
  You can't post medical fear inducing comments without good references. Reddit doesn't qualify (it doesn't even open in a browser).
- shadowprofile77 6y ago
  Do a google search of personal narratives for nearly any usually fairly mild illness, condition or odd medical problem you care to mention, or even a google search for what it was like to take X medicine (said medicine being something very, very commonly prescribed to millions of people per year without statistical evidence of frequent severe problems and side effects) You know what you'll very likely find? A ton of horrifying personal accounts with all sorts of worst case scenarios and unexpected terrible things that many people will be posting about having happened to them. This is one of the big reasons behind the now old joke that if you google search "persistent cough" you'll end up diagnosing yourself somewhere between super cancer and mega HIV... The point i'm making here is that these sorts of self reporting-based accounts massively bias towards awful outcomes, despite being statistically minor in broad terms of probable outcomes. Poeple who got sick and felt fine after recovering have a lot less incentive to bother posting about it. I suspect you're seeing a lot of this with what you describe and especially if your linked source is a damn reddit thread where exactly the sorts of people who had unusually bad things happen to them after recovering are likely to go. This will likely apply even more so given the immense media attention and public fear around COVID. I can only imagine how many recovered people are either experiencing psychosomatic long run symptoms or attributing any new bad thing they feel from of some unrelated cause to the virus post-recovery despite no connection between the two. (you mentioned penis pain, well, a person can still get herpes or chlamydia some time after having recovered from COVID, for example) Sars Cov 2 is a coronavirus, one among several of a similar type. We're still learning much about it and doubtless there are going to be many complicated patient outcomes from some among the many millions who recover from it, but it's not some insane new super disease from the bowels of hell. Let's calm the alarmist hysteria before jumping to unsubstantiated claims about widespread terrible shit. You mention literature backing up your claims. Well, link to it, and let's see if it's statistically significant or based on a small number of reported cases out of (so far) millions of recoveries. Finally, a bit of anecdote of my own: I personally know 6 people who have gotten the virus and recovered. All of them now feel more or less okay several weeks after recovery. Two of these people are 91 years old by the way, making them an exceptional case but worth mentioning.
disabled 6y ago
This is a worthwhile read too, about how COVID-19 is believed to cause a new type of inflammatory syndrome, in just about everybody: Coronavirus warning from Italy: Effects of COVID-19 could be worse than first thought: https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-warning-from-italy-effects-of-covid-19-could-be-worse-than-first-thought-12027348 https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-warning-from-italy-ef... Also: Older Children Spread the Coronavirus Just as Much as Adults, Large Study Finds: http://archive.is/D5wQn http://archive.is/D5wQn (The study of nearly 65,000 people in South Korea suggests that school reopenings will trigger more outbreaks.) I understand why people want schools to reopen. I also understand that it is a place where social services are executed. But, this is extremely problemsome.
dustinmoris 6y ago
Just to counter some of the negative news, my wife had COVID, she picked it up at work from her colleagues where the majority of them had COVID, even the reception staff at their medical practice where she works all got COVID and when she was at home coughing I also got COVID. We all had mild symptoms, mostly a cough, fever and loss of smell and taste. We all recovered from it like from a cold or flu. At no point did anything bad happen. No organ damages. No lasting health issues. This was in April, so many weeks ago and we’ve all been super healthy and fit since then. At her work nobody even talks about it because it’s such a non thing in their eyes. I perform physically just as good as I did before I got ill. So there’s that, good first hand experiences which you’ll never hear because it doesn’t fit the current media narrative. Luckily smart people will look at science and hard statistical facts rather than individual selected stories. Anxious people will always be anxious. You can choose to call me a liar or whatever, but Prince Charles had COVID and recovered from it like from a normal cold, so did the British prime minister, lots of staff and MPs around him, so did Tom Hanks, Idris Elba, and literary hundreds of other super famous celebrities from old to young. You going to call them all liars too? It’s important to stay mentally healthy and I think people need to stop reading this fear provoking nonsense which really doesn’t change anything except making people mentally ill. The virus won’t become more or less dangerous by reading sensationalised news stories which aim at playing into people’s worst fears. I find it abhorrent.
- smcl 6y ago
  I’m not sure what your point is here. Everyone knows by now that it’s possible to get COVID, experience mild symptoms and recover. However some people also die or recover and experience severe respiratory issues, and this is an interesting thing to study and report on. The article isn’t sensationalist or alarmist. It’s not calling anyone a liar - to be honest I’ve no idea what your “you going to call them all liars too?” comment is directed at.
  - dustinmoris 6y ago
    > However some people also die or recover and experience severe respiratory issues, and this is an interesting thing to study and report on I fully agree on that. I'm not disappointed about the studying, but the media coverage and amplification of people's irrational fears. There is many viruses out there which kill humans and cause all sorts of post viral effects which can last for months and we should all study them, get better at treating them, and finding new ways of curing them and that is fine, but it doesn't help to make lots of people mentally ill by singling out a disease and making people prisoners of their own fears. For example, in Brazil people should be more worried about getting Dengue fever, which you cannot easily prevent by washing your hands and keeping social distance, yet you don't hear about Dengue at all, because it's been normalised and there's no news story today. So the media just jump on something novel where there is still potential for playing into people's fears and they capitalise on this. I'm sick and tired of watching many people around me getting depressed and falling into lows because of fears of just going even for a walk in the park. Social media and the internet have always amplified the worst of humans. It's a joke that we've known for years that if you google for a pain in your toe you'll get diagnosed with a terminal brain cancer on the internet. It shouldn't really be a surprise that we see the same thing happening for COVID-19.
sradman 6y ago
> We don't yet understand why these patients are having such long-term problems. ACE2 receptors are found in the Type II pneumocytes [1] of the lung alveoli. These cells produce the pulmonary surfactant that changes the surface tension which, among other things, controls how hard it is to breath in/out. I'd be surprised if these damaged/destroyed cells were fully regenerated. The question I have, is whether the breathlessness is due to the sensation of extra muscular effort required to breathe or a measurable lower SpO2? Long term, I wonder if COVID-19 related pneumonia will increase the incidence of lung cancer as these individuals age. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulmonary_alveolus#Type_II_cells https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulmonary_alveolus#Type_II_cel...
- qrbLPHiKpiux 6y ago
  The Pentagon sent a memo to all military physicians. COVID survivors permanently disqualified from ever joining the military. What do they know that we don't? https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/06/coronavirus-survivors-banned-from-joining-the-military/ https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/06/... There's been an edit since I last seen it, here's the updated guidance: https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/21/the-ban-on-covid-19-survivors-joining-up-has-lifted-but-some-cases-could-still-be-denied/ https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/21/...
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > What do they know that we don't? They know exactly what we know: there are a variety of apparent delayed effects, some quite serious, and isn’t clear what the whole set is and how long they take to manifest. This is a policy based in precautionary cognizance of ignorance, not some special detailed occult knowledge. Once we have a better idea, the policy will be reviewed and probably eliminated or narrowed to focus on specific issues of concern.
    - gremlinsinc 6y ago
      It'll be interesting to see if the NBA starts back up, if some of the players who had COVID have issues just making laps up/down the courts. I wonder if the 'weaker' or 'long-term effected' players might take sabbaticals or sit-out a season or two or retire altogether.
chiefalchemist 6y ago
Keep in mind, the majority of acute cases happen to people with pre-existing conditions. Deaths have the same profile. Of course there are exceptions. "Perfectly healthy" people can be hit hard. The articles, and many similar, consistently fail to mention the pre-existing conditions of the people in the study. Editorial: A couple weeks ago I saw a news story about a man who "survived Covid-19" after 60 days in hospital and 40+ days on a ventilator. They showed him leaving hospital in a wheelchair. He was easily 275 lbs, perhaps 300 lbs. You don't put on weight being fed via drip or tube. There's a reason it's called "morbidly obese." I'm glad he survived. No one deserves to die. I'm not convinced the virus was his only significant medical issue. It's time we start being honest about the dangers in the foods we eat and the lifestyles we lead.
satysin 6y ago
I had COVID end of February/early March. Thankfully I didn't need hospital treatment, in fact at the time I didn't even know it was COVID. It was only recently I got it confirmed. However several months on I still notice the effects from it. Mostly regular fatigue and almost daily shortness of breath. Last night I was laying in bed going to sleep and got quite panicked as it feels like I am not getting enough air in each breath. I have moment like this almost daily and it is extremely unsettling and worrying. I am in my mid-thirties and generally quite healthy. A bit overweight but before COVID I didn't get out of breath going up the stairs. I didn't find myself needing to lie down on the sofa from exhaustion. I am still able to run but no where near as long as I could just a few months ago. Putting it bluntly it is fucking scary. I am very fortunate that two good friends of mine are doctors (a cardiologist and her husband a microbiologist) and they have been kind enough to check on me weekly with some basic lung function tests and blood work but they are seeing these kinds of issues with many recovered COVID patients.
- garganzol 6y ago
  Does your daily routine include a bit of exercising or/and walking? What's your daily walking distances? I am asking because some post-pneumonia (non-COVID) patients tend to have temporary shortage of breath/fatigue syndromes. And a good way to get rid of them is to get some elementary body movements like relaxed walking among tree alleys. Nothing crazy, just comfortable stress-less motion. It helps to clear up the lungs and balance the immune response. I wonder if this information can be of any help in your situation.
  - satysin 6y ago
    I have a 7yo son so we go out pretty much every day to the park. I haven't tracked anything but ballparking it from the distance and how long we are out I probably walk around 2-3 miles a day. Some of that will be a light jog while kicking a ball around or catching frisbee. I have had a few gentle runs as well for 5-7 miles but as previously mentioned they are exhausting me right now and exacerbating my anxiety about the impact COVID has had to my body so I have cut them out for the most part and sticking to gentler exercise with my son. I am hoping all of this is made worse by the added stress of life right now. I am on holiday for the next few weeks so looking forward to a change of scenery and less day to day responsibilities.
hatenberg 6y ago
I had fatigue for about 3 month after a bout with mono (mid 30s). Lost 15 kg, had to restart running from scratch after running 10k @2 times a week for years. It was scary, the doctors said there is no treatment just optimising healthy living and hoping it goes away. Ever since this started I could not understand the people here on HN arguing there is no proof that there could be long term effects. Now we have proof of the opposite and they are out in force marginalising (its just a few people) to keep their own fears contained.
hprotagonist 6y ago
More and more, SARS-CoV-2 is sounding like polio more than any other disease in our recent history.
gerbler 6y ago
My wife likely had covid in March (she was unable to get tested at the time due to no fever) and experiences similar symptoms described in the article (breathlessness and fatigue). Interestingly, she had a physical in February and all blood work was normal. She went for another check-up in June due to her breathlessness and found that she had hyperthyroidism. Our hypothesis is that her thyroid problem could have been caused by covid. Mentioning in case anyone else has observed this pattern.
Seb-C 6y ago
I got sick in march with covid-like symptoms but could not get tested. I have also experienced being out of breath when climbing stairs or walking. I also started to worry and attribute other symptoms like headache to this, but then realized that : - I spent 3 months at home without going out much - I'm wearing a mask everytime I go out and I noticed that masks make breating harder - I did not move much for 3 months and worked at home. This is significantly less than my usual 30 minutes of walk + 1h of transports + climbing stairs 4 times a day - Only seeing the world through the news has a big negative psychological effect on me Now it is just my humble experience. I am certainly not saying that people does not have symptoms and I only am one dot of incomplete data. I just want to say that if you got sick and then experienced long terms effects, please don't forget about the radical life-style changes that you are experiencing before attributing everything to the virus. Understanding this helped me to rebalance my daily routine and get and feel better.
- garganzol 6y ago
  Downvotes to your post are unwarranted. Western medical school tends to think that pulmonary fibrosis is incurable, despite the fact you have just provided a practical recipe for post-pneumonia rehabilitation. Probably what happens is a casual reader just sees a statement that says that "masks make breating harder" and gives you a downvote without further thought. This is what I call a comfortable ignorance. Kudos for finding the practical way out of this situation.
rjsw 6y ago
I have been ill since early March, never bad enough to need to go to hospital. Have had mono a couple of times and do tend to get post-viral fatigue, this is different as I still have symptoms of covid19 as well. Sore throat and conjunctivitis are the main things that affect me, did notice that my sense of smell improved a couple of weeks ago. Was pretty fit before this and still did competitive sport in my 50s.
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Sounds like Cancer symptoms

My wife got covid in march. She wasn't hospitalised, but we did have to call an ambulance multiple times. She 'recovered' and was fine for about a week before developing most of these symptoms. The most infuriating part is how little help there is from medical professionals. She's now 4 months in with what can only be seen as a chronic health problem, but the only medical advice doctors will give her is to rest. After she recovered and came down with the post-covid symptoms, we went to a doctor whose best guess was that she had somehow got another viral infection (despite not leaving the house). My only hope is that as these symptoms become more widespread and well-known, long-term support is made available. It's incredibly frustrating that we've known about these issues for a couple of months (and so have many others, old.reddit.com/r/covid19positive was full of similar stories in march). Meanwhile it seems like medical professionals are only just starting to consider that it can affect you for more than a couple of weeks.

_nalply 6y ago
Sorry for your experience. Because I am also the husband of a sick wife, I can relate to you. My own feelings swing between hope and despair and a dread of future is emerging. Realistically, what do you expect from medical professionals?
- StevenWaterman 6y ago
  I certainly don't expect a magic bullet that solves everything, but I would like it to be treated like any other chronic illness. A single point of contact to help track and manage her symptoms, a care plan to ease her back into life with the expectation that some symptoms will be here forever, and the hope that they won't.
H8crilA 6y ago
> The most infuriating part is how little help there is from medical professionals (...) the only medical advice doctors will give her is to rest I don't think it's bad will, they simply have no idea what to do. Just see what the research looks like: "they" are still busy categorising symptoms. Understanding of this disease is still in early stages. It will improve. Mind boggling how just a few months ago all my friends were throwing the 0.x% CFR numbers for our age group, implying that there is nothing to be afraid of. There's much so more complexity and many unknown unknowns in health!
- StevenWaterman 6y ago
  Yeah absolutely, they're doing their best with the information available to them. That's why I'm hopeful that all the recent news around persistent symptoms will improve awareness and make more resources available. It's a nightmare situation all-round and I have full sympathy for the situation doctors are in.
  - kijin 6y ago
    Another problem is that most of the world is still too busy trying (and failing) to control the spread of infection. They don't have much attention to spare for people who aren't deemed infectious anymore.
    - annamargot 6y ago
      On top of that, downplaying the severity of covid is critical to the arguments of those who want this to be over for political, economic, or any reasons. The focus by many has been deaths. Mortality rate can be spun to make covid seem not so bad. If we start talking about the percentage of people whose lives are significantly affected, we create a much bigger percentage. If you’re trying to paint the opposite picture, it’s not in your interest to acknowledge or increase awareness of that percentage.
      - ThomPete 6y ago
        well tell that to the cancer, diabetes and high blood pressure ,depression victims who don't get diagnosed in time or havent gotten the proper treatment. Tell that to the people who's lifework have been destroyed and I could go on with people being significantly affected. Its not that simple.
script3r 6y ago
You should research Chronic Fatigue Syndrome / Myalgic encephalomyelitis. The medical community, from my experience, does not handle this type of diagnosis well. I’ve experienced post-viral fatigue symptoms that lasted well over 8 months, and almost all doctors I visited (ranging from primary care to neurologists) suggested simply rest and/or believed it was depression related (even though I have never suffered from depression before). I hope your wife gets better. Remission from these symptoms is possible, but sadly, I don’t think you’ll get more information out of the doctors.
- hh3k0 6y ago
  > The medical community, from my experience, does not handle this type of diagnosis well. I've read some time ago that Stanford scientists developed a blood test. It'll be harder for docs to ignore once there's a proper diagnostic tool.
  - H_Pylori 6y ago
    >It'll be harder for docs to ignore once there's a proper diagnostic tool. Simon Wessely is already trying to cover is ass [0]. What a wonderful guy, he richly deserves his reputation. [0] https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-study-investigating-a-potential-biomarker-for-chronic-fatigue-syndrome-me/ https://www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-reaction-to-study-...
  - rtp 6y ago
    Yeah, in its initial study, the nanoneedle had a 100% specificity and selectivity, and according to Ron Davis - main author - the results have held up as they've increased the number of tested people. That said it might also give a positive result for other illnesses. Hopefully a follow-up will be published soon.
    - dm319 6y ago
      Be wary of anything that claims a 100% sensitivity and specificity. It usually indicates the wrong gold standard or poor methods.
jessriedel 6y ago
I don't think we have any non-trivial treatments that are safe and effective enough to use on non-hospitalized folks. Until a patient's condition gets bad enough to justify risky/unpleasant interventions, rest and hydration seem like the proper prescription.
scawf 6y ago
I have the exact same experience. It took about 100 days before my wife could start working again, and she is still experiencing chest pain, breathlessness and fatigue (at first symptoms + 115 days). She was told to endure and rest. What a great plan.
- watwut 6y ago
  There is no other known treatment. Or basically no known treatment.
- tenken 6y ago
  I'm not a doctor, but I would argue against rest. By that I mean, endure ... sure, but focus hopefully on calisthenics, breathing exercises, yoga, taking supplemental vitamins and improving physical fitness. Typically post surgery doctors recommend PT ... I'm just saying start some regular PT post illness -- not "rest".
garganzol 6y ago
Based on my humble experience, I would suggest her to take the walks in the open air. Start from small, then gradually increase. Once she reaches at least 3 km per day, the walking activities should fully rejuvenate her ability to breathe. This should totally work out. The moderate activities and safe relaxed walks do the miracles for the usual post-pneumonia as well. Note of caution: avoid walking in masks. A mask impairs the natural ventilation and you would not get the recovery effect. This means you should keep a healthy distance and avoid getting into crowded places.
- rbinv 6y ago
  > Once she reaches at least 3 km per day, the walking activities should fully rejuvenate her ability to breathe. And you base that on what? Seems completely arbitrary. You don't know any details of her issues.
  - garganzol 6y ago
    Experimentation. Medicine is my life-long interest. Yes, the exact details are missing. But I gave a solid general advice. Not sure everybody can grasp it being blinded by their own cultural expectations (which are not 100% true after all).
    - michaelcampbell 6y ago
      How many double blind experiments did you do with a control group with/without masks? O2 sat levels from any tests I've seen aren't affected by masks, so I'm more than a bit skeptical here.
      - garganzol 6y ago
        No tests, sorry. I would gladly make some statistically significant experiments, but I am not in professional medicine. I am more math/computer/physics guy by trade. From math/physics perspective: mask has a porous structure and stands in a way of the air. So it is clearly adds some resistance to overcome with an additional suction. Healthy people can provide that suction, so their O2 remains untouched. Not-so-healthy people may hit the physical limit of their suction and this is the situation when adding an additional barrier (the mask) will lead to O2 decrease.
loopz 6y ago
Just wait until the professionals start referring to psychological help. Chronic health problems from previous infections do not exist in modern medicine. Besides there's very little professional help to get. I believe we can reasonably expect this to develop into massive amounts of people unable to work due to ME/CFS. The effects may last for life. There are courses where they tell you to lie to yourself and say you're healthy ("lightning process"). The breaking of personal boundaries can unfortunately for sufferers lead to permanent health and capacity reduction, so take with big grains of salt wether it's worth the risk. What may work, if it's ME/CFS-like, is to find personal limitations and avoid too much toll, ie. less or no stressful exercise. Then find ways to live healthier and gently up those boundaries without exertion, avoiding possible permanent regressions for life. Of course also seek professional medical help, but always evaluate what kind of help one is getting where and what the consequences are. Life can and should be joyful and one should shed fear and anger, but be sceptical of claims (even this one), and do due R&D.
- PaulKeeble 6y ago
  Since they classed the first known outbreak of ME as mass hysteria its been constant gaslighting for sufferers for 70 odd years. Even now this article is written as if ME/CFS doesn't exist, as if doctors in the UK are completely baffled, but we know what this is and it will have the same hallmark Post Exertional Malaise but its not even mentioned in the article. The NHS doesn't recognise the international definition of the disease and continues to harm patients that show up with it every day. The Chinese after SARS didn't have issues calling it ME/CFS, around 10% of the SARs sufferers still suffer with ME/CFS to this day, they had papers calling it what it was very early on. The NHS however is going with "no clue". We do know a lot more than we knew 2 years ago. We know the condition swells the brain in the central and front regions and that explains the memory problems, headaches and coordination issues. We know that sufferers have virus RNA in their body and in their brains, so its possible its just an ongoing infection but it also appears to be partially replicated in cells. We know that patients cells produce down to about 25% of the energy that a normal persons cells do in their mitochondria and it is at least partially to do with the Calcium ion channel being turned off with a gene switch. A sufferers plasma will shut down someone else's cell too so its probably a signal of some description in the immune system soup. What we don't know is if any of this is the root cause of the condition and there is frighteningly small amounts of research being done for a disease that can be as debilitating as MS. We know a lot about how its not Psychological now and research is getting funded at last. But its been 70 years of "its all in your head", nothing about this condition paints doctors and researchers at all in a good light.
hellofunk 6y ago
You’ve pretty much exactly described someone I know who caught the virus at the end of March as well. Approximately 40 years old, and healthy, and currently is exhausted from climbing one flight of stairs. She finally started leaving the house just a couple weeks ago. It’s been a very very gradual improvement over time, so I suspect that eventually it will go away. She’s been getting some physical therapy to help get her body moving and gradually become more active.
amalcon 6y ago
So sorry to hear about your wife. This is an incredibly scary disease for a lot of reasons. Adding the frustration of a chronic condition to that is not what anyone needs. The basic problem is: What do you do about a chronic condition for which there is no proven treatment? I have a few people in my life with one such condition or another. There are three responses, mostly unhelpful. The most common response is to essentially suggest things at random. Both rest and (generic) exercise are common suggestions. This can make the patient happy, but it's often actively harmful -- obviously, both rest and exercise won't help the same thing, unless it's a specific exercise chosen with the condition in mind. The other common response is to not suggest anything, and basically try to get the patient to go away. If you're lucky, they'll try to sympathize, but mostly you'll just get brushed off. This makes the patient feel bad, but at least it won't actively make the condition worse. The response you'll get if you're really lucky, is that they'll refer you to participate in a study of some kind. This is lucky because it's very high variance: it could kill you, but it also could significantly improve things. Obviously that risk isn't for everyone, but it's lucky to even have the choice. Unfortunately, without a proven treatment, there isn't a lot else for doctors to do.
- Aeolun 6y ago
  > Unfortunately, without a proven treatment, there isn't a lot else for doctors to do. Figure out a treatment? Or at least establish what is actually wrong?
  - t_von_doom 6y ago
    I'm fairly certain that people are indeed working on a treatment, but until it's ready what do you propose?
  - yencabulator 6y ago
    > Figure out a treatment? That'd be the "refer you to participate in a study" part. Your average medical practitioner does not do research. > Or at least establish what is actually wrong? How? Based on what? That's the whole point for something like this; the medical consensus does not know how to diagnose it.
sjg007 6y ago
Post viral syndrome is a thing and may be a covid thing too.
DanBC 6y ago
> The most infuriating part is how little help there is from medical professionals. She's now 4 months in with what can only be seen as a chronic health problem, but the only medical advice doctors will give her is to rest. They're still trying to understand what's best. You could try looking into the type of rehab that some sepsis patients go through, because that's an emerging treatment in the UK. See for example this comment from a UK doctor: https://twitter.com/SepsisUK/status/1283316617615683584?s=20 https://twitter.com/SepsisUK/status/1283316617615683584?s=20
- DanBC 6y ago
  Here's more information for people looking for help with long term recovery from covid or sepsis, from the UK Sepsis Trust. https://www.youtube.com/user/TheUKSepsisTrust/videos https://www.youtube.com/user/TheUKSepsisTrust/videos
dennis_jeeves 6y ago
StevenWaterman , 2 questions: - I assume that you yourself never became sick during this period, despite being in close proximity to her? -Did you wife have other preexisting conditions?
- StevenWaterman 6y ago
  I was essentially asymptomatic. I had a tiny bit of vertigo and stomach problems for a couple of days, but I only noticed when looking back. She had incredibly mild asthma but didn't need an inhaler (and does now). Other than that, nothing.
wolco 6y ago
When the answer is not simple or require new thinking your local gp doctors are not the group to ask.
spanktheuser 6y ago
My sense is medicine has for some time neglected chronic symptoms from acute viral infection. During my lifetime, chronic fatigue syndrome went from a psychological malady confined to malingerers and depressed women to a physical malady associated with infection... but maybe also malingerers / depressed women. Which was where things stood when I contracted mononucleosis in my 40s. Weeks / months long fatigue and multi-organ involvement is characteristic of mono. In my case as the other symptoms slowly abated the fatigue remained, lingering over six months with some intervening flare-ups of fever etc. I learned that that this progression is considerably more common in older patients. Beyond that, little was known and my doctors reacted with a shrug and symptom management. There was no know cause to these symptoms. And seemingly to me considerably less medical interest. Perhaps Covid will yield a greater focus and fundamental understanding of chronic conditions resulting from viruses. However, given the contrast between the prevalence of CFS and attention paid... and the medical reaction to Lyme Disease I’m not entirely optimistic.
- perl4ever 6y ago
  I didn't know what to think of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, but in the one specific instance of diagnosis I know of first hand, it preceded a diagnosis of terminal pancreatic cancer a bit later. Made me wonder if there could be a viral factor or something that leads to immune system problems that gradually develop over years.

zby 6y ago

OK - but what are the stats here? Worldometer shows that there are more than 8 million Covid survivors, how many of them have the prolonged symptoms? 8 million is really many people - so I would not be surprised if there are a few strange stories (https://www.gwern.net/Littlewood https://www.gwern.net/Littlewood as always).

Al-Khwarizmi 6y ago
The post has a figure with rather scary stats. Although I suppose it comes from a followup of severe cases, not from a random sample of cases? Otherwise it's really, really scary.
- zby 6y ago
  Ah - yeah - I though the graph was about patients who report persistent symptoms not the whole population. If indeed 60% of all Covid patients have fatigue and 40% breathlessness after more than 60 days - than it is scary indeed. But we don't know how the 143 patients where found - are they random people with Covid or are they only hospitalized Covid patients? With 8 millions we should really have better stats.
  - r721 6y ago
    Quote from another story (by Der Spiegel): >Long-term* symptoms reported by COVID-19 patients >47% general fatigue >24% prolonged respiratory problems >*longer than 30 days; analysis of a study of COVID-19 symptoms from King's College London; >8,065 people who tested positive, of whom 857 had long-term symptoms https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/covid-19-many-people-stay-sick-after-recovering-from-coronavirus-a-d814c20b-fb3d-47b1-bd2b-d6fd65e0ef33 https://www.spiegel.de/international/world/covid-19-many-peo...
    - zby 6y ago
      OK - that would be compatible with the theory that the original article were about those who had long-term symptoms. Journalism is a mess. But the 10% is still scary.

pgt 6y ago

(IANAD) I wonder if any of the neurological symptoms like depression and memory-loss are caused by chronic inflammation following infection. Virus reservoirs are mentioned in the article. Could it be that there are bits of broken up, deactivated virus floating around triggering auto-immune conditions?

philjohn 6y ago
They mention that in the article. The other interesting point is - chest x-ray and sound are both normal, but someone is still getting breathless which could point to it being more about vascular involvement in many cases - perhaps the blood vessels that are responsible for uptake of oxygen from the lungs are inflamed and not working as effectively.
sradman 6y ago
> I wonder if any of the neurological symptoms like depression and memory-loss are caused by chronic inflammation following infection. Changes in sleep and stress patterns seem like a simpler explanation. The sensation of not being able to breathe can not be positive for either. All of these things, including inflammation, are measurable though a good baseline for what is normal for any given individual is probably rare.

echelon 6y ago

There are numerous studies coming out that report immunity against coronavirus does not last long: https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/06/chinese-study-antibodies-covid-19-patients-fade-quickly https://www.cidrap.umn.edu/news-perspective/2020/06/chinese-... https://theconversation.com/immunity-to-covid-19-may-not-last-this-threatens-a-vaccine-and-herd-immunity-142556 https://theconversation.com/immunity-to-covid-19-may-not-las... > Finally, the researchers measured how long the antibody response lasted. This is the most important data. Unfortunately, antibodies levels began falling after day 20 and only 17% of patients retained a potent level at day 57. Some patients completely lost their antibodies after two months. It's terrifying to think that our adaptive immune system might not be good at learning Covid-19. I don't know that this is the case, but our immune system evolved to fight the things we deal with regularly over many centuries. Just like HIV, this thing is relatively new on the evolutionary scale. Perhaps those that remain sick aren't clearing the virus completely? It may be this in some combination with vascular/organ damage and immune system depletion.

matwood 6y ago
Antibodies may not stay around, but it's hard to know for sure about immunity without also looking at t-cell response. At least that's my non-biologist reading of the many articles on this topic.

kesor 6y ago

The more important question is why people are being sick for so many years with "modern medicine" doing absolutely nothing to get them out of their sickness state. Diabetes type II, heart problems, autoimmune problems, all these chronic diseases plaguing most of the human population on planet earth for the last several hundred years (when "modern" medicine existed) and none of them going away. Covid mostly takes the people who are already sick, and kills them. Would be nice to figure out how to not have so many people sick in the first place.

lm28469 6y ago
> them out of their sickness state. Diabetes type II, heart problems, autoimmune problems, all these chronic diseases plaguing most of the human population You mean all these diseases that are almost exclusively due to lifestyle, ie. lack of physical activity, poor diet choices, &c. ? People knew 2000 years ago that gluttony and sloth weren't good things, it's not "modern medicine"'s role to cure our lack of will.
- DangitBobby 6y ago
  I'm interested to know where you got the idea that autoimmune disorders are due to lifestyle?
  - MrRiddle 6y ago
    Please read the site guidelines and refrain from ill intentioned comments.
    - jlokier 6y ago
      In my opinion DangitBobby's comment is reasonable and interesting, not ill-intentioned. lm28469 quoted a list which includes "autoimmune problems" and linked all of them to gluttony, sloth and lack of will. That strikes me as nonsense. To the best of my knowledge, people suffering with autoimmune problems can't just fix it with a bit of will, and life's hard enough without people making it worse by telling them their disease is their own fault. But regardless of what I think it is perfectly reasonable to question that link.

LatteLazy 6y ago

This should be a huge wake up call for people to look after their health. We are going to see this sort of pandemic more and more regularly, so it's time to make those lifestyle changes you've been putting off! Lose that weight, cut back on the sugar, get some exercise and sleep more.

danparsonson 6y ago
The article features a picture of one of the patients squating with 105kg before she got sick - she was extremely fit and healthy and now she gets breathless walking up stairs.
maxerickson 6y ago
It's quite likely another pandemic will be quite a lot worse. I see people taking the wrong lesson from this pandemic, that trying to control it was an over-reaction. So if we face a disease that kills a larger percentage of people, that lesson will not serve us well (it's not doing us any good this time around!).
paulcole 6y ago
> We are going to see this sort of pandemic more and more regularly What is this based on?
- loopz 6y ago
  Eradication of wildlife.
  - indymike 6y ago
    Please explain?
    - loopz 6y ago
      Deserves much more than that: https://duckduckgo.com/?q=virus+pandemic+wildlife+destruction https://duckduckgo.com/?q=virus+pandemic+wildlife+destructio...

throwaway84774 6y ago

Something that has been striking about COVID-19 is that it seems to have been consistently underestimated by experts, especially in western nations. With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response), Asian countries that were hit hard by SARS or MERS responded swiftly and decisively: Taiwan, Hong Kong, South Korea and China crushed the virus. Other countries seemed to dither, and react slowly. Australia, which was the exception, seems poised to squander its gains. Is it because of limited mortality in the young (which doesn't seem to translate to limited morbidity)? Is it the fact that "coronavirus" meant "common cold" to medical experts? Arrogance? Complacency? To a non-expert, a rapidly spreading novel virus with unknown long-term effects would be something to be eradicated, but the emphasis from western governments in particular seems to be reactive and ambivalent and hinging on the hope of a vaccine.

kinghtown 6y ago
I live in Taiwan. Simple answer is that it’s a cultural difference which has a positive impact on health. Wearing a mask was normal behaviour before covid so it’s a non issue to wear one during the peak. There is no one screaming about their independence being taken away by being “forced” to wear a mask. All the homeschooler supermom Karens and anti vax types protesting about their right to choose a mask or whatever looks really really bad over here and Taiwanese people generally think westerners are retarded in regards to covid. Also, asians are healthier, slimmer with Well rounded diets (on average.) Tons of smokers here though. A lot of Taiwanese people are happy homebodies too.
- gremlinsinc 6y ago
  Many westerners think anti-mask westerners are retarded as well, lol. I can't even imagine how insane we must look to other cultures right now.
MHordecki 6y ago
> With the exception of Singapore (which put an Australian in charge of its response) Both Lawrence Wong and Gan Kim Yong are Singaporeans. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Singapore https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_pandemic_in_Singapore

jkhaui 6y ago

To everyone who throws around the argument that "only x% of people infected with COVID die", please consider that many survivors are still experiencing major relapses 4 months later [0]. If you're guided only by selfish motives (as I suspect most of us are), at least consider the following: - You'll likely experience internal organ pain so excruciating it feels like you're dying. - There's rapidly growing evidence that significant damage occurs not just to the lungs but also the penis(!!!), heart, and brain. This occurs EVEN in asymptomatic cases. - Organ damage may be permanent. - There's a good chance you'll be so sick you can't work for a good chunk of the year. And based on the literature + anecdotal experiences I've read, this stuff is happening to some of the fittest people in society (regular gym goers, triathlon participants, people in their teens/20s/30s, etc). [0] https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19positive/ https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19positive/

nicc 6y ago
Nice try.
amelius 6y ago
You can't post medical fear inducing comments without good references. Reddit doesn't qualify (it doesn't even open in a browser).
shadowprofile77 6y ago
Do a google search of personal narratives for nearly any usually fairly mild illness, condition or odd medical problem you care to mention, or even a google search for what it was like to take X medicine (said medicine being something very, very commonly prescribed to millions of people per year without statistical evidence of frequent severe problems and side effects) You know what you'll very likely find? A ton of horrifying personal accounts with all sorts of worst case scenarios and unexpected terrible things that many people will be posting about having happened to them. This is one of the big reasons behind the now old joke that if you google search "persistent cough" you'll end up diagnosing yourself somewhere between super cancer and mega HIV... The point i'm making here is that these sorts of self reporting-based accounts massively bias towards awful outcomes, despite being statistically minor in broad terms of probable outcomes. Poeple who got sick and felt fine after recovering have a lot less incentive to bother posting about it. I suspect you're seeing a lot of this with what you describe and especially if your linked source is a damn reddit thread where exactly the sorts of people who had unusually bad things happen to them after recovering are likely to go. This will likely apply even more so given the immense media attention and public fear around COVID. I can only imagine how many recovered people are either experiencing psychosomatic long run symptoms or attributing any new bad thing they feel from of some unrelated cause to the virus post-recovery despite no connection between the two. (you mentioned penis pain, well, a person can still get herpes or chlamydia some time after having recovered from COVID, for example) Sars Cov 2 is a coronavirus, one among several of a similar type. We're still learning much about it and doubtless there are going to be many complicated patient outcomes from some among the many millions who recover from it, but it's not some insane new super disease from the bowels of hell. Let's calm the alarmist hysteria before jumping to unsubstantiated claims about widespread terrible shit. You mention literature backing up your claims. Well, link to it, and let's see if it's statistically significant or based on a small number of reported cases out of (so far) millions of recoveries. Finally, a bit of anecdote of my own: I personally know 6 people who have gotten the virus and recovered. All of them now feel more or less okay several weeks after recovery. Two of these people are 91 years old by the way, making them an exceptional case but worth mentioning.

disabled 6y ago

This is a worthwhile read too, about how COVID-19 is believed to cause a new type of inflammatory syndrome, in just about everybody: Coronavirus warning from Italy: Effects of COVID-19 could be worse than first thought: https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-warning-from-italy-effects-of-covid-19-could-be-worse-than-first-thought-12027348 https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-warning-from-italy-ef... Also: Older Children Spread the Coronavirus Just as Much as Adults, Large Study Finds: http://archive.is/D5wQn http://archive.is/D5wQn (The study of nearly 65,000 people in South Korea suggests that school reopenings will trigger more outbreaks.) I understand why people want schools to reopen. I also understand that it is a place where social services are executed. But, this is extremely problemsome.

dustinmoris 6y ago

Just to counter some of the negative news, my wife had COVID, she picked it up at work from her colleagues where the majority of them had COVID, even the reception staff at their medical practice where she works all got COVID and when she was at home coughing I also got COVID. We all had mild symptoms, mostly a cough, fever and loss of smell and taste. We all recovered from it like from a cold or flu. At no point did anything bad happen. No organ damages. No lasting health issues. This was in April, so many weeks ago and we’ve all been super healthy and fit since then. At her work nobody even talks about it because it’s such a non thing in their eyes. I perform physically just as good as I did before I got ill. So there’s that, good first hand experiences which you’ll never hear because it doesn’t fit the current media narrative. Luckily smart people will look at science and hard statistical facts rather than individual selected stories. Anxious people will always be anxious. You can choose to call me a liar or whatever, but Prince Charles had COVID and recovered from it like from a normal cold, so did the British prime minister, lots of staff and MPs around him, so did Tom Hanks, Idris Elba, and literary hundreds of other super famous celebrities from old to young. You going to call them all liars too? It’s important to stay mentally healthy and I think people need to stop reading this fear provoking nonsense which really doesn’t change anything except making people mentally ill. The virus won’t become more or less dangerous by reading sensationalised news stories which aim at playing into people’s worst fears. I find it abhorrent.

smcl 6y ago
I’m not sure what your point is here. Everyone knows by now that it’s possible to get COVID, experience mild symptoms and recover. However some people also die or recover and experience severe respiratory issues, and this is an interesting thing to study and report on. The article isn’t sensationalist or alarmist. It’s not calling anyone a liar - to be honest I’ve no idea what your “you going to call them all liars too?” comment is directed at.
- dustinmoris 6y ago
  > However some people also die or recover and experience severe respiratory issues, and this is an interesting thing to study and report on I fully agree on that. I'm not disappointed about the studying, but the media coverage and amplification of people's irrational fears. There is many viruses out there which kill humans and cause all sorts of post viral effects which can last for months and we should all study them, get better at treating them, and finding new ways of curing them and that is fine, but it doesn't help to make lots of people mentally ill by singling out a disease and making people prisoners of their own fears. For example, in Brazil people should be more worried about getting Dengue fever, which you cannot easily prevent by washing your hands and keeping social distance, yet you don't hear about Dengue at all, because it's been normalised and there's no news story today. So the media just jump on something novel where there is still potential for playing into people's fears and they capitalise on this. I'm sick and tired of watching many people around me getting depressed and falling into lows because of fears of just going even for a walk in the park. Social media and the internet have always amplified the worst of humans. It's a joke that we've known for years that if you google for a pain in your toe you'll get diagnosed with a terminal brain cancer on the internet. It shouldn't really be a surprise that we see the same thing happening for COVID-19.

sradman 6y ago

> We don't yet understand why these patients are having such long-term problems. ACE2 receptors are found in the Type II pneumocytes [1] of the lung alveoli. These cells produce the pulmonary surfactant that changes the surface tension which, among other things, controls how hard it is to breath in/out. I'd be surprised if these damaged/destroyed cells were fully regenerated. The question I have, is whether the breathlessness is due to the sensation of extra muscular effort required to breathe or a measurable lower SpO2? Long term, I wonder if COVID-19 related pneumonia will increase the incidence of lung cancer as these individuals age. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulmonary_alveolus#Type_II_cells https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulmonary_alveolus#Type_II_cel...

qrbLPHiKpiux 6y ago
The Pentagon sent a memo to all military physicians. COVID survivors permanently disqualified from ever joining the military. What do they know that we don't? https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/06/coronavirus-survivors-banned-from-joining-the-military/ https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/06/... There's been an edit since I last seen it, here's the updated guidance: https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/21/the-ban-on-covid-19-survivors-joining-up-has-lifted-but-some-cases-could-still-be-denied/ https://www.militarytimes.com/news/your-military/2020/05/21/...
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > What do they know that we don't? They know exactly what we know: there are a variety of apparent delayed effects, some quite serious, and isn’t clear what the whole set is and how long they take to manifest. This is a policy based in precautionary cognizance of ignorance, not some special detailed occult knowledge. Once we have a better idea, the policy will be reviewed and probably eliminated or narrowed to focus on specific issues of concern.
  - gremlinsinc 6y ago
    It'll be interesting to see if the NBA starts back up, if some of the players who had COVID have issues just making laps up/down the courts. I wonder if the 'weaker' or 'long-term effected' players might take sabbaticals or sit-out a season or two or retire altogether.

chiefalchemist 6y ago

Keep in mind, the majority of acute cases happen to people with pre-existing conditions. Deaths have the same profile. Of course there are exceptions. "Perfectly healthy" people can be hit hard. The articles, and many similar, consistently fail to mention the pre-existing conditions of the people in the study. Editorial: A couple weeks ago I saw a news story about a man who "survived Covid-19" after 60 days in hospital and 40+ days on a ventilator. They showed him leaving hospital in a wheelchair. He was easily 275 lbs, perhaps 300 lbs. You don't put on weight being fed via drip or tube. There's a reason it's called "morbidly obese." I'm glad he survived. No one deserves to die. I'm not convinced the virus was his only significant medical issue. It's time we start being honest about the dangers in the foods we eat and the lifestyles we lead.

satysin 6y ago

I had COVID end of February/early March. Thankfully I didn't need hospital treatment, in fact at the time I didn't even know it was COVID. It was only recently I got it confirmed. However several months on I still notice the effects from it. Mostly regular fatigue and almost daily shortness of breath. Last night I was laying in bed going to sleep and got quite panicked as it feels like I am not getting enough air in each breath. I have moment like this almost daily and it is extremely unsettling and worrying. I am in my mid-thirties and generally quite healthy. A bit overweight but before COVID I didn't get out of breath going up the stairs. I didn't find myself needing to lie down on the sofa from exhaustion. I am still able to run but no where near as long as I could just a few months ago. Putting it bluntly it is fucking scary. I am very fortunate that two good friends of mine are doctors (a cardiologist and her husband a microbiologist) and they have been kind enough to check on me weekly with some basic lung function tests and blood work but they are seeing these kinds of issues with many recovered COVID patients.

garganzol 6y ago
Does your daily routine include a bit of exercising or/and walking? What's your daily walking distances? I am asking because some post-pneumonia (non-COVID) patients tend to have temporary shortage of breath/fatigue syndromes. And a good way to get rid of them is to get some elementary body movements like relaxed walking among tree alleys. Nothing crazy, just comfortable stress-less motion. It helps to clear up the lungs and balance the immune response. I wonder if this information can be of any help in your situation.
- satysin 6y ago
  I have a 7yo son so we go out pretty much every day to the park. I haven't tracked anything but ballparking it from the distance and how long we are out I probably walk around 2-3 miles a day. Some of that will be a light jog while kicking a ball around or catching frisbee. I have had a few gentle runs as well for 5-7 miles but as previously mentioned they are exhausting me right now and exacerbating my anxiety about the impact COVID has had to my body so I have cut them out for the most part and sticking to gentler exercise with my son. I am hoping all of this is made worse by the added stress of life right now. I am on holiday for the next few weeks so looking forward to a change of scenery and less day to day responsibilities.

hatenberg 6y ago

I had fatigue for about 3 month after a bout with mono (mid 30s). Lost 15 kg, had to restart running from scratch after running 10k @2 times a week for years. It was scary, the doctors said there is no treatment just optimising healthy living and hoping it goes away. Ever since this started I could not understand the people here on HN arguing there is no proof that there could be long term effects. Now we have proof of the opposite and they are out in force marginalising (its just a few people) to keep their own fears contained.

hprotagonist 6y ago

More and more, SARS-CoV-2 is sounding like polio more than any other disease in our recent history.

gerbler 6y ago

My wife likely had covid in March (she was unable to get tested at the time due to no fever) and experiences similar symptoms described in the article (breathlessness and fatigue). Interestingly, she had a physical in February and all blood work was normal. She went for another check-up in June due to her breathlessness and found that she had hyperthyroidism. Our hypothesis is that her thyroid problem could have been caused by covid. Mentioning in case anyone else has observed this pattern.

Seb-C 6y ago

I got sick in march with covid-like symptoms but could not get tested. I have also experienced being out of breath when climbing stairs or walking. I also started to worry and attribute other symptoms like headache to this, but then realized that : - I spent 3 months at home without going out much - I'm wearing a mask everytime I go out and I noticed that masks make breating harder - I did not move much for 3 months and worked at home. This is significantly less than my usual 30 minutes of walk + 1h of transports + climbing stairs 4 times a day - Only seeing the world through the news has a big negative psychological effect on me Now it is just my humble experience. I am certainly not saying that people does not have symptoms and I only am one dot of incomplete data. I just want to say that if you got sick and then experienced long terms effects, please don't forget about the radical life-style changes that you are experiencing before attributing everything to the virus. Understanding this helped me to rebalance my daily routine and get and feel better.

garganzol 6y ago
Downvotes to your post are unwarranted. Western medical school tends to think that pulmonary fibrosis is incurable, despite the fact you have just provided a practical recipe for post-pneumonia rehabilitation. Probably what happens is a casual reader just sees a statement that says that "masks make breating harder" and gives you a downvote without further thought. This is what I call a comfortable ignorance. Kudos for finding the practical way out of this situation.

rjsw 6y ago

I have been ill since early March, never bad enough to need to go to hospital. Have had mono a couple of times and do tend to get post-viral fatigue, this is different as I still have symptoms of covid19 as well. Sore throat and conjunctivitis are the main things that affect me, did notice that my sense of smell improved a couple of weeks ago. Was pretty fit before this and still did competitive sport in my 50s.

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