3 ms·

Although you are of course correct that it is defined as post-covid exposure, I guess their more general point is that we don't talk about things like 'Long Flu

by Closi 5y ago

Although you are of course correct that it is defined as post-covid exposure, I guess their more general point is that we don't talk about things like 'Long Flu', 'Long Cancer' or 'Long Diarrhoea' as a particular 'illness'. Instead we generally talk about specific symptoms after recovery from these things (e.g. We would say there are long-term effects of cancer and that specific person has Post Cancer Fatigue, rather than just saying someone has 'long cancer'), or specific effects that the illness has (e.g. impact of severe childhood diohreah on growth) which seems more useful than bundling it all together into one 'thing' which covers completely different impacts (e.g. long term taste loss, tinnitus and fatigue). Just calling it long covid seems to make it seem like something special/different, while in reality plenty of illnesses have long term health impacts and ongoing symptoms. It doesn't mean that there isn't cause for concern - but I don't necessarily see why we should make the language of Covid different to other illnesses (other than for PR purposes).

shapefrog 5y ago
So your problem is branding related. You dont like the logo or theme music? We dont call it 'Long Cancer' meme is a really fascinating one. You are right, we don't call it exactly that. The long term effects of cancer, which really would span such an enormous range of things collectively are known, to use the technical term, as 'The long term effects of cancer'. When you get diagnosed with cancer, you 'have Cancer'. When you are 100% free from cancer you are still a cancer patient but its said to be 'in remission', and would likely not be considered 'Cured' of your cancer for many years. But why do we use that language, when I have the sniffles and they go away I am 'cured'. It is almost like the english language has room for more than one adjective, What other language is in use - conditions can be called 'Chronic illnesses'. It turns out sometimes it is useful to bundle things together into 'Syndromes', a bit like that Gulf War Syndrome. Now personally I believe that how 'scary' or 'special' a sequence of words are, which is your main argument against the word 'Long', is subjective. Personally 'long' doesnt instill me with fear in particular, but lets try on some alternative brandings that are more in line with other illnesses are you helpfully suggest size shall we. Chronic Covid, In remission Covid, Covid Syndrome, Post Covid Lung Failure. Covid Syndrome seems the obvious choice really. It is the most consistent with medical language used to date, as such could not possibly be described as being thrown around for PR purpopses or just out right fear mongering.
- tinus_hn 5y ago
  > Covid Syndrome seems the obvious choice really. Covid Syndrome on one hand would be great because a syndrome specifically means a set of symptoms appearing. So that would by definition at least require an agreed upon list of conditions that comprise it. On the other hand it would not be great because it doesn’t specify the cause so Covid would be a specific virus, but Covid Syndrome would just be a bunch of conditions that are not necessarily related to that virus. People get shortness of breath all the time.
- Closi 5y ago
  > So your problem is branding related. You dont like the logo or theme music? That's one of my issues, I think the words we use are important. > When you are 100% free from cancer you are still a cancer patient but its said to be 'in remission'. Actually, the term "in remission" is used because the signs and symptoms might have disappeared, but cancer may still be in the body. It means cancer has not been found, and that there is no evidence of disease, however due to the nature of the disease you can't be sure that the cancer has been 'cured' (i.e. gone) because it still might be in the body even though there is no sign of disease. When you are 100% free of cancer you are said to be cured, however as this can not be known, some doctors say you are "cured" after 5 years of complete remission, because that gives a sufficient degree of certainty that the cancer is gone. > It is the most consistent with medical language used to date, as such could not possibly be described as being thrown around for PR purpopses or just out right fear mongering. It might be an improvement, although personally I think the main issue is bundling it all together is misleading, as you bundle the extreme cases with the less-severe ones. If 1% of people have 'long covid' there is a big difference between 0.9% of people having a slightly reduced sense of taste after 12 weeks which recovers after 6 months and 0.1% of people having chronic fatigue forever, and visa-versa. The bundling together as a singular 'Long Covid' I personally think is an intentional language tactic increase compliance to rules IMO.
smorgusofborg 5y ago
We talk about cancer not as cured but as in remission when we can't detect it and we view it as a big deal. We probably do talk about long flu because any attempt to separate fibromyalgia causes in frequently occuring life events is a debate and we certainly argue about long Lyme aka chronic Lyme. The reason this is a big deal is because we know roughly what percentage of people at any given time have all of those other long problems while the future of pandemic recovery is unknown.

by Closi 5y ago

shapefrog 5y ago

So your problem is branding related. You dont like the logo or theme music? We dont call it 'Long Cancer' meme is a really fascinating one. You are right, we don't call it exactly that. The long term effects of cancer, which really would span such an enormous range of things collectively are known, to use the technical term, as 'The long term effects of cancer'. When you get diagnosed with cancer, you 'have Cancer'. When you are 100% free from cancer you are still a cancer patient but its said to be 'in remission', and would likely not be considered 'Cured' of your cancer for many years. But why do we use that language, when I have the sniffles and they go away I am 'cured'. It is almost like the english language has room for more than one adjective, What other language is in use - conditions can be called 'Chronic illnesses'. It turns out sometimes it is useful to bundle things together into 'Syndromes', a bit like that Gulf War Syndrome. Now personally I believe that how 'scary' or 'special' a sequence of words are, which is your main argument against the word 'Long', is subjective. Personally 'long' doesnt instill me with fear in particular, but lets try on some alternative brandings that are more in line with other illnesses are you helpfully suggest size shall we. Chronic Covid, In remission Covid, Covid Syndrome, Post Covid Lung Failure. Covid Syndrome seems the obvious choice really. It is the most consistent with medical language used to date, as such could not possibly be described as being thrown around for PR purpopses or just out right fear mongering.

tinus_hn 5y ago
> Covid Syndrome seems the obvious choice really. Covid Syndrome on one hand would be great because a syndrome specifically means a set of symptoms appearing. So that would by definition at least require an agreed upon list of conditions that comprise it. On the other hand it would not be great because it doesn’t specify the cause so Covid would be a specific virus, but Covid Syndrome would just be a bunch of conditions that are not necessarily related to that virus. People get shortness of breath all the time.
Closi 5y ago
> So your problem is branding related. You dont like the logo or theme music? That's one of my issues, I think the words we use are important. > When you are 100% free from cancer you are still a cancer patient but its said to be 'in remission'. Actually, the term "in remission" is used because the signs and symptoms might have disappeared, but cancer may still be in the body. It means cancer has not been found, and that there is no evidence of disease, however due to the nature of the disease you can't be sure that the cancer has been 'cured' (i.e. gone) because it still might be in the body even though there is no sign of disease. When you are 100% free of cancer you are said to be cured, however as this can not be known, some doctors say you are "cured" after 5 years of complete remission, because that gives a sufficient degree of certainty that the cancer is gone. > It is the most consistent with medical language used to date, as such could not possibly be described as being thrown around for PR purpopses or just out right fear mongering. It might be an improvement, although personally I think the main issue is bundling it all together is misleading, as you bundle the extreme cases with the less-severe ones. If 1% of people have 'long covid' there is a big difference between 0.9% of people having a slightly reduced sense of taste after 12 weeks which recovers after 6 months and 0.1% of people having chronic fatigue forever, and visa-versa. The bundling together as a singular 'Long Covid' I personally think is an intentional language tactic increase compliance to rules IMO.

smorgusofborg 5y ago

We talk about cancer not as cured but as in remission when we can't detect it and we view it as a big deal. We probably do talk about long flu because any attempt to separate fibromyalgia causes in frequently occuring life events is a debate and we certainly argue about long Lyme aka chronic Lyme. The reason this is a big deal is because we know roughly what percentage of people at any given time have all of those other long problems while the future of pandemic recovery is unknown.