23 ms·

COVID and the autoimmune response to it damages the endothelial layer of your cardiovascular systems. https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/ATVBAHA.121.316101

by dzink 5y ago

COVID and the autoimmune response to it damages the endothelial layer of your cardiovascular systems. https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/ATVBAHA.121.316101 https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/ATVBAHA.121.316101 and https://www.nature.com/articles/s41392-021-00819-6 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41392-021-00819-6 The big question is how quickly and completely can that layer restore itself? If damage accumulates over time and people are catching new variants every 3-4 months it is only a matter of time before mortality from cardiovascular issues in COVID negative formerly infected people goes much higher and much younger. We need studies on the cardiovascular recovery pace after COVID damage in different age groups, and after repeat COVID diagnosis from different variants.

kodah 5y ago
I had Delta once. Prior to it I would ride 30 miles on my bike like it was a breezy day. When I'd take breaks to vacation or whatever I could pick back up easily. A year after COVID, I'm struggling to hit 20 miles and I lose my progress easily. I'm not sure it's COVID related, but nothing else has changed in my life.
- forgingahead 5y ago
  Did you take the vaccine?
- laurent92 5y ago
  Lockdowns have also broken everyone’s regular exercise and healthy habits. On charts we all assign this to Covid, but lockdowns were an artificial, additional decision.
  - parineum 5y ago
    Presumably they are using non-infected people as a control.
    - jhugo 5y ago
      Unfortunately they didn't perform any tests to verify that the control group had not had COVID (it's in the article).
  - dijit 5y ago
    I think on a macro scale you're right, attitudes and disciplines are also somewhat to blame. Sweden, though, did not lock down, and I hear (and experience) the same issue as the parent. The first day back after COVID and I reached my max heart rate in 60s of moderate jogging.
    - kkjjkgjjgg 5y ago
      Not sure it is accurate to say Sweden did not lock down. Afaik they had some measures in place, and were counting on people to behave sensibly in other aspects. So even though there were perhaps less lockdown rules, most people might still have adjusted their behavior.
      - dijit 5y ago
        As mentioned I think this really only applies on a macro scale. Individual anecdotes (such as my personal friends who did not change behaviour), while unscientific, paint a similar picture to what is being presented as evidence, so it's an additional data point to consider. So, at least there is some correlation with the sentiment, and by people whom I know have not adjusted their behaviour. (including myself) Sweden's restrictions were excessively light, by the way, 8pm closing of restaurants and gyms is not exactly a big deal to people going to the gym after work.
    - bjoli 5y ago
      Both my gym and pool were closed for almost half a year in Sweden.
      - dijit 5y ago
        What, really? SATS closed for like 2 months at the start of the pandemic and has been open since then. My girlfriend is the manager of one of the Malmo branches.
      - passerby1 5y ago
        In Göteborg SATS nor Friskis&Svettis were never closed during the pandemic. I also knew that Fitness24 was open all the way too. Which gym are you talking about?
  - EdwardDiego 5y ago
    Citation needed. Anecdotally a lot of people in my country took up exercise for something to do in lockdown. No citations on that though.
  - ralferoo 5y ago
    I experienced the opposite effect described here, and I ascribe the positive effects to lockdown. Before COVID, I ran about 5km once a month, and I was pretty slow. I got COVID early on in February 2020, and while it initially seemed mild, the tail end was severe. Pain that made me worry I might have been having a mini-stroke, and after that lung issues making it painful to take a shallow breath. After a week or so, it was just painful to breathe deeply but otherwise OK. I started doing low heart-rate running, trying to keep my HR below 132. Initially, this was really hard, and even jogging slightly too fast could cause my HR to spike to 180 and stay there for 5 minutes. But over the next couple of weeks as my lungs improved again, it got better and better. Within a few months, I was doing at least 5km every time I went for a run, and running 3 or 4 times a week. I've got faster and faster as a result, and I've knocked a third off my 5km PB time from pre-COVID. My health hasn't been better for many years, and that's only because the lockdown conditions meant that I was working from home so could take a long break at lunchtime, we were allowed out for exercise, but otherwise the streets were deserted. I think lockdown was the best thing that's ever happened to me in terms of exercise opportunities.
    - RickJWagner 5y ago
      "knocked a third off my 5km PB..." Wow. Congratulations, that's got to feel good.
  - Reason077 5y ago
    > "Lockdowns have also broken everyone’s regular exercise and healthy habits." If anything, I think I actually got a bit healthier because of lockdown. Eating healthier due to fewer restaurant meals, drinking less due to not being able to go to pubs and parties etc. Probably got more exercise too because for a while it was one of the few valid excuses to get out of the house!
  - jonathanstrange 5y ago
    Lockdown was also in place for the control group so its effects should be accounted for. You could try to show a negative health effect of people in quarantine, but this is not possible if all infected are placed in quarantine.
  - wwweston 5y ago
    There certainly was some disruption in gyms as workout places, but I'd be cautious about systematic conclusions like "broken everyone's regular exercise and healthy habits" given observable factors like: * increased personal time for workouts for anyone working remotely (or forgoing employment entirely) * dramatically increased demand & prices for home exercise equipment * shifts to cooking at home March / April 2020 seemed to be marked by a lot of people going outside and running. Personally, I shed over 35 lbs of bodyfat in 2020 and have had few comparable periods where I hiked as often or ate as cleanly, and I'm far from alone in my circle of acquaintances.
    - napier 5y ago
      Absolutely. Sales of bike exercise equipment (plus Peloton’s share price), and outdoor sports gear went parabolic in 2020 and remain at record highs. The idea that “lockdowns” inhibited exercise while in many countries exercising outdoors is laughable.
      - chiefalchemist 5y ago
        Not nitpicking, because I hope you're correct. That said, sales doesn't equal actual sustained usage. Anecdotal: I run almost every day. Don't get excited, only 2 to 4 miles :) Early in the pandemic I saw plenty of new faces - often couples - out exercising. Some running, mostly walking. I don't see many of those faces any more.
        wwweston 5y ago
        > That said, sales doesn't equal actual sustained usage. Neither do open gyms. :) Though post-holiday covid peaks may have slightly altered the long-running wry observations about January in the gym.
        chiefalchemist 5y ago
        In fact, I'd guess most gyms are profitable because of those who pay who but rarely show up.
  - null_object 5y ago
    > Lockdowns have also broken everyone’s regular exercise and healthy habits. Why do you make assumptions about "everyone"? I'm sure there are as many diverse experiences during 'lockdowns' as there are people who experienced them. Obviously if you include the rare cases where people were actually kept indoors (how long did those actually last?), then healthy exercise might have been more difficult. In my case, my health has improved immeasurably, as I no longer need to sit in an office all day, eat an unhealthy lunch and eat office-supplied snacks the way I did before. I eat more healthily, get more fresh air, walk and cycle at lunchtimes - and even get more work done in fewer hours.
  - michaelmrose 5y ago
    The US lock down was a joke. Most places barely shut down gyms and that still leaves exercising at home and outdoor recreation as an option. We know that these people contracted a disease that damages the cardiovascular system. It stretches credibility past the breaking point to surmise that lock downs resulted in a meaningful portion of this mortality or morbidity.
  - yay_throw 5y ago
    All of the replies to this completely ignore those of us who have families, and especially young families. Good for you if the sudden removal of responsibilities gave you the freedom to get outside for long periods every day. However, frankly people like this were the main reason I had to quit Strava. While my wife and I struggled to hold our lives and jobs together when it became illegal to have anyone else look after our kids, I had to watch everyone else enjoy day-long rides and runs in the hills. And before you come out with the usual "you just need to use more imagination and take your kids with you" - for a start, the situation I described above drained more energy and life than I care to remember. Also, there's only so much a 1 year old will put up with, when I am used to rides of up to 100 miles. Personally, I am deeply embittered by the whole experience.
    - nradov 5y ago
      Hopefully people have had their eyes opened about the dangers of allowing too much government control over our lives.
      - yay_throw 5y ago
        I wish it were true, but I doubt it. The main thing I have learned is that people really don't care, until it affects them.
    - wwweston 5y ago
      Childcare is definitely an issue in so many contexts, can definitely recognize that. Hopefully that's something more people are thinking about going forward with an eye towards the social value of it and the problems of people facing it in even non-epidemic situations. But gains from no-commute / remote setups weren't limited to single/childless people. Some of the people I know who were taking rides / runs in the hills were couples with kids working schedules out with their partners, and I can think of families who demonstrated that reproduction doesn't bar one from buying home exercise equipment. And "it became illegal to have anyone else look after our kids" -- I get that it's frustrating to have a service that you rely on closed. I can see that'd be especially hard with group daycare. I saw that frustration play out. I also saw people continue babysitting or au pair arrangements with whatever behavioral stipulations for epidemic-safety made sense to them, and that got easier as lots of people pulled out of service/retail labor force. Childcare was different but illegal seems like hyperbole. I'm sure your experience was difficult or stressful; lots of people found adapting difficult in various ways (nor were single/childless people exempt, though the challenges might be different). But the idea that the parent poster forwarded that somehow civil policies generally "broke" people's health/exercise habits is a poor generalization... and whatever the truth about the difficulty of your particular situation, the idea that adapting was just impossible for people with kids and additionally that anyone pushing back on criticism of restrictions just isn't thinking about that doesn't hold up as a generalization either.
  - kccoder 5y ago
    I ride a bike 3k+ miles a year, every year for the past 15 years, on the various trails near me and I can say with absolute certainty that the volume of people running, biking, walking, ... on those same trails more than tripled at the beginning of the pandemic and have yet to decrease back to baseline. I don't know about those individuals exercise habits prior to the pandemic, but they certainly weren't on the trails.
  - dnautics 5y ago
    Oh no. I have created a new exercise habit thanks to lockdown. I got on the "get exercise equipment" train early. I'm MUCH healthier now thanks to lockdown; lost about 5 kg, can do 13 pull-ups, lift weights 5 days a week, etc.
  - cmsonger 5y ago
    Count me with the "more healthy" crowd. Work from home has made it much easier to keep a healthy lifestyle. Eating at home with food I cook. No time commuting to work. No temptation to go out to some restaurant for tasty, but horrible for me, food and a couple of cocktails. I have a good deal of empathy for those who don't get to work from home, but I'm the opposite of "healthy habits got worse."
- lampe3 5y ago
  I know two people who have basically the same story. One was a runner a Marathon was nothing for him and now almost a year later he can do a half Marathon. The other one was a natural body builder. They know the weights they can push. He told me that 8 Months after Covid he was down 20% in weights.
  - wrycoder 5y ago
    I lost 20% my max lifts after the second jab, but gained out back in a couple of months.
  - thematrixturtle 5y ago
    This isn't really specific to COVID though, any serious illness can do a real number on you. Anecdote: I'm an avid runner and cyclist, but after I had dengue fever, it took me months to regain my fitness. I used to run 10K's before breakfast, but the first time I attempted a 5 km walk afterwards, I was basically comatose for the rest of the day.
    - ryanbrunner 5y ago
      Post-viral conditions happen, yeah, but the percentages coming out of long COVID studies as well as the sheer number of anecdotes everyone has seems fairly novel. At the very least, even if there's a similar prevalence of these issues for COVID, the sheer amount of infections is going to mean this is a larger concern for COVID than other viruses.
    - agumonkey 5y ago
      It would be interesting (to at least one person) to have good rehab plans. How long did it take for you to go back to easy 10Ks
    - lobocinza 5y ago
      When I got dengue I was really bad for a few days but quickly recovered and actually improved my fitness/health due to changing lifestyle (so it's biased). Wasn't it chikungunya?
- L_Rahman 5y ago
  Like you I was a 50km/30 mile wake up and go person regardless of baseline health before the pandemic. Since I got the original strain in March 2020, I struggle to break 10.
- agumonkey 5y ago
  Adding to this, I'm not sure I had COVID, but 1) I had cardiac troubles before the pandemic, 2) did many months of bike to gain back some average cardiovascular health 3) I got vaccinated in Jan, and now my heart is doing different things (less fatigue but more and larger skipped beats). It's hard to know what's causing what now. I assume a lot of people are in the same case.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - longitudinal93 5y ago
    Similar to me. I am (was?) a healthy mid-fifties life-long cyclist and the first dose (Moderna) caused 10+% PVCs that I'm now on beta blockers to try and manage. Both my doctor and now cardiologist have advised me against receiving the second shot.
    - agumonkey 5y ago
      I guess covid is gonna make a lot of us cardiovascular specialists .. I wish you a good recovery (as much as possible)
- edmcnulty101 5y ago
  A year later means it's probably permanent. I don't think there's any tissue that takes longer than a year to regenerate.
  - bregma 5y ago
    Back in my 40s I broke my leg: a simple tib-fib fracture. Without any artificial fixation it took 3 years to recover. There's plenty of tissues in a human body that can take more than 1 year to fully regenerate.
    - nicklaf 5y ago
      > There's plenty of tissues in a human body that can take more than 1 year to fully regenerate. Nerves, for instance[0]. [0] https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/peripheral-nerve-injuries/diagnosis-treatment/drc-20355632 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/peripheral-ne...
      - edmcnulty101 5y ago
        Heart muscle doesn't though. From what I remember from a family members heart attack ... the heart doesn't really heal. Hence pace makers for a lifetime. >The heart is unable to regenerate heart muscle after a heart attack and lost cardiac muscle is replaced by scar tissue. https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration
    - edmcnulty101 5y ago
      >The heart is unable to regenerate heart muscle after a heart attack and lost cardiac muscle is replaced by scar tissue. https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration
  - chiefalchemist 5y ago
    Reference link, please.
- larryflint 5y ago
  Did you take the vaccine?
  - chiefalchemist 5y ago
    Better question: were they treated in any way?
    - galangalalgol 5y ago
      What treatments do you mean?
      - loudtieblahblah 5y ago
        Considering hospitals have basically banned or obfuscated all treatments other than prevention, good questions.
        Tagbert 5y ago
        Hospitals are frequently using anti-viral and mono-clonal antibody treatments for severe cases. They are not using drugs that have been shown ineffective.
        chiefalchemist 5y ago
        It's not a question of ineffectivrness. It's a question of treating a large number of people, with a spot light on them, and then blaming the illness for "long Covid". Maybe it is the virus? But maybe it's the treatment? Or a combo of both? Or a combo plus some other factor? Two examples that might help frame things: 1) Chemo. It's toxic. 2) A couple of yrs ago a family member was hospitalized from a stroke. They needed to be put on assisted breathing. Well that helped, but it also led to a lung infection. And then that required treatment. Fair enough, it prevented death. The point is, not every treatment is without sidside effects. But with Covid, evidently there are no longer comorbidies, and the treatments have no side effects.
- mseepgood 5y ago
  > nothing else has changed in my life Except that you got a year older.
  - yxwvut 5y ago
    Endurance typically improves with age into the mid/late 30s even at the elite level.
- darkerside 5y ago
  How old are you?
  - kodah 5y ago
    I'm in my early 30s
- nradov 5y ago
  Professional triathlete Lucy Charles-Barclay had Covid in November 2020 and then won the Ironman 70.3 world championship 10 months later. Everyone is different.
  - slim109ya 5y ago
    Absolutely true. I only have weird smells sometimes, while my wife still suffers loss of appetite and a reduction of energy levels. It's been 6 months since we recovered.
- edmcnulty101 5y ago
  >The heart is unable to regenerate heart muscle after a heart attack and lost cardiac muscle is replaced by scar tissue. https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration
- t0bia_s 5y ago
  Are you vaccinated?
- sytelus 5y ago
  How bad were your symptoms?
easymodex 5y ago
Do you know if the immune response from the vaccine also causes that damage or not?
- lucd 5y ago
  The vaccine antigen is only a small part of the virus. Furthermore is was modified and is inert. https://cen.acs.org/pharmaceuticals/vaccines/tiny-tweak-behind-COVID-19/98/i38 https://cen.acs.org/pharmaceuticals/vaccines/tiny-tweak-behi... Because of international pharmacovigilance we know that ARNm vaccine induce some myocarditis and pericarditis, at a much lower rate than the virus and less severe.
  - inciampati 5y ago
    There is not evidence that heart inflammation after vaccination is less common or severe than after COVID-19 infection. For instance: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.23.21268276v1 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.23.21268276v... suggests rates several fold higher for vaccination than infection. Not to say that on balance vaccination is anything but preferable to naive infection, but it's not a side effect free panacea.
    - arisAlexis 5y ago
      This has been debunked many times
      - Asooka 5y ago
        I don't see you posting links to papers that support your assertion.
        Hallucinaut 5y ago
        Amongst others here's one. https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.23.21260998v1.full-text https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.23.21260998v... See my comment above on why that paper tells us nothing about unvaccinated myocarditis rates.
habibur 5y ago
Bad news is that heart muscle doesn't rebuild, like how our body muscles do. But a doctor can ensure how much of our fear is right.
- px43 5y ago
  Funny enough, one of the original MRNA treatments developed my Moderna was something that would temporarily activate stem cell generation around heart tissue. Sounds like in testing, the mice that got the treatment after having a heart attack were much less likely to have subsequent heart attacks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4-DMKNT7xI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4-DMKNT7xI
  - hahajk 5y ago
    I was going to ask if anyone knew how they found mice for these studies. Do they choose mice they have on hand that naturally have had heart attacks? Would those mice be involved in other studies too? But I ended up googling it and sort of wish I didn’t ask the question. https://www.theawl.com/2016/04/if-you-give-a-mouse-a-heart-attack/ https://www.theawl.com/2016/04/if-you-give-a-mouse-a-heart-a...
    - NLMichel 5y ago
      Hopefully one day we'll have a perfect digital twin of the human body and can test drugs like this without harming animals..
- dangerbird2 5y ago
  But that means it's almost impossible to get heart cancer, so at least we've got that going for us
timr 5y ago
Both of these articles are about severe Covid-19, and study patients who were hospitalized. It is incorrect and irresponsible to extrapolate these two papers to the entire world.
- Aldipower 5y ago
  Thank you.
amcoastal 5y ago
Is it reasonable that the autoimmune response stimulated by vaccination could do this too?
giantg2 5y ago
I saw that it's mostly severe infection that results in high levels of auto-antibodies. But the studies I saw seemed to indicate that they only focused on acute infection. I wonder what the prevalence of anti-autobodies are in mild cases and how that correlates with the main article's finding of cardiovascular risk increase even in mild cases. Specifically, if these individuals already had auto-antibodies or some other outlying issue, or if this reaction is representative of the entire group. It could take years for some autoimmune issues to arise. It would be quite concerning if this affects nearly everyone infected, including asymptomatic or mild infections following vaccination.

by dzink 5y ago

kodah 5y ago

I had Delta once. Prior to it I would ride 30 miles on my bike like it was a breezy day. When I'd take breaks to vacation or whatever I could pick back up easily. A year after COVID, I'm struggling to hit 20 miles and I lose my progress easily. I'm not sure it's COVID related, but nothing else has changed in my life.

forgingahead 5y ago
Did you take the vaccine?
laurent92 5y ago
Lockdowns have also broken everyone’s regular exercise and healthy habits. On charts we all assign this to Covid, but lockdowns were an artificial, additional decision.
- parineum 5y ago
  Presumably they are using non-infected people as a control.
  - jhugo 5y ago
    Unfortunately they didn't perform any tests to verify that the control group had not had COVID (it's in the article).
- dijit 5y ago
  I think on a macro scale you're right, attitudes and disciplines are also somewhat to blame. Sweden, though, did not lock down, and I hear (and experience) the same issue as the parent. The first day back after COVID and I reached my max heart rate in 60s of moderate jogging.
  - kkjjkgjjgg 5y ago
    Not sure it is accurate to say Sweden did not lock down. Afaik they had some measures in place, and were counting on people to behave sensibly in other aspects. So even though there were perhaps less lockdown rules, most people might still have adjusted their behavior.
    - dijit 5y ago
      As mentioned I think this really only applies on a macro scale. Individual anecdotes (such as my personal friends who did not change behaviour), while unscientific, paint a similar picture to what is being presented as evidence, so it's an additional data point to consider. So, at least there is some correlation with the sentiment, and by people whom I know have not adjusted their behaviour. (including myself) Sweden's restrictions were excessively light, by the way, 8pm closing of restaurants and gyms is not exactly a big deal to people going to the gym after work.
  - bjoli 5y ago
    Both my gym and pool were closed for almost half a year in Sweden.
    - dijit 5y ago
      What, really? SATS closed for like 2 months at the start of the pandemic and has been open since then. My girlfriend is the manager of one of the Malmo branches.
    - passerby1 5y ago
      In Göteborg SATS nor Friskis&Svettis were never closed during the pandemic. I also knew that Fitness24 was open all the way too. Which gym are you talking about?
- EdwardDiego 5y ago
  Citation needed. Anecdotally a lot of people in my country took up exercise for something to do in lockdown. No citations on that though.
- ralferoo 5y ago
  I experienced the opposite effect described here, and I ascribe the positive effects to lockdown. Before COVID, I ran about 5km once a month, and I was pretty slow. I got COVID early on in February 2020, and while it initially seemed mild, the tail end was severe. Pain that made me worry I might have been having a mini-stroke, and after that lung issues making it painful to take a shallow breath. After a week or so, it was just painful to breathe deeply but otherwise OK. I started doing low heart-rate running, trying to keep my HR below 132. Initially, this was really hard, and even jogging slightly too fast could cause my HR to spike to 180 and stay there for 5 minutes. But over the next couple of weeks as my lungs improved again, it got better and better. Within a few months, I was doing at least 5km every time I went for a run, and running 3 or 4 times a week. I've got faster and faster as a result, and I've knocked a third off my 5km PB time from pre-COVID. My health hasn't been better for many years, and that's only because the lockdown conditions meant that I was working from home so could take a long break at lunchtime, we were allowed out for exercise, but otherwise the streets were deserted. I think lockdown was the best thing that's ever happened to me in terms of exercise opportunities.
  - RickJWagner 5y ago
    "knocked a third off my 5km PB..." Wow. Congratulations, that's got to feel good.
- Reason077 5y ago
  > "Lockdowns have also broken everyone’s regular exercise and healthy habits." If anything, I think I actually got a bit healthier because of lockdown. Eating healthier due to fewer restaurant meals, drinking less due to not being able to go to pubs and parties etc. Probably got more exercise too because for a while it was one of the few valid excuses to get out of the house!
- jonathanstrange 5y ago
  Lockdown was also in place for the control group so its effects should be accounted for. You could try to show a negative health effect of people in quarantine, but this is not possible if all infected are placed in quarantine.
- wwweston 5y ago
  There certainly was some disruption in gyms as workout places, but I'd be cautious about systematic conclusions like "broken everyone's regular exercise and healthy habits" given observable factors like: * increased personal time for workouts for anyone working remotely (or forgoing employment entirely) * dramatically increased demand & prices for home exercise equipment * shifts to cooking at home March / April 2020 seemed to be marked by a lot of people going outside and running. Personally, I shed over 35 lbs of bodyfat in 2020 and have had few comparable periods where I hiked as often or ate as cleanly, and I'm far from alone in my circle of acquaintances.
  - napier 5y ago
    Absolutely. Sales of bike exercise equipment (plus Peloton’s share price), and outdoor sports gear went parabolic in 2020 and remain at record highs. The idea that “lockdowns” inhibited exercise while in many countries exercising outdoors is laughable.
    - chiefalchemist 5y ago
      Not nitpicking, because I hope you're correct. That said, sales doesn't equal actual sustained usage. Anecdotal: I run almost every day. Don't get excited, only 2 to 4 miles :) Early in the pandemic I saw plenty of new faces - often couples - out exercising. Some running, mostly walking. I don't see many of those faces any more.
      - wwweston 5y ago
        > That said, sales doesn't equal actual sustained usage. Neither do open gyms. :) Though post-holiday covid peaks may have slightly altered the long-running wry observations about January in the gym.
        chiefalchemist 5y ago
        In fact, I'd guess most gyms are profitable because of those who pay who but rarely show up.
- null_object 5y ago
  > Lockdowns have also broken everyone’s regular exercise and healthy habits. Why do you make assumptions about "everyone"? I'm sure there are as many diverse experiences during 'lockdowns' as there are people who experienced them. Obviously if you include the rare cases where people were actually kept indoors (how long did those actually last?), then healthy exercise might have been more difficult. In my case, my health has improved immeasurably, as I no longer need to sit in an office all day, eat an unhealthy lunch and eat office-supplied snacks the way I did before. I eat more healthily, get more fresh air, walk and cycle at lunchtimes - and even get more work done in fewer hours.
- michaelmrose 5y ago
  The US lock down was a joke. Most places barely shut down gyms and that still leaves exercising at home and outdoor recreation as an option. We know that these people contracted a disease that damages the cardiovascular system. It stretches credibility past the breaking point to surmise that lock downs resulted in a meaningful portion of this mortality or morbidity.
- yay_throw 5y ago
  All of the replies to this completely ignore those of us who have families, and especially young families. Good for you if the sudden removal of responsibilities gave you the freedom to get outside for long periods every day. However, frankly people like this were the main reason I had to quit Strava. While my wife and I struggled to hold our lives and jobs together when it became illegal to have anyone else look after our kids, I had to watch everyone else enjoy day-long rides and runs in the hills. And before you come out with the usual "you just need to use more imagination and take your kids with you" - for a start, the situation I described above drained more energy and life than I care to remember. Also, there's only so much a 1 year old will put up with, when I am used to rides of up to 100 miles. Personally, I am deeply embittered by the whole experience.
  - nradov 5y ago
    Hopefully people have had their eyes opened about the dangers of allowing too much government control over our lives.
    - yay_throw 5y ago
      I wish it were true, but I doubt it. The main thing I have learned is that people really don't care, until it affects them.
  - wwweston 5y ago
    Childcare is definitely an issue in so many contexts, can definitely recognize that. Hopefully that's something more people are thinking about going forward with an eye towards the social value of it and the problems of people facing it in even non-epidemic situations. But gains from no-commute / remote setups weren't limited to single/childless people. Some of the people I know who were taking rides / runs in the hills were couples with kids working schedules out with their partners, and I can think of families who demonstrated that reproduction doesn't bar one from buying home exercise equipment. And "it became illegal to have anyone else look after our kids" -- I get that it's frustrating to have a service that you rely on closed. I can see that'd be especially hard with group daycare. I saw that frustration play out. I also saw people continue babysitting or au pair arrangements with whatever behavioral stipulations for epidemic-safety made sense to them, and that got easier as lots of people pulled out of service/retail labor force. Childcare was different but illegal seems like hyperbole. I'm sure your experience was difficult or stressful; lots of people found adapting difficult in various ways (nor were single/childless people exempt, though the challenges might be different). But the idea that the parent poster forwarded that somehow civil policies generally "broke" people's health/exercise habits is a poor generalization... and whatever the truth about the difficulty of your particular situation, the idea that adapting was just impossible for people with kids and additionally that anyone pushing back on criticism of restrictions just isn't thinking about that doesn't hold up as a generalization either.
- kccoder 5y ago
  I ride a bike 3k+ miles a year, every year for the past 15 years, on the various trails near me and I can say with absolute certainty that the volume of people running, biking, walking, ... on those same trails more than tripled at the beginning of the pandemic and have yet to decrease back to baseline. I don't know about those individuals exercise habits prior to the pandemic, but they certainly weren't on the trails.
- dnautics 5y ago
  Oh no. I have created a new exercise habit thanks to lockdown. I got on the "get exercise equipment" train early. I'm MUCH healthier now thanks to lockdown; lost about 5 kg, can do 13 pull-ups, lift weights 5 days a week, etc.
- cmsonger 5y ago
  Count me with the "more healthy" crowd. Work from home has made it much easier to keep a healthy lifestyle. Eating at home with food I cook. No time commuting to work. No temptation to go out to some restaurant for tasty, but horrible for me, food and a couple of cocktails. I have a good deal of empathy for those who don't get to work from home, but I'm the opposite of "healthy habits got worse."
lampe3 5y ago
I know two people who have basically the same story. One was a runner a Marathon was nothing for him and now almost a year later he can do a half Marathon. The other one was a natural body builder. They know the weights they can push. He told me that 8 Months after Covid he was down 20% in weights.
- wrycoder 5y ago
  I lost 20% my max lifts after the second jab, but gained out back in a couple of months.
- thematrixturtle 5y ago
  This isn't really specific to COVID though, any serious illness can do a real number on you. Anecdote: I'm an avid runner and cyclist, but after I had dengue fever, it took me months to regain my fitness. I used to run 10K's before breakfast, but the first time I attempted a 5 km walk afterwards, I was basically comatose for the rest of the day.
  - ryanbrunner 5y ago
    Post-viral conditions happen, yeah, but the percentages coming out of long COVID studies as well as the sheer number of anecdotes everyone has seems fairly novel. At the very least, even if there's a similar prevalence of these issues for COVID, the sheer amount of infections is going to mean this is a larger concern for COVID than other viruses.
  - agumonkey 5y ago
    It would be interesting (to at least one person) to have good rehab plans. How long did it take for you to go back to easy 10Ks
  - lobocinza 5y ago
    When I got dengue I was really bad for a few days but quickly recovered and actually improved my fitness/health due to changing lifestyle (so it's biased). Wasn't it chikungunya?
L_Rahman 5y ago
Like you I was a 50km/30 mile wake up and go person regardless of baseline health before the pandemic. Since I got the original strain in March 2020, I struggle to break 10.
agumonkey 5y ago
Adding to this, I'm not sure I had COVID, but 1) I had cardiac troubles before the pandemic, 2) did many months of bike to gain back some average cardiovascular health 3) I got vaccinated in Jan, and now my heart is doing different things (less fatigue but more and larger skipped beats). It's hard to know what's causing what now. I assume a lot of people are in the same case.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- longitudinal93 5y ago
  Similar to me. I am (was?) a healthy mid-fifties life-long cyclist and the first dose (Moderna) caused 10+% PVCs that I'm now on beta blockers to try and manage. Both my doctor and now cardiologist have advised me against receiving the second shot.
  - agumonkey 5y ago
    I guess covid is gonna make a lot of us cardiovascular specialists .. I wish you a good recovery (as much as possible)
edmcnulty101 5y ago
A year later means it's probably permanent. I don't think there's any tissue that takes longer than a year to regenerate.
- bregma 5y ago
  Back in my 40s I broke my leg: a simple tib-fib fracture. Without any artificial fixation it took 3 years to recover. There's plenty of tissues in a human body that can take more than 1 year to fully regenerate.
  - nicklaf 5y ago
    > There's plenty of tissues in a human body that can take more than 1 year to fully regenerate. Nerves, for instance[0]. [0] https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/peripheral-nerve-injuries/diagnosis-treatment/drc-20355632 https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/peripheral-ne...
    - edmcnulty101 5y ago
      Heart muscle doesn't though. From what I remember from a family members heart attack ... the heart doesn't really heal. Hence pace makers for a lifetime. >The heart is unable to regenerate heart muscle after a heart attack and lost cardiac muscle is replaced by scar tissue. https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration
  - edmcnulty101 5y ago
    >The heart is unable to regenerate heart muscle after a heart attack and lost cardiac muscle is replaced by scar tissue. https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration
- chiefalchemist 5y ago
  Reference link, please.
larryflint 5y ago
Did you take the vaccine?
- chiefalchemist 5y ago
  Better question: were they treated in any way?
  - galangalalgol 5y ago
    What treatments do you mean?
    - loudtieblahblah 5y ago
      Considering hospitals have basically banned or obfuscated all treatments other than prevention, good questions.
      - Tagbert 5y ago
        Hospitals are frequently using anti-viral and mono-clonal antibody treatments for severe cases. They are not using drugs that have been shown ineffective.
        chiefalchemist 5y ago
        It's not a question of ineffectivrness. It's a question of treating a large number of people, with a spot light on them, and then blaming the illness for "long Covid". Maybe it is the virus? But maybe it's the treatment? Or a combo of both? Or a combo plus some other factor? Two examples that might help frame things: 1) Chemo. It's toxic. 2) A couple of yrs ago a family member was hospitalized from a stroke. They needed to be put on assisted breathing. Well that helped, but it also led to a lung infection. And then that required treatment. Fair enough, it prevented death. The point is, not every treatment is without sidside effects. But with Covid, evidently there are no longer comorbidies, and the treatments have no side effects.
mseepgood 5y ago
> nothing else has changed in my life Except that you got a year older.
- yxwvut 5y ago
  Endurance typically improves with age into the mid/late 30s even at the elite level.
darkerside 5y ago
How old are you?
- kodah 5y ago
  I'm in my early 30s
nradov 5y ago
Professional triathlete Lucy Charles-Barclay had Covid in November 2020 and then won the Ironman 70.3 world championship 10 months later. Everyone is different.
- slim109ya 5y ago
  Absolutely true. I only have weird smells sometimes, while my wife still suffers loss of appetite and a reduction of energy levels. It's been 6 months since we recovered.
edmcnulty101 5y ago
>The heart is unable to regenerate heart muscle after a heart attack and lost cardiac muscle is replaced by scar tissue. https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration https://www.uclahealth.org/heart/cardiac-repair-regeneration
t0bia_s 5y ago
Are you vaccinated?
sytelus 5y ago
How bad were your symptoms?

easymodex 5y ago

Do you know if the immune response from the vaccine also causes that damage or not?

lucd 5y ago
The vaccine antigen is only a small part of the virus. Furthermore is was modified and is inert. https://cen.acs.org/pharmaceuticals/vaccines/tiny-tweak-behind-COVID-19/98/i38 https://cen.acs.org/pharmaceuticals/vaccines/tiny-tweak-behi... Because of international pharmacovigilance we know that ARNm vaccine induce some myocarditis and pericarditis, at a much lower rate than the virus and less severe.
- inciampati 5y ago
  There is not evidence that heart inflammation after vaccination is less common or severe than after COVID-19 infection. For instance: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.23.21268276v1 https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.12.23.21268276v... suggests rates several fold higher for vaccination than infection. Not to say that on balance vaccination is anything but preferable to naive infection, but it's not a side effect free panacea.
  - arisAlexis 5y ago
    This has been debunked many times
    - Asooka 5y ago
      I don't see you posting links to papers that support your assertion.
      - Hallucinaut 5y ago
        Amongst others here's one. https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.23.21260998v1.full-text https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.07.23.21260998v... See my comment above on why that paper tells us nothing about unvaccinated myocarditis rates.

habibur 5y ago

Bad news is that heart muscle doesn't rebuild, like how our body muscles do. But a doctor can ensure how much of our fear is right.

px43 5y ago
Funny enough, one of the original MRNA treatments developed my Moderna was something that would temporarily activate stem cell generation around heart tissue. Sounds like in testing, the mice that got the treatment after having a heart attack were much less likely to have subsequent heart attacks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4-DMKNT7xI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4-DMKNT7xI
- hahajk 5y ago
  I was going to ask if anyone knew how they found mice for these studies. Do they choose mice they have on hand that naturally have had heart attacks? Would those mice be involved in other studies too? But I ended up googling it and sort of wish I didn’t ask the question. https://www.theawl.com/2016/04/if-you-give-a-mouse-a-heart-attack/ https://www.theawl.com/2016/04/if-you-give-a-mouse-a-heart-a...
  - NLMichel 5y ago
    Hopefully one day we'll have a perfect digital twin of the human body and can test drugs like this without harming animals..
dangerbird2 5y ago
But that means it's almost impossible to get heart cancer, so at least we've got that going for us

timr 5y ago

Both of these articles are about severe Covid-19, and study patients who were hospitalized. It is incorrect and irresponsible to extrapolate these two papers to the entire world.

Aldipower 5y ago
Thank you.

amcoastal 5y ago

Is it reasonable that the autoimmune response stimulated by vaccination could do this too?

giantg2 5y ago

I saw that it's mostly severe infection that results in high levels of auto-antibodies. But the studies I saw seemed to indicate that they only focused on acute infection. I wonder what the prevalence of anti-autobodies are in mild cases and how that correlates with the main article's finding of cardiovascular risk increase even in mild cases. Specifically, if these individuals already had auto-antibodies or some other outlying issue, or if this reaction is representative of the entire group. It could take years for some autoimmune issues to arise. It would be quite concerning if this affects nearly everyone infected, including asymptomatic or mild infections following vaccination.