14 ms·

Long Covid risk falls only slightly after vaccination, study shows

98 points by Todd 4y ago

smt88 4y ago
There are no conclusions to draw here. The study doesn't "show" anything -- it indicates a need for further research. I'm disappointed that Nature.com is engaging in this kind of sensational journalism. From their own article: > He praises the study, which was difficult to perform because of the amount and quality of data, but adds that it is limited because it does not break the data down by key factors, such as the participants’ medical history. “These are very important questions we need answers to,” Putrino says. “We don’t have any really well constructed studies just yet.” The study also doesn't seem to control for comorbid mental health issues. The pandemic caused a massive spike in anxiety and depression, which (by themselves or due to medications) can result in the same symptoms used to diagnose long Covid in this study: brain fog and fatigue. There really is nothing to report here yet.
- cmattoon 4y ago
- johndfsgdgdfg 4y ago
  The problem is we've set-up asymmetric incentive structure. Say, there are some uncertainties regarding the risk and aftermath of COVID. If you genuinely underestimate the risk, then you are a pro-grandma killer and one of the worst human beings in the world. But if you overplay the risk, then you are an amazing human being whose only flaw is caring too much about human lives. Unfortunately this becomes another 'The Boy Who Cried Wolf' story and also causes a lot of harm in the long run.
  - joemazerino 4y ago
  - smt88 4y ago
    > If you genuinely underestimate the risk, then you are a pro-grandma killer and one of the worst human beings in the world. I totally disagree with this. When omicron started spreading, a lot of scientists jumped to the conclusion that it was less lethal than previous variants. They were happy to share positive-sounding news, regardless of whether they turned out to be wrong. At the beginning, the evidence (from South Africa) was far from conclusive.
    - native_samples 4y ago
      Huh, that's the opposite of how I remember it. Where on earth did you see that? I couldn't see my family for Christmas this year because they freaked out over Omicron and insisted that me and my girlfriend would have to quarantine for 10 days before being able to visit them. This was driven entirely by "scientists" jumping to conclusions that Omicron would be as deadly as Delta but much more infectious and demanding more lockdowns, quarantines etc. They had no scientific basis for this doom-mongering, which appeared to be driven purely by some strange ideological desire for more restrictions. I told family at the time - this is crazy. All the evidence about Omicron says it's a mild cold. There is no evidence pointing to any other conclusion. The people who discovered it in South Africa are communicating clearly that there's no crisis. Public health scientists are lying, again, because they're claiming there's no data when I was reading about that supposedly non-existent data in the press just yesterday and so you shouldn't listen. Well, they listened to the "scientists" and not me. For a few weeks, at least. February comes around, nothing about the virus has changed but they suddenly realize that it causes a mild cold and nobody cares. The Queen gets it aged 95 and it's on the front pages for about half a day. She doesn't even stop working. Then they want us to visit so we can do the celebrations we didn't do at Christmas. So the scores are: South African doctors: 1 native_samples: 1 Public health: -a million, again. The people from South Africa turned out to be completely correct.
- water554 4y ago
  - Angostura 4y ago
    > I am logical as they come > the (clearly engineered) Yeh. No.
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      The lab leak hypothesis is still well in the realm of possible. Not known but not impossible.
      - notahacker 4y ago
        There's a big difference between "lab leak makes some sense given it was the same city and lab leaks are known to have spread respiratory viruses before" which is a reasonable starting point for an investigation and "clearly engineered".
        water554 4y ago
    - water554 4y ago
- hda111 4y ago
  What medications cause anxiety and depression?
  - reportingsjr 4y ago
    Birth control among many other medications.
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    Not exactly a medication but alcohol for one. But many other drugs can cause these sorts of symptoms too including anti-depressants paradoxically.
    - havblue 4y ago
      Do you mean a treatment for anxiety and depression or a cause? “Here's to alcohol: the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.” -Homer Simpson
      - vorpalhex 4y ago
        Alcohol can definitely cause anxiety, and make anxiety worse. I will also suggest alcohol can trigger depression - but that is a claim that is ripe for debate and not well accepted. Alcohol can also "treat" (in the sense of suppressing symptoms) anxiety and depression, thus leading to a downward spiral since it tends to make these things worse, thus you get into the cycle of "Oh I'm feeling anxious, better have a beer - oh, now my anxiety is worse now that I have sobered up, better have more..."
        robonerd 4y ago
        Alcohol objectively causes physiological CNS depression. Whether or not it necessarily causes the mood of depression or 'major depressive disorder' as diagnosed by clinical psychologists or psychiatrists is another matter.
  - iamed2 4y ago
    Medications for anxiety and depression can cause brain fog and fatigue.
- r00fus 4y ago
  Was this study also with an average age of 71? (cohort was US veterans with 3 week vax interval. Also baseline mortality in the group was 1% over 6mo - definitely an older, vulnerable population). So yeah, not a representative study at all. And I'm someone who's somewhat concerned specifically about long covid.
- jrnichols 4y ago
  > I'm disappointed that Nature.com is engaging in this kind of sensational journalism. I am too, but it is not surprising. It's getting them page views. We're also going to be seeing "long covid" articles for years to come as it's going to be a goldmine for research funding.
  - smt88 4y ago
    > It's getting them page views. But why do they need page views??? It's not like they're going to go bankrupt if they lose advertising revenue. Their greatest asset is their brand name, and they're destroying it for... what? It makes no sense.
swayvil 4y ago
- andi999 4y ago
- bamboozled 4y ago
  Noticed this too!
- baisq 4y ago
  - SeanLuke 4y ago
    In what universe would getting vaccinated be getting conned? It's the smartest thing you could have done. AFAIK covid vaccines are not connected with heart issues beyond rather rare and generally mild cases of myocarditis, but getting covid is strongly connected to heart problems.
    - tuckerpo 4y ago
      Is it really fair to call any form of cardiovascular dysfunction "mild"?
      - qbasic_forever 4y ago
        Tons of people have atrial fibrillation or other easily managed or mild heart conditions. Many people have no idea they even have issues until they get an Apple watch and it starts alerting them that their heart rate is fluctuating unexpectedly.
      - micromacrofoot 4y ago
        Yes. In the rare instance of myocarditis post vaccination... most patients recovered after rest and medication. No other intervention necessary. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/myocarditis.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/my...
sudden_dystopia 4y ago
- bee_rider 4y ago
  Science is not actually sentient. I think it was expected/hope for by policy folks.
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago
  > What were they even right about with the vaccine? The things it was tested for. Preventing hospitalization and death from Covid. Which the Pfizer, Moderna and even J&J shots are terrifically good at. > credibility is going to be lost if we don’t pull heads out of butts So? The people who matter mostly got the message. People who wanted protection mostly got it.
  - encoderer 4y ago
    I have taken both jnj and Moderna. But I have to admit that the grandparent has a point. It feels it’s almost heretical to say, but the vaccines were terribly over-sold. In the beginning they were sold as traditional vaccines - prevention against infection not just serious disease. But very soon we saw “breakthrough infections” (not even written about anymore as they are so common) and the goal posts started being moved. Public health establishment deserves a D- for their handling of the pandemic starting basically on day 1.
    - throwaway5752 4y ago
      The virus mutated and became more resistant, nobody should have to explain that to a grown-ass adult. The General Public deserves an F for civic-mindedness, being able to ascertain good sources of information on the internet, and scientific literacy. It's a miracle the vaccines were available as soon they were and it prevent hundreds of thousands if not millions of deaths globally. And you are mad about 3rd party marketing. We all collectively deserve what's coming.
      - 4y ago
JamesBarney 4y ago
The problem with a study like this is that they probably aren't doing a good job distinguish true long covid from psychosomatic long covid. And there is a lot of evidence that "long covid" correlates much more highly with pre-existing anxiety levels than disease severity. I think long covid exists I just think there is also a lot of psychosomatic long covid and until we have a good diagnostic criteria to differentiate the two it'll be really hard to study it.
- ipaddr 4y ago
  The media wants you to believe that the vaccine protects against longterm covid. If it doesn't many people would skip the upcoming 4th, 5th, 6th round because it is providing no additional protection against the latest variants. But here is an actual study that goes against this story. Will you believe science or myth? Are there enough excuses to keep the myth alive?
  - californical 4y ago
    Why does the media care if you get a 4th dose? How does it help them?
    - r00fus 4y ago
      Pharma profits handsomely whenever government subsidizes more boosters.
      - micromacrofoot 4y ago
        The government isn't exactly rushing to 4th doses. They could authorize it for under 50s right now, but there's little evidence that it makes a significant difference, so they haven't. Also note that we still don't have vaccines for kids under 5. If the government wanted to line the pockets of pharma more, there's not a lot stopping them. So it's hard to take blanket statements about this seriously. I'm not denying that this has happened in the past, just that it's a lot more complicated than any single conspiracy theory.
SemanticStrengh 4y ago
I am wondering how much immune "budget" do humans have for vaccines? This topic is left unadressed and is extremely worrying, being an existential risk. Basically, the body has a limited amount of unspecialized naive T cells in its lifetime, mostly located/modulated in the thymus gland, which involute quickly with age. I suppose that 1) vaccines increase the rate of specialisation of naive T cells to mature t cells (hence the number of naive t cells diminish supraphysically)and I also believe that 2) those specific mature T cells, generating covid spike protein specific antibodies, have lost some or total ability to fight non-covid diseases as a cost of specialization. 1) would increase thymus involution rate and therefore age speed of immunosupression. 2) would reduce generic immune ability (learning other pathogens) 3) I believe the increased immune profile after a vaccine induce a long lasting (at least 6 month) increase of accelerated aging process in humans, via increased inflammation and therefore apoptosis, DNA mutations and oxidative stress, although in a mild form and hence in the medium term asymptomatic. Above all the premises I enumerated, the 2) is the one I would draw the most attention to, which can be reformulated as: do the repetitive administrations of a vaccine (here the 3 mRNA doses), reduce the effectiveness of the immune system for future non-COVID diseases, and even more importantly, does those doses reduce the immune learnability budget and therefore do those vaccines reduce the effectiveness of future vaccines against the next non-COVID pandemic? There has to be a limit to immune memory, the question is, after how many vaccines do the effect become non-negligible on aging? study backing chronic inflammation and therefore accelerated aging: > vaccine-induced hypermetabolic lymph nodes https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34857663/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34857663/ study backing the depletion of lymphocite T helper cell production: Study Shows Immune Cells Against Covid-19 Stay High in Number Six Months After Vaccination https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/study-shows-immune-cells-against-covid-19-stay-high-in-number-six-months-after-vaccination#:~:text=Study%20Shows%20Immune,who%20are%20unvaccinated https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/.... Moreover, I have an issue understanding why would vaccine not massively lose effectiveness after the age of 70 since at 70 the thymus has ~completely involuted (although maybe the stem cells in the bone marrow suffice?).
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- 4y ago
smm11 4y ago
ThrowawayTestr 4y ago
Is there any evidence that "long covid" is actually a thing?
- blenderdt 4y ago
  No and yes. Long covid is nothing special. All virus infections can cause the same symptoms. The Epstein-Barr virus for example can make people tired for months.
  - neverstop222 4y ago
    And years later can cause multiple sclerosis
- tostonescon 4y ago
  It sure seems like a lot of people in the medical community are taking it pretty seriously. Given the quantity of medical journal articles discussing long covid, I'm going to go with YES
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  People definitely report it and genuinely believe they have it.. but similar problems occur in a small subset of all people who recover from infectious diseases. So it may not be covid specific but it does seem to exist and with a wide ranging illness such as covid then obviously more overall people have it than from say pneumonia.
  - robonerd 4y ago
    > People definitely report it and genuinely believe they have it.. This alone is not convincing, since hypochondriacs have never been rare in the first place and for the past few years have been encouraged and doubtlessly felt very vindicated.
    - smearth 4y ago
      If you understood how the brain creates pain and retains memory of the molecules that it interacts with you would understand that hyperchondria is a worse than useless diagnosis for anybody. Certain people are going to recover faster from illness than other people. It isn’t because they have better mental hygiene. They are fortunate. If you had long-covid you wouldn’t be able to type that because you would be mentally fatigued. Like Mike Tyson says, everyone’s got a plan until they get punched in the face. If your mitochondia locks up on you one day and your energy starts collapsing within 72hours of mild exertion I’d love seeing you blaming your own thinking to fix the situation while everyone else does. I don’t feel vindicated. I am beating chronic fatigue syndrome anyway, I have to do spinal strenthening exercises, I have to get plenty of sleep, I have eat healthily, I have to not do too much physical exercise in a day, I can’t sit for too long or I end up with post-exertional malaise. I think the people diagnosing other people with mental-disorders to explain what they couldn’t are going to get progressively more and more exposed as people find non-obvious ways to overcome their chronic multi-systemic health conditions. People are figuring it out. There is a psycho-somatic component. There is a physical component. It is brought on by viral illnesses. People with anxiety are prone to it but they are also prone to hypermobility(joint dislocation). One of us is right. I’d hope I’m not a delusional hyperchondriac. When my fibula pops out of my knee joint and I pop it back in and carry on with my day is that hyperchondria? Or could that be in some way related to managing chronic fatigue syndrome of which long-covid appears to be a sub-set. 60% of people with hyper-mobility have anxiety disorders. It doesn’t matter to me whether I’m right or you are right. All that matters to me is that I can sustain employment to rise up maslow’s hierarchy. I know that your approach would not have allowed me to do this because I tried it. Believe me I tried it.
bee_rider 4y ago
It seems like there must be a million confounding factors at thing point. Given that immunity eventually wanes and new variants show up, at what point is a person considered no longer 'vaccinated?' I get that people were excited to not need masks anymore, but I'm hanging on to my n95 in most indoor situations, even in my relatively low-risk region.
- neverstop222 4y ago
  If you are still wearing an n95 and your risk avoidance criteria remain stable, you will be wearing one in public for the rest of your life. That's your choice, and it's your right, but it's absolutely bonkers, and if you think it should be mandated, you're a totalitarian.
  - bee_rider 4y ago
    Unfortunately I can't really afford "brain fog" at the moment, and we're still apparently finding out new information about long COVID and vaccines, so I guess it turns out this wasn't actually bonkers.
    - neverstop222 4y ago
      I'm sure there are lots of diseases that could dehabilitate you; my wife has brain fog from her multiple sclerosis and is still brave enough to go back to regular life because she understands that the risks of serious outcomes from the extant strains are incredibly low, and somehow she manages to be a successful professional with the brain fog. Life is a risk. You have a lower chance of serious outcome -- assuming you're relatively healthy and younger than 80 -- from the extant strains than you have risk from driving. You can choose to face the risks of life and live, or grow old and die sad and scared. I choose to be inspired by my wife's courage in the face of her brain fog. Our time on this planet is limited, and spending it afraid is a waste.
      - bee_rider 4y ago
        Risk evaluation is a matter of tradeoffs. Since I can easily avoid this particular danger and I don't benefit from engaging in it, it isn't 'brave' to get rid of my masks, just foolish. I'd rather spend my risk budget on things more interesting than showing my chin off at the grocery store.
bergenty 4y ago
niklasbuschmann 4y ago
I found the study „Association between vaccination status and reported incidence of post-acute COVID-19 symptoms in Israel“ (https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.01.05.22268800v2.full.pdf https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.01.05.22268800v...) quite interesting. See https://postimg.cc/HjjsR2SF https://postimg.cc/HjjsR2SF for a overview of the results.

98 points by Todd 4y ago

There are no conclusions to draw here. The study doesn't "show" anything -- it indicates a need for further research. I'm disappointed that Nature.com is engaging in this kind of sensational journalism. From their own article: > He praises the study, which was difficult to perform because of the amount and quality of data, but adds that it is limited because it does not break the data down by key factors, such as the participants’ medical history. “These are very important questions we need answers to,” Putrino says. “We don’t have any really well constructed studies just yet.” The study also doesn't seem to control for comorbid mental health issues. The pandemic caused a massive spike in anxiety and depression, which (by themselves or due to medications) can result in the same symptoms used to diagnose long Covid in this study: brain fog and fatigue. There really is nothing to report here yet.

cmattoon 4y ago
johndfsgdgdfg 4y ago
The problem is we've set-up asymmetric incentive structure. Say, there are some uncertainties regarding the risk and aftermath of COVID. If you genuinely underestimate the risk, then you are a pro-grandma killer and one of the worst human beings in the world. But if you overplay the risk, then you are an amazing human being whose only flaw is caring too much about human lives. Unfortunately this becomes another 'The Boy Who Cried Wolf' story and also causes a lot of harm in the long run.
- joemazerino 4y ago
- smt88 4y ago
  > If you genuinely underestimate the risk, then you are a pro-grandma killer and one of the worst human beings in the world. I totally disagree with this. When omicron started spreading, a lot of scientists jumped to the conclusion that it was less lethal than previous variants. They were happy to share positive-sounding news, regardless of whether they turned out to be wrong. At the beginning, the evidence (from South Africa) was far from conclusive.
  - native_samples 4y ago
    Huh, that's the opposite of how I remember it. Where on earth did you see that? I couldn't see my family for Christmas this year because they freaked out over Omicron and insisted that me and my girlfriend would have to quarantine for 10 days before being able to visit them. This was driven entirely by "scientists" jumping to conclusions that Omicron would be as deadly as Delta but much more infectious and demanding more lockdowns, quarantines etc. They had no scientific basis for this doom-mongering, which appeared to be driven purely by some strange ideological desire for more restrictions. I told family at the time - this is crazy. All the evidence about Omicron says it's a mild cold. There is no evidence pointing to any other conclusion. The people who discovered it in South Africa are communicating clearly that there's no crisis. Public health scientists are lying, again, because they're claiming there's no data when I was reading about that supposedly non-existent data in the press just yesterday and so you shouldn't listen. Well, they listened to the "scientists" and not me. For a few weeks, at least. February comes around, nothing about the virus has changed but they suddenly realize that it causes a mild cold and nobody cares. The Queen gets it aged 95 and it's on the front pages for about half a day. She doesn't even stop working. Then they want us to visit so we can do the celebrations we didn't do at Christmas. So the scores are: South African doctors: 1 native_samples: 1 Public health: -a million, again. The people from South Africa turned out to be completely correct.
water554 4y ago
- Angostura 4y ago
  > I am logical as they come > the (clearly engineered) Yeh. No.
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    The lab leak hypothesis is still well in the realm of possible. Not known but not impossible.
    - notahacker 4y ago
      There's a big difference between "lab leak makes some sense given it was the same city and lab leaks are known to have spread respiratory viruses before" which is a reasonable starting point for an investigation and "clearly engineered".
      - water554 4y ago
  - water554 4y ago
hda111 4y ago
What medications cause anxiety and depression?
- reportingsjr 4y ago
  Birth control among many other medications.
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  Not exactly a medication but alcohol for one. But many other drugs can cause these sorts of symptoms too including anti-depressants paradoxically.
  - havblue 4y ago
    Do you mean a treatment for anxiety and depression or a cause? “Here's to alcohol: the cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems.” -Homer Simpson
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      Alcohol can definitely cause anxiety, and make anxiety worse. I will also suggest alcohol can trigger depression - but that is a claim that is ripe for debate and not well accepted. Alcohol can also "treat" (in the sense of suppressing symptoms) anxiety and depression, thus leading to a downward spiral since it tends to make these things worse, thus you get into the cycle of "Oh I'm feeling anxious, better have a beer - oh, now my anxiety is worse now that I have sobered up, better have more..."
      - robonerd 4y ago
        Alcohol objectively causes physiological CNS depression. Whether or not it necessarily causes the mood of depression or 'major depressive disorder' as diagnosed by clinical psychologists or psychiatrists is another matter.
- iamed2 4y ago
  Medications for anxiety and depression can cause brain fog and fatigue.
r00fus 4y ago
Was this study also with an average age of 71? (cohort was US veterans with 3 week vax interval. Also baseline mortality in the group was 1% over 6mo - definitely an older, vulnerable population). So yeah, not a representative study at all. And I'm someone who's somewhat concerned specifically about long covid.
jrnichols 4y ago
> I'm disappointed that Nature.com is engaging in this kind of sensational journalism. I am too, but it is not surprising. It's getting them page views. We're also going to be seeing "long covid" articles for years to come as it's going to be a goldmine for research funding.
- smt88 4y ago
  > It's getting them page views. But why do they need page views??? It's not like they're going to go bankrupt if they lose advertising revenue. Their greatest asset is their brand name, and they're destroying it for... what? It makes no sense.

swayvil 4y ago

andi999 4y ago
bamboozled 4y ago
Noticed this too!
baisq 4y ago
- SeanLuke 4y ago
  In what universe would getting vaccinated be getting conned? It's the smartest thing you could have done. AFAIK covid vaccines are not connected with heart issues beyond rather rare and generally mild cases of myocarditis, but getting covid is strongly connected to heart problems.
  - tuckerpo 4y ago
    Is it really fair to call any form of cardiovascular dysfunction "mild"?
    - qbasic_forever 4y ago
      Tons of people have atrial fibrillation or other easily managed or mild heart conditions. Many people have no idea they even have issues until they get an Apple watch and it starts alerting them that their heart rate is fluctuating unexpectedly.
    - micromacrofoot 4y ago
      Yes. In the rare instance of myocarditis post vaccination... most patients recovered after rest and medication. No other intervention necessary. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/myocarditis.html https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/vaccines/safety/my...

sudden_dystopia 4y ago

bee_rider 4y ago
Science is not actually sentient. I think it was expected/hope for by policy folks.
JumpCrisscross 4y ago
> What were they even right about with the vaccine? The things it was tested for. Preventing hospitalization and death from Covid. Which the Pfizer, Moderna and even J&J shots are terrifically good at. > credibility is going to be lost if we don’t pull heads out of butts So? The people who matter mostly got the message. People who wanted protection mostly got it.
- encoderer 4y ago
  I have taken both jnj and Moderna. But I have to admit that the grandparent has a point. It feels it’s almost heretical to say, but the vaccines were terribly over-sold. In the beginning they were sold as traditional vaccines - prevention against infection not just serious disease. But very soon we saw “breakthrough infections” (not even written about anymore as they are so common) and the goal posts started being moved. Public health establishment deserves a D- for their handling of the pandemic starting basically on day 1.
  - throwaway5752 4y ago
    The virus mutated and became more resistant, nobody should have to explain that to a grown-ass adult. The General Public deserves an F for civic-mindedness, being able to ascertain good sources of information on the internet, and scientific literacy. It's a miracle the vaccines were available as soon they were and it prevent hundreds of thousands if not millions of deaths globally. And you are mad about 3rd party marketing. We all collectively deserve what's coming.
    - 4y ago

JamesBarney 4y ago

The problem with a study like this is that they probably aren't doing a good job distinguish true long covid from psychosomatic long covid. And there is a lot of evidence that "long covid" correlates much more highly with pre-existing anxiety levels than disease severity. I think long covid exists I just think there is also a lot of psychosomatic long covid and until we have a good diagnostic criteria to differentiate the two it'll be really hard to study it.

ipaddr 4y ago
The media wants you to believe that the vaccine protects against longterm covid. If it doesn't many people would skip the upcoming 4th, 5th, 6th round because it is providing no additional protection against the latest variants. But here is an actual study that goes against this story. Will you believe science or myth? Are there enough excuses to keep the myth alive?
- californical 4y ago
  Why does the media care if you get a 4th dose? How does it help them?
  - r00fus 4y ago
    Pharma profits handsomely whenever government subsidizes more boosters.
    - micromacrofoot 4y ago
      The government isn't exactly rushing to 4th doses. They could authorize it for under 50s right now, but there's little evidence that it makes a significant difference, so they haven't. Also note that we still don't have vaccines for kids under 5. If the government wanted to line the pockets of pharma more, there's not a lot stopping them. So it's hard to take blanket statements about this seriously. I'm not denying that this has happened in the past, just that it's a lot more complicated than any single conspiracy theory.

SemanticStrengh 4y ago

I am wondering how much immune "budget" do humans have for vaccines? This topic is left unadressed and is extremely worrying, being an existential risk. Basically, the body has a limited amount of unspecialized naive T cells in its lifetime, mostly located/modulated in the thymus gland, which involute quickly with age. I suppose that 1) vaccines increase the rate of specialisation of naive T cells to mature t cells (hence the number of naive t cells diminish supraphysically)and I also believe that 2) those specific mature T cells, generating covid spike protein specific antibodies, have lost some or total ability to fight non-covid diseases as a cost of specialization. 1) would increase thymus involution rate and therefore age speed of immunosupression. 2) would reduce generic immune ability (learning other pathogens) 3) I believe the increased immune profile after a vaccine induce a long lasting (at least 6 month) increase of accelerated aging process in humans, via increased inflammation and therefore apoptosis, DNA mutations and oxidative stress, although in a mild form and hence in the medium term asymptomatic. Above all the premises I enumerated, the 2) is the one I would draw the most attention to, which can be reformulated as: do the repetitive administrations of a vaccine (here the 3 mRNA doses), reduce the effectiveness of the immune system for future non-COVID diseases, and even more importantly, does those doses reduce the immune learnability budget and therefore do those vaccines reduce the effectiveness of future vaccines against the next non-COVID pandemic? There has to be a limit to immune memory, the question is, after how many vaccines do the effect become non-negligible on aging? study backing chronic inflammation and therefore accelerated aging: > vaccine-induced hypermetabolic lymph nodes https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34857663/ https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34857663/ study backing the depletion of lymphocite T helper cell production: Study Shows Immune Cells Against Covid-19 Stay High in Number Six Months After Vaccination https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/study-shows-immune-cells-against-covid-19-stay-high-in-number-six-months-after-vaccination#:~:text=Study%20Shows%20Immune,who%20are%20unvaccinated https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/newsroom/news-releases/.... Moreover, I have an issue understanding why would vaccine not massively lose effectiveness after the age of 70 since at 70 the thymus has ~completely involuted (although maybe the stem cells in the bone marrow suffice?).

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
4y ago

smm11 4y ago

ThrowawayTestr 4y ago

Is there any evidence that "long covid" is actually a thing?

blenderdt 4y ago
No and yes. Long covid is nothing special. All virus infections can cause the same symptoms. The Epstein-Barr virus for example can make people tired for months.
- neverstop222 4y ago
  And years later can cause multiple sclerosis
tostonescon 4y ago
It sure seems like a lot of people in the medical community are taking it pretty seriously. Given the quantity of medical journal articles discussing long covid, I'm going to go with YES
vorpalhex 4y ago
People definitely report it and genuinely believe they have it.. but similar problems occur in a small subset of all people who recover from infectious diseases. So it may not be covid specific but it does seem to exist and with a wide ranging illness such as covid then obviously more overall people have it than from say pneumonia.
- robonerd 4y ago
  > People definitely report it and genuinely believe they have it.. This alone is not convincing, since hypochondriacs have never been rare in the first place and for the past few years have been encouraged and doubtlessly felt very vindicated.
  - smearth 4y ago
    If you understood how the brain creates pain and retains memory of the molecules that it interacts with you would understand that hyperchondria is a worse than useless diagnosis for anybody. Certain people are going to recover faster from illness than other people. It isn’t because they have better mental hygiene. They are fortunate. If you had long-covid you wouldn’t be able to type that because you would be mentally fatigued. Like Mike Tyson says, everyone’s got a plan until they get punched in the face. If your mitochondia locks up on you one day and your energy starts collapsing within 72hours of mild exertion I’d love seeing you blaming your own thinking to fix the situation while everyone else does. I don’t feel vindicated. I am beating chronic fatigue syndrome anyway, I have to do spinal strenthening exercises, I have to get plenty of sleep, I have eat healthily, I have to not do too much physical exercise in a day, I can’t sit for too long or I end up with post-exertional malaise. I think the people diagnosing other people with mental-disorders to explain what they couldn’t are going to get progressively more and more exposed as people find non-obvious ways to overcome their chronic multi-systemic health conditions. People are figuring it out. There is a psycho-somatic component. There is a physical component. It is brought on by viral illnesses. People with anxiety are prone to it but they are also prone to hypermobility(joint dislocation). One of us is right. I’d hope I’m not a delusional hyperchondriac. When my fibula pops out of my knee joint and I pop it back in and carry on with my day is that hyperchondria? Or could that be in some way related to managing chronic fatigue syndrome of which long-covid appears to be a sub-set. 60% of people with hyper-mobility have anxiety disorders. It doesn’t matter to me whether I’m right or you are right. All that matters to me is that I can sustain employment to rise up maslow’s hierarchy. I know that your approach would not have allowed me to do this because I tried it. Believe me I tried it.

bee_rider 4y ago

It seems like there must be a million confounding factors at thing point. Given that immunity eventually wanes and new variants show up, at what point is a person considered no longer 'vaccinated?' I get that people were excited to not need masks anymore, but I'm hanging on to my n95 in most indoor situations, even in my relatively low-risk region.

neverstop222 4y ago
If you are still wearing an n95 and your risk avoidance criteria remain stable, you will be wearing one in public for the rest of your life. That's your choice, and it's your right, but it's absolutely bonkers, and if you think it should be mandated, you're a totalitarian.
- bee_rider 4y ago
  Unfortunately I can't really afford "brain fog" at the moment, and we're still apparently finding out new information about long COVID and vaccines, so I guess it turns out this wasn't actually bonkers.
  - neverstop222 4y ago
    I'm sure there are lots of diseases that could dehabilitate you; my wife has brain fog from her multiple sclerosis and is still brave enough to go back to regular life because she understands that the risks of serious outcomes from the extant strains are incredibly low, and somehow she manages to be a successful professional with the brain fog. Life is a risk. You have a lower chance of serious outcome -- assuming you're relatively healthy and younger than 80 -- from the extant strains than you have risk from driving. You can choose to face the risks of life and live, or grow old and die sad and scared. I choose to be inspired by my wife's courage in the face of her brain fog. Our time on this planet is limited, and spending it afraid is a waste.
    - bee_rider 4y ago
      Risk evaluation is a matter of tradeoffs. Since I can easily avoid this particular danger and I don't benefit from engaging in it, it isn't 'brave' to get rid of my masks, just foolish. I'd rather spend my risk budget on things more interesting than showing my chin off at the grocery store.

bergenty 4y ago

niklasbuschmann 4y ago

I found the study „Association between vaccination status and reported incidence of post-acute COVID-19 symptoms in Israel“ (https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.01.05.22268800v2.full.pdf https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2022.01.05.22268800v...) quite interesting. See https://postimg.cc/HjjsR2SF https://postimg.cc/HjjsR2SF for a overview of the results.