At low chances, there are severe symptoms and death, which obviously are not good outcomes. At higher chances seem to be less severe but long-term systemic effects, and I'm particularly concerned about cognitive impairment. Studies show a measurable overall impact in people who have seemingly recovered from the virus.
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Long covid is a bitch, truly. I know of one person who suffers heavily from it, and another who has a persistent cough but is otherwise fine.
However, I simply lack the data to analyze this myself (if you have data, please share!).
I've seen studies claiming that 30% of "light" recoveries develop long covid, symptoms of which range from the neurological to the cardiac to mental health issues ... just about anything except cancer.
Something just smells off to me about the really wide-spread range and high occurrence of symptoms.
Note: I'm NOT a medical expert. Maybe this is not as abnormal as I think it is.
But anecdotally, for example:
Israel has had ~1.3 million cases since the start of the pandemic, or ~14% of the population. I find it hard to believe that we have ~400k (~4.2%) long covid haulers with severe impact to their health and yet VERY few people seem to know anyone who's had long-lasting effects.
In comparison, almost everyone here seems to know a family who lost a son to war, despite statistically this being a very rare occurrence.
I'm fully aware that this is definitely not a scientific approach, but it's what I have. If long covid was truly that common, it would be impossible to ignore.
I'm not downplaying its severity - but the situation on the ground doesn't match what the studies show.
P.S. I have no idea why in that meta-analysis they added the Swiss study that looked at patients "5.5 ± 2.4 days post ICU discharge". I can't imagine returning to proper cognitive function a week after being discharged from the ICU for any reason. The other studies involved seem to be decent (at a glance), however.
I was cognitively impaired for at least 2 weeks after breaking my ankle and being at home on opiates for 3 days.
Thanks for confirming! I vaguely remember that some of the studies looked over longer periods of time, but this just further proves that the Swiss study is hot air
I just got done watching Dopesick (about Oxycontin) which is essential viewing btw...
It made me look in my cupboard because I remember being given opiates after the rebuild of my ankle with a titanium insert. I found that I'd been given 20x5mg of Oxycodone which is functionally the same but without the slow release feature. I took only 11 pills out of the 20 I was given because I know that stuff is bad news and switched myself to over the counter pills.
Anyone in ICU is probably going to receive something that messes with their head in a significant way...
I just looked at that study! 100% mechanical ventilation!!! That means complete sedation for days!!! I can't imagine anyone being impaired 5.5 days after surviving that.
Guess I'll have to check it out. I've heard a lot about the opioid crisis to know to stay away. My dad was given opioids against his will (so I understood) and I don't understand how he's OK with it in retrospect.
I agree entirely, that and the Brazilian study both had 100% mechanical ventilation (some other studies had 50, 30% etc) but I see that their numbers aren't TOO high compared to the rest. So in theory, they shouldn't skew the results too much, but it's still a travesty that these studies got pooled in.
I really have to sit down and go over the meta-analysis properly, maybe they divided long covid outcomes dependent on how severe the covid was to begin with and I just missed it.