Thread by @LongCovKidsScot

Brilliant easy to read article 👇👇👇

TL;DR
👉~14% of people who catch covid-19 end up with lasting symptoms: ~25 million people worldwide.
👉Could be big underestimate - less than 10% of infections detected - true figure could be nearer 250 million.

sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

👉No universally agreed definition.
👉NIHR divide #LongCovid into 4 groups: those with after-effects of ventilation; those with organ damage caused by #SARSCoV2; those with post-viral fatigue syndrome; miscellaneous group that the authors call those with long-term covid syndrome.

👉One puzzling feature: those most prone to long covid aren't those most likely to get sick from the initial infection.
👉women 30% more likely to get it than men
👉35 to 69-year-olds are the age group most often affected (ONS)
👉WHO working to agree a clinical case definition.

👉Causes? 3 broad ideas: persistent viral infections; lasting tissue damage caused by the virus; and immune system changes.
👉There is evidence to support all 3 (Akiko Iwasaki, Yale School of Medicine)
👉Evidence that fragments of SARS-CoV-2 could linger for months.

👉Treatment: "It's really focused on treating the symptoms, because we don't know the cause" Melissa Heightman, UCL Hospitals
👉Aren't enough clinics or specialists. “We can't refer everyone to a long covid clinic, they'd just be inundated,” Kamlesh Khunti,University of Leicester

👉WHO working on separate definition for long covid in young people.
👉#Longcovidkids needs more consideration in UK gov plans, Layla Moran, LibDem MP
👉“Long tail of covid is real & will only get worse if the virus is allowed to let rip among the unvaccinated younger population”

👉To deal with long covid in children, “you have to be more serious about preventing children getting the infection in the first place” @Dr2NisreenAlwan
👉🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿15 specialist long-covid services for children.

#LongCovidKids #LongCovid #MaskUp #Masks #vaccination #MakeSchoolsSafe