Exactly. Those who are all for "let's go back to normal" are literally telling those who are more at "risk" they don't care if those "vulnerable" people die
BUT
Here is the lie within the lie by many policy makers. Covid is Russian roulette. The "other" could be you #LongCovid
Of course, vaccination has made it more difficult to die or suffer severe disease. This is good! But you never know what happens if you get infected. You don't know if it's you to get #LongCovid. We have already reports about Long Covid happening even in the vaccinated.
It was the same in early 2020: do you remember?
"Only the old and sick will die" "covid is a flu" many policy makers said. This was not true. Many people hospitalized in Wuhan --as per the publications in January 2020 --weren't old. Covid was already proven to be a SARS disease
SARS had left many with chronic disease #longSARS. This was already known before the pandemic. Viral-onset diseases aren't unheard of from before the pandemic! e.g. #MECFS
All of this to say: it's key we don't lose sight of safety for everyone. It's important we keep protections up. It's important we keep airborne prevention in use, like masks. It's important to vaccinate, test, isolate and seek care if you are ill. No room for useless risks
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Five years ago today the term #LongCovid was first used as a Twitter hashtag. A single tweet by a patient linked together a growing, grassroots movement of people who weren't recovering from Covid. Across the world, we were fighting for recognition and studying our own disease
I feel strange posting this again after five years of fighting, suffering, and a global, grassroot mobilization of Covid survivors, who changed how Covid was understood and communicated to the public
Far from being a short, respiratory illness in most, dangerous only for the "old and frail", as said in early guidelines, Covid was a prolonged, multi-system disease, which could be severe and even fatal also in the "young and healthy": #LongCovid
A severe surge in Covid cases is reported in Asian countries.
"In Hong Kong, weekly cases surged over 30 times in 10 weeks. Cases also surged by nearly 30 per cent in a week in Singapore. There are also reports of significant surges in China and Thailand" indiatoday.in/diu/story/in-n…
There also seems to be a raise in certain indicators about Covid in Italy, such as child hospitalizations, in Italy, where novel variants of concern have been detected
However, surveillance in the country remains low
Biopsies of five patients with myocarditis in #LongCovid showed disruption of mitochondrial integrity in the heart. This research was replicated in mice and shed light on the profound cardiovascular impact of SARS-CoV-2 infection on cardiovascular health sciencedirect.com/science/articl…
The team's "investigation provides histopathological and electron microscopic analyses from endomyocardial biopsies of five patients who experienced various post-COVID-19 cardiovascular outcomes." such as myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle)
"Electron microscopy revealed widespread mitochondrial disorder and the presence of myofilament degradation within the cardiomyocytes from the patients.
Similar mitochondria disorganization were found in SARS-CoV-2 infected mice."
I appreciate WHO raising awareness about Long Covid. I, however, considered, and still consider, a great mistake to have declared the end of Covid "as a global emergency" two years ago. This contributed to minimize the ongoing risks of SARS-CoV-2 infection, including death and LC
We must also interrogate ourselves as to whether LC is (only) 6% of people who get Covid (as per WHO quote). I think further reflection is needed here, especially when taking into consideration sub-clinical pathology and those who are never diagnosed with LC.
(Not making any assumptions about prevalence and incidence of LC in this thread myself, as there are so many issues to consider, as I have already pointed out many times. I think, however, health bodies should be careful around this point, too.)
New PET imaging data reveal the long-term impact of COVID on heart and lungs, showing changes to these organs which are not detectable by standard medical assessments.
"We [study's authors] believe long COVID results in an inflammatory response that may predispose patients to premature coronary artery disease, pulmonary hypertension, and valvular damage such as stenosis or regurgitation."
Study on 100 patients who were treated for COVID in 🇺🇸 between December 2020 and July 2021. Nearly one year after their initial infection, each patient was struggling with lingering cardiopulmonary symptoms; 91 underwent hybrid 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose PET/MRI
NVC test shows significant microvascular damage in #LongCovid patients vs matched healthy controls. Dilated capillaries, microhaemorrhages, abnormal shapes and reduced capillary density are still detectable in LC 12 months after acute SARS-CoV-2 infection rmdopen.bmj.com/content/11/2/e…
Background to the study "SARS-CoV-2 induces endothelial and capillary damage, that is detectable by nailfold videocapillaroscopy (NVC)."
"NVC [had showed in prior research] significant capillary dilations, microhaemorrhages and abnormal shapes in the acute phase of COVID-19 and significant reduction of nailfold capillary density in the short-term recovery phase (3 months)."