Thread by @loscharlos

I just found out author of this fantastic piece — @sophiehh14 — is mutual friend of my cousin. Both went to @Stanford together.

#LongCovid is literally everywhere — hiding in plain site. So many people are sick, very few are aware of it.
thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/…

"I don’t share any of this to get pity. I cringe at the thought of it. That’s why, for a long time, I resisted writing this piece. I wanted my health journey to be my business."

EXACTLY — Nobody wants to share, but we see no else way forward.
thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/…

“Before the pandemic, I was a law student who spent my weekdays studying for long hours & my weekends hiking or cycling. When I developed COVID-19 symptoms in March 2020, my case was mild, initially, as was the case for most healthy young people.. But then I never got better.”

“I spent the first year of the pandemic getting sicker & sicker, until I became mostly housebound, unable to walk around the block, and unable to sit up or think straight for long enough to hold down a job or continue my coursework.” #LongCovid

“One by one, I said goodbye to the pieces of my old life — coursework, exercise, time with friends, my ability to live independently — until all that was left was spending almost all day horizontal, occasionally sitting up for food or drink, or standing to walk to the bathroom”

“It’s hard to appreciate how much energy breathing takes until you’ve experienced the bone-deep fatigue that makes you acutely aware of the effort to expand your ribcage for each breath.” #LongCovid thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/…

“While COVID-19 is a new illness, post-infection chronic illnesses including #MECFS have been recognized for decades, but massively under researched. Now, COVID-19 long haulers join the millions of others with post-infectious chronic illness.. been left in limbo, lives on pause”

“If our government’s current plan for #LongCovid is to literally let hundreds of thousands of British Columbians develop a chronic illness for which there is no treatment and minimal support, then it’s past time we had an honest conversation about it.”thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/…

“#LongCovid turned my life upside down. Amidst all the loss I’ve experienced, there’s been the cognitive dissonance of watching most of the rest of the world try to return to normal.. unaware of the reality that COVID-19 is.. resulting in long-term chronic illness”

“Part of the insidious nature of this illness is how easily it is rendered invisible. Those who are sickest are housebound or even bedbound. Our communities don’t see what we’re going through.” #LongCovid

“Even for longhaulers who aren’t housebound, their illness often is not visible. They may not share details with colleagues or friends due to fear of stigma. Many can still work full time, but must follow complex medication regimens ..They may no longer be able to exercise”

“There can be no ‘return to normal’ as long as COVID-19 continues to trigger chronic illness & disability en masse. The push to return to normal amounts to a denial or wilful ignorance of #LongCovid”thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/…

“While it’s understandable to want to put all the fear from the pandemic behind us, it’s inexcusable for those responsible for public health to look the other way while more and more British Columbians get sick.” #LongCovid

“It is common knowledge within disability community, but foreign concept outside of it: Anyone, at any time, could become disabled. This has always been true.. perhaps especially when a virus that causes brain damage &.. chronic illnesses continues to circulate at a high level.”

“Yet I doubt many non-disabled people have fully grasped this.. If the non-disabled majority understood they, too, could at any point develop a chronic illness that rendered them unable to work, surely disability assistance rates below poverty line would be politically untenable”

“Maybe, buried deep in the minds of the not-yet-disabled, there is an ableist belief that chronically ill people just aren’t trying hard enough. Maybe it’s just too uncomfortable to even consider the possibility of suddenly becoming debilitatingly ill, with no end in sight.”

“I remember, at the beginning of the pandemic, hearing from housebound chronically ill people about how lockdowns made participation in public life more accessible for them. With everyone interacting online from home, they had equal access to cultural events for the first time.”

“My not-yet-disabled self had never considered that… The only reason I was able to stay in school for the first year of my illness is because courses were online. But now that non-disabled UCB law students no longer need remote access, there are no more online.. law courses”

“In their book The Future is Disabled, disability justice writer Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (@thellpsx), ‘access is created, it gets taken away/destroyed, but it can be created again.’ The first waves of the pandemic saw brief acknowledgement of the needs”

“The current approach to COVID-19 is simultaneously ‘removing disabled people’s access to public life while creating more disabled people,’ writes American disability activist Charis Hill (@BeingCharisBlog).”

“I don’t know if my health will ever be what it was.. I am focused now not on trying to magically get my life back.. but on how to live the fullest life I can with this sick body. I am planning for my own disabled future — while dreaming of a better collective one.”

“Let’s get serious about protecting population health from the long-term effects of COVID-19 as best we can. All while preparing for a more disabled future, with more accessibility and collective care.” thetyee.ca/Analysis/2023/…

This is probably the best #LongCovid piece I’ve read centering the existing disability framework & movement in the context of LC — we really need to think about that & discuss it much more — great stuff @sophiehh14

@LisaAMcCorkell @SFdirewolf @StephTaitWrites @exceedhergrasp1