Thread by @sheencr

Today is #LongCovidAwarenessDay
LongCovid is a condition comprising often severe symptoms that can affect many different organs. It occurs following infection with SARS-CoV-2. Symptoms include cardiovascular, respiratory, neurological as summarised by @EricTopol and colleagues

Its REALLY common. Estimates vary - it occurs in at least 10% of Covid 19 infections and around 65 million individuals worldwide are estimated to have Long Covid.

It can occur irrespective of severity of the initial disease and any person of any age can be affected. The highest percentage of diagnoses are between the ages of 36 and 50 years but even children are affected. longcovidkids.org

Long COVID is persistent- with data emerging that in those with long COVID, the rate in which symptoms affected daily life decreased from 45% → 25% over 7 months. That’s a LONG time for ANYONE to suffer.

and also has massive economic implications e.g. tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…

We don’t yet know WHY it is happening but there is clear underlying biology and immunology. For example some individuals have latent viral reservoirs, some have immune abnormalities causing autoimmunity and some have clotting abnormalities. nature.com/articles/s4157…

This is still with us, although vaccination and prior infection have created some immunity-there is still a risk. e.g. In UK, risk of long COVID dropped after 2nd infections compared to 1st (4% → 2.4%). Risk is clearly NOT zero.

COVID-19 infection is NOT a trivial thing and it can still cause severe disease in some individuals and the risk of LongCovid MUST be acknowledged. We are learning more about this condition but we need to be able to better diagnose, treat it and support those with this condition.