[bb2018]

I do wonder if this is proportional to your symptoms/proportional to other ailments.

For instance, is someone with Covid (who was on the verge of needing oxygen) more likely to have long term symptoms than someone the same age who got the flu/pneumonia (and was also on the verge of needing oxygen).

In other words - is there something unique about Covid? Or is that any disease that sets you back has serious long-term consequences, and Covid is just statistically much more likely to do that than the flu, for example.

[f38zf5vdt]

For me varicella-zoster was the causative agent. I had a lot of trouble being taken seriously by friends/some medical staff after I said that I had serious issues after a bad infection with it, because of most people believe it to be a relatively benign disease. I think it's the case that most viruses will cause chronic disease in a small subset of people.

> “If Covid didn’t cause chronic symptoms to occur in some people,” PolyBio Research Foundation microbiologist Amy Proal told Vox, “it would be the only virus that didn’t do that.”

> Even with growing awareness about long Covid, patients with chronic “medically unexplained” symptoms — that don’t correspond to problematic blood tests or imaging — are still too often minimized and dismissed by health professionals. It’s a frustrating blind spot in health care, but one that can’t be as easily ignored with so many new patients entering this category, said Megan Hosey, assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Department of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.

https://www.vox.com/22298751/long-term-side-effects-covid-19...

[TaupeRanger]

It's frustrating but it's not a blind spot - we simply have no way to help these patients. You have brain fog and occasionally your heart feels like it's beating out of your chest for no discernable reason? Sorry, there's nothing we can do...try exercising and getting good sleep, we guess?

[fragmede]

We (humanity) can still treat the symptoms - and the damage they cause. Eg the specific mechanism for covid-induced heart palpitations may not yet be understood, but a heart rate of 160 or even higher for prolonged periods will damage the heart. Beta blockers will manage that - but not all doctors have been willing to prescribe medication to people that clearly need it.

[TaupeRanger]

Rarely have I heard of sustained 160 BPM heart rate as a post-COVID symptom. Likely something else would be going on there. Mostly it's vague symptoms, maybe you have 90-120 BPM, but then it goes away by the time you see the doctor the next day. Beta blockers have their own problems and you don't want to just start prescribing them for these vague, transient symptoms.

[fragmede]

It's frustrating that it took an an at-home heart rate monitor and a smartphone video of my heart rate for my cardiologist to do something about it (they sent me home w/ an ECG for a day or so), but I eventually managed to get a prescription for it. Doctor still can't explain the "something else going on there" but thankfully my heart rate no longer spikes for no apparent reason.

[dangom]

The SARS-CoV-2 virus binds to a specific receptor (ACE2) that is expressed in a multitude of different cells in our bodies, most curiously the endothelial cells that line up your vessels. Some hypothesis suggest that the disruption of the systems associated with ACE2 is what causes downstream effects that lead to symptoms of COVID. By virtue of infecting blood vessels, the virus can cause them to stop functioning properly, and thus impair the supply of oxygen to otherwise healthy tissue. These hypoxic microlesions, which have been found even in the brain of patient populations, could in turn be responsible for some of the sequelae that the infection leaves behind after the end of acute period of the disease.

The extent to which damage is caused, and the extent to which the body can recover will evidently dictate the period of convalescence. Because symptoms vary wildly from case to case, pinpointing general routes of treatment or estimating the duration of recovery is a highly complex problem.

[bb2018]

I obviously realize that influenza does not attack the body in the same way with the same receptors - but it obviously attacks the body in its own unique way.

It rarely causes serious health consequences but for the people it does (I've known younger people sent hospital with it) are there long term consequences on the same order of magnitude? It doesn't seem like the data really exists for this.

[Jefro118]

I believe one difference with Covid is that people often have issues across multiple organs (I believe this is because the virus binds to ACE2 receptors which are present over the body, not an expert though) whereas with flu/pnemuonia I think it's more likely to be just generic fatigue and lung capacity as longer term effects.

I think the sheer range of long lasting symptoms is quite unique to Covid, although other diseases like Ebola or Smallpox would leave more severe damage.

[jacquesm]

Good question, and one that I would like to have the answer to too. I also wonder what the effects are on longer term immunity, apparently there is some evidence that if you had a more serious case that your immunity will be longer lasting but I have yet to find something that is conclusive.

[dennis_jeeves]

>In other words - is there something unique about Covid?

No is my guess, based on anecdotes, experience and observation.