[Llamamoe]

It takes very severe disability for it not to be brushed off as depression, anxiety, burnout, or blamed on lifestyle.

Additionally, a lot of those numbers are based on earlier strains of COVID, which were much more severe.

I suspect the 1/5 figure is largely true for "has some degree of cardiovascular damage and worsened general health after COVID", but the number of people actually disabled by the condition is much lower.

That said, any loss of ability is a sad thing, and I am incredibly disappointed that we did not introduce any shared indoor space air quality legislation post-pandemic.

[notmyjob]

And the lipid nanoparticle based Covid prevention shots caused myocarditis in some younger males, so earlier incidence of cardiovascular complications vs. the present (when most people especially younger healthy males are choosing not to take updated boosters) would correlate with that as well.

[Llamamoe]

They did but if you go through the actual studies, the incidence of myocarditis was low, and almost all cases were non-serious, with no measured long-term impacts.

Further, the studies on long COVID incidence in vaccinated vs unvaccinated people suggested that the rates in vaccinated individuals were lower, though iirc it was only by something like a third or half. (among people who were symptomatic, at least, the total protective effect was likely greater)

[clanky]

The one Thai prospective study that I saw on this subject (the only one I ever found which measured biomarkers of heart damage like troponin before and after injection, which is utterly shameful), estimated a rate of heart damage in adolescent males in the range of 1-3%. So even that would be nowhere near enough to reach the 1/5 number.

[cjbgkagh]

I got pericarditis bad enough that I thought it was going to kill me but not bad enough to show up in any test. Thankfully the cardiologist accepted my description of what I felt and prescribed me colchicine which worked. I guess it would be called subclinical pericarditis and it would be good to have some stats on how often that happens.

[notmyjob]

I suspect many people commit the grave sin of mixing data sources to derive percentages, which seems almost impossible not to do in this case. I also strongly suspect that rates of infection (the denominator in question) were inflated to some extent during the pandemic as insurers and hmo were incentivized to detect covid even when it may not have been the primary reason for presenting. There were also disincentives or at least a lack of incentive to detect teratogenic effects of the lipid nanoparticle based preventative, and unfortunately likely personal biases as the preventative was highly politicized. But I’m not thinking about it much deeper than that, so you may be right.

[Llamamoe]

The reported rates might have been inflated compared to what people presented with, but wastewater tracking and excess death measures all suggest that as a whole, infections were severely under-counted, possibly by a factor of up to over 2x.

Majority of the studies on myocarditis after vaccination found very low rates, with close to zero moderate to serious cases, and a full return to baseline of whatever the metrics studied were, I don't remember.

[notmyjob]

So if we were undercounting the denominator and over-counting the numerator (long covid) that would support my initial conjecture right?

[swed420]

> Additionally, a lot of those numbers are based on earlier strains of COVID, which were much more severe.

Long COVID associated with SARS-CoV-2 reinfection among children and adolescents in the omicron era

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/laninf/article/PIIS1473-3...

(The same omicron era the media originally claimed was "not as bad as previous variants." Perhaps not in the acute phase, but as we've seen, that's the least of anybody's concerns who track the longterm risks.)

> I am incredibly disappointed that we did not introduce any shared indoor space air quality legislation post-pandemic.

That seems like a tempting thing to lament, and I did too until seeing this recently:

Study finds HEPA purifiers alone may not be enough to reduce viral exposure in schools

https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1101354

This suggests our most reliable protection to date is consistent N95 usage (since present vaccines don't reliably prevent transmission) until next gen vaccines are developed.

[Llamamoe]

There's more to air quality than HEPA filters. In-line far UV sterilisation, ventilation to reduce rebreathing and CO2 levels, and HEPA might not be enough as a single-building intervention, but it would almost definitely change disease spread dynamics if deployed world/nation wide.

[swed420]

> There's more to air quality than HEPA filters.

Agreed. In fact, even before COVID this was long overdue to be addressed in classrooms etc:

> ventilation to reduce rebreathing and CO2 levels

Unfortunately since that hasn't happened yet, methods like:

> In-line far UV sterilisation

> HEPA

are not effective. It isn't that they don't kill/stop the virus. The problem traces back to the inadequate forced air exchange and distribution which these methods require, and which is often a show stopper when you're talking about retrofitting existing structures without costs becoming insane. At a certain point it's easier to build new with these things in mind (and we absolutely should be taking requirements to do so more seriously).

> might not be enough as a single-building intervention, but it would almost definitely change disease spread dynamics if deployed world/nation wide.

The point of the previously linked study is to demonstrate that "something is better than nothing" reasoning doesn't always apply. We need to go big to see an actual measurable improvement over longer time spans. Otherwise, what's the benefit seen if you delay an average (but inevitable) infection from occurring by X days? There basically is none.

[Llamamoe]

> Otherwise, what's the benefit seen if you delay an average (but inevitable) infection from occurring by X days? There basically is none.

It reduces the R0 factor, which reduces the amount of people that need to be resistant for herd immunity to take place, and which makes it easier for other measures to bring it down further, potentially below 1 where the disease dies out instead of continuing to spread.

[swed420]

> It reduces the R0 factor

The results of the study suggest it doesn't, as measured by outcomes:

> While we did not find an association between HEPA purifier use and high overall viral exposure, the intervention was associated with a 32.8% reduction in viral diversity. However, the clinical significance of these changes is not clear given that we did not find an association between viral diversity and school absenteeism.

Point being, it only takes a very small dose of a aerosol borne virus to keep it in circulation. Breaking this chain requires extreme measures. Not impossible to achieve, but not trivial, either. Considering the widespread damage that long COVID is causing, I sincerely hope we find a way.

[Arete314159]

It's a layered approach. There's not one silver bullet. But sending kids to school without clean air upgrades is criminal.

[wahnfrieden]

The legislation and policy changes being introduced is to remove funding and access to vaccines. Of course we will not legislate for clean air.