Andy
Retired committee member
We have a unique window to analyze how the virus overlaps with chronic illnesses – but medicine has a habit of dismissing women who suffer from them
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On day 16, Helene finally woke up with energy. “I did this long walk. I came back, and I was in the garden, lying in the sun. And then I felt I was getting a migraine.” At first she thought nothing of it, putting it down to spring pollen causing hay fever. But then it got worse. “I developed this sinus pain and then it turned into nausea, and my whole body ached. So I went to bed. I don’t think I was ever the same after that.”
Helene was recounting this story to me in August 2020, five months after contracting Covid-19. Her story is not unusual. Her description of feeling better and then getting even sicker after exercise has a medical name: post-exertional malaise. It is common in patients with post-viral fatigue and is a hallmark of chronic fatigue syndrome or myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME) and some other overlapping chronic pain conditions.
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This is an excerpt from Pain and Prejudice: How the Medical System Ignores Women –And What We Can Do About It, by Gabrielle Jackson, available now from Greystone Books. Excerpted with permission of the publisher.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/mar/25/women-coronavirus-long-covid-health
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On day 16, Helene finally woke up with energy. “I did this long walk. I came back, and I was in the garden, lying in the sun. And then I felt I was getting a migraine.” At first she thought nothing of it, putting it down to spring pollen causing hay fever. But then it got worse. “I developed this sinus pain and then it turned into nausea, and my whole body ached. So I went to bed. I don’t think I was ever the same after that.”
Helene was recounting this story to me in August 2020, five months after contracting Covid-19. Her story is not unusual. Her description of feeling better and then getting even sicker after exercise has a medical name: post-exertional malaise. It is common in patients with post-viral fatigue and is a hallmark of chronic fatigue syndrome or myalgic encephalomyelitis (CFS/ME) and some other overlapping chronic pain conditions.
....
This is an excerpt from Pain and Prejudice: How the Medical System Ignores Women –And What We Can Do About It, by Gabrielle Jackson, available now from Greystone Books. Excerpted with permission of the publisher.
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2021/mar/25/women-coronavirus-long-covid-health
