News about Long Covid including its relationship to ME/CFS 2020 to 2021

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They Got COVID-19. Months Later, They’re Still Sick. Who Are the COVID Long-Haulers?

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Notably, some providers have observed that long COVID appears similar to another condition: myalgic encephalomyelitis, or chronic fatigue syndrome. Infectious disease expert and White House adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci has pointed out the parallels, and in October, the U.S. ME/CFS Clinician Coalition wrote a letter encouraging providers to consider ME/CFS – which can occur after a person suffers from an infectious disease – as a diagnosis among long-haul patients.

"Given the similarity in symptoms and the preceding infectious illness, we recommend that you consider a diagnosis of post-viral fatigue syndrome or ME/CFS … in the differential diagnosis of those patients who remain ill for an extended time following a COVID-19 infection and meet established ME/CFS criteria," the coalition wrote.

In February, the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke additionally acknowledged the overlapping symptoms and said research was being done with that knowledge in mind.

"Through these studies, we hope to identify new targets for therapies and preventive measures and to soon welcome a future in which no one must live with ME/CFS or (post-acute COVID syndrome)," wrote Dr. Nina Schor, the institute's deputy director."

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-...s-plagued-by-symptoms-as-experts-seek-answers

 
NY Times
Long Covid Is Not Rare. It’s a Health Crisis.

Tracking long Covid in a more comprehensive way is vital to understand the full impact of Covid-19, and for governments to make decisions about funding research into long-term symptoms. Illnesses and conditions that are thought to be “rare” are often not researched as thoroughly.

We’ve seen this before with myalgic encephalomyelitis, also known as chronic fatigue syndrome. Because ME/CFS, as it is also called, is difficult to diagnose, many patients have gone uncounted, and research into treatments and cures remains underfunded compared to other illnesses. As a result, clinicians tend to be undereducated and patients are less likely to receive adequate care and government support. There’s a risk of repeating this cycle with people with long Covid.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/17/opinion/long-covid.html
 
Children and the return to school: how much should we worry about covid-19 and long covid?

Among the unknowns that have featured in the steep learning curve of our covid-19 year, the question of risks to (and from) children has been an ongoing area of uncertainty. At first, the conundrum that the young seemed so little affected by the infection prompted at least one world leader to pronounce that they were “somehow immune.”

A year into the pandemic we have a much clearer perspective, especially from random testing surveys such as R, seroprevalence studies, and contact tracing studies. The overwhelming observation has been that, across the pandemic, children and adolescents are considerably less likely to be affected by severe disease or to be admitted to hospital. In transmission tracing studies, children are roughly half as likely as adults to become infected.1 While this is still the case, during the latest wave the age distribution of cases has shifted downwards.

https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n701
 
Mij said:
My GP acknowledged during my tele-consult today that there are many similarities. and that it was 'serious'.
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How odd that it wasn't seen as such a year or more ago, given I would imagine your symptoms are probably roughly the same as then.

Presumably that suggests that something is only a serious medical issue not on it's own merits but instead only if the media is looking.
 
Wonko said:
How odd that it wasn't seen as such a year or more ago, given I would imagine your symptoms are probably roughly the same as then.

Presumably that suggests that something is only a serious medical issue not on it's own merits but instead only if the media is looking.
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Most people seem entirely influenced by media narratives. In recent months I've had some interactions with doctors who have for the first time ever acknowledged the gravity of my illness after totally dismissing it for years. Why? Because they saw first-hand the effect of long covid on their staff and in some cases patients. Mind boggling.
 
Andy said:
Children and the return to school: how much should we worry about covid-19 and long covid?

Among the unknowns that have featured in the steep learning curve of our covid-19 year, the question of risks to (and from) children has been an ongoing area of uncertainty. At first, the conundrum that the young seemed so little affected by the infection prompted at least one world leader to pronounce that they were “somehow immune.”

A year into the pandemic we have a much clearer perspective, especially from random testing surveys such as R, seroprevalence studies, and contact tracing studies. The overwhelming observation has been that, across the pandemic, children and adolescents are considerably less likely to be affected by severe disease or to be admitted to hospital. In transmission tracing studies, children are roughly half as likely as adults to become infected.1 While this is still the case, during the latest wave the age distribution of cases has shifted downwards.

https://www.bmj.com/content/372/bmj.n701
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Lots of kids are asymptomatic, ( school testing in England will be interesting )
Any parent knows full well how good at communicating disease and infections children are - why should COVID be any different.
 
Long Covid: could chronic fatigue syndrome be taken seriously at last?

‘Long Covid’ has become shorthand for a wide range of post-viral symptoms experienced by some patients following a Covid-19 infection. Cases of chronic fatigue after acute respiratory illness are far from unprecedented, but the scale at which they are now occurring is unprecedented. Advocates for patients with similar illnesses are now hoping that the attention being given to long Covid could help improve care for these illnesses as well. Chloe Kent reports.

https://pharma.nridigital.com/pharma_apr21/long_covid_chronic_fatigue
 
Is this simply Russian roulette? Oh, nothing to be worried about, just 1-10% chance of your life as you know it being over, no big deal. People spend thousands on insurance every year for things with far lower odds of happening.


The ‘long Covid’ time bomb: an interview with Tim Spector

https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-long-covid-time-bomb-an-interview-with-tim-spector

And unsurprisingly there’s already a great angry divide on the subject. There are the long Covid forums full of desperate, exhausted men and women — long-haulers they call themselves — suffering from breathlessness, hair loss, gut pain and crippling headaches. And then there’s the snap-out-of-it crowd, for whom long Covid is just another excuse for malingering. It’s ME all over again, they say.

Is long Covid simply ME? I ask Spector. Is it identical to other post-viral syndromes or is there a set of symptoms specific to it? ‘There are some similarities with the general post-viral thing but there are also some very specific things that set it apart: Covid toes; autoimmune skin rashes… you generally don’t get diarrhoea, you don’t get intermittent fevers,’ he says. ‘Yes, headache, fatigue and shortness of breath and muscle pain might be common to a number of them, but there are significant differences.’ Other disease experts agree. ‘It appears that post-Covid symptoms tend to be more common, severe and longer-lasting than other viral illnesses, such as influenza,’ says Timothy Hendrich, a viral immunologist at the University of California.
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Turns out not understanding the thing you compare to makes for bad comparisons. Paying attention is underrated, the attention to detail in medicine goes from 100 all the way down to 0 at times.

"Show me someone with Long Flu", they say. Someone with Long Flu raises their hands and says "ME". "Sit down", they say, indifferent to being wrong about what they thought was a rhetorical point.
 
The Medical System Should Have Been Prepared for Long COVID

https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjp...repared-for-long-haul-covid-patients-symptoms

COVID long haulers have been breathlessly covered, but there’s nothing surprising about medically unexplained symptoms—or the reaction to them.
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Touches on the broader issue of MUS and how this is a long-standing problem in medicine.

Replies to the author from physicians pretty much emphasize the point of how reactionary "psychosomatic medicine" is:

 
Sly Saint said:
"things that set it apart: Covid toes; autoimmune skin rashes… you generally don’t get diarrhoea, you don’t get intermittent fevers,’"

covid toes ie chillblains aside maybe, but the other things I would think are quite common in pwME.
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My daughters feet are a colour that you would expect to find a morgue tag on.
After walking to loo and back they go from frozen to chillblains , literally feel as though they are on fire, and colour has changed.
It may not look the same as COVID, but there may be a similar underlying mechanism
 
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