Technically, for Metformin, the use they're recommending is for preventing long COVID before it starts, not for symptom reduction in already sick people.
News from Germany
- Thread starter TiredSam
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- germany me/cfs news regional thread
Yes, that's fair and an important distinction; I should have noted it - I'll admit I was probably too focused on my own interest here (treatment vs. prophylaxis).
Not sure why this is in the news again, this is just the same announcement from months ago right: https://www.bfarm.de/DE/Arzneimittel/Zulassung/Zulassungsrelevante-Themen/Expertengruppe-Long-COVID-Off-Label-Use/_node.html ?
Jonathan Edwards
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
This seems very strange.
It almost sems to be a recognition that German doctors need some placebos handy to deal with the LC patients.
Atypical anti-depressants can produce some pretty horrific side-effects too.
“In the Bundesliga match between @tsghoffenheim and @1FSVMainz05, players and referees gathered on the pitch before kickoff with a clear message: CURE ME/CFS!Another powerful and successful campaign by http://EmptyStands.me “
If the match is in Germany, why is the sign in English?
Tree
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Is Fatigo another government funded crappy charity?
The "ME/CFS Psychotherapy Network" posted a statement on a position paper by the DGPPN/DGPM, I think it's the "German Society of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Psychosomatics and Nerve Medicine".
Statement: .
Post on Bluesky from one of the authors:
I think this is the statement they are responding to.
Statement: .
Post on Bluesky from one of the authors:
I think this is the statement they are responding to.
Sounds interesting, but unfortunately behind a paywall.
Translation:
I was able to find the session details with some additional infos from the congress‘ website. Professor Schomerus seems involved as well:
Felis Catus
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
I'm not sure if it's allowed to request and post automated translations. I don't speak German.
Could someone advise how to get a translation on the phone, please? Something convenient. I keep clicking on the wrong things on a small screen.
Could someone advise how to get a translation on the phone, please? Something convenient. I keep clicking on the wrong things on a small screen.
You can copy the website URL into https://translate.google.com/?sl=auto&tl=en&op=websites and it'll translate the whole page. Or just copy bits of text to translate.
If you use Firefox browser, it also has built-in translation, explained here: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/website-translation#w_translate-the-full-page
Felis Catus
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Thank you very much!
I didn't realise you could put a URL into Google translate because the Google translate app on my phone which opens automatically when I click on translate.google.com links doesn't have it.
I'll work around it. Thank you!
This is the largest support group for people with ME/CFS in Germany.
Total number of members:
3,517 members as at 6 March 2026
Membership fees:
Financial year: 01/25 to 12/25
Total: €140,001 to €150,000
Public sector grants or subsidies (mostly health insurance funds):
Financial year: 01/25 to 12/25
approx. €250,000
So yes, it seems like Fatigo is another (indirectly) government funded crappy charity...
I’ve now left the group and am looking for another one.
Pay-walled but some excerpts were posted by bluesky users and it seems there is a lot of cope in attempting to manufacture a fake "social" Long Covid (literally in the title of the article) to cover up the real problem. Obviously "changes in daily routine" do not lead to significant losses in motor control, energy and performance. The whole premise is absurd, they will literally invent fake "mass hysteria" to cover up the consequences of a real pandemic that happened just a few years and while the virus is still circulating.
At this point medicine genuinely deserves to lose credibility for fumbling this so hard, and does not deserve to get it back until they've worked very hard at earning it. We can't have a system built on the premise of honest expertise be this blatantly dishonest and corrupt. This is a mockery of what expertise is supposed to do.
"Perhaps we are dealing with a kind of social long Covid"
www.spektrum.de
At this point medicine genuinely deserves to lose credibility for fumbling this so hard, and does not deserve to get it back until they've worked very hard at earning it. We can't have a system built on the premise of honest expertise be this blatantly dishonest and corrupt. This is a mockery of what expertise is supposed to do.
"Perhaps we are dealing with a kind of social long Covid"
Motorik im Sinkflug: »Vielleicht haben wir es mit einer Art sozialem Long Covid zu tun«
Die Pandemie ging, die »Verhäuslichung« blieb – mit drastischen Folgen, sagt die Sportwissenschaftlerin Claudia Niessner im Interview.
www.spektrum.de
German song. Video shows son's life pre- and post-ME/CFS.
Anil van der Zee said:
I was previously a bit pessimistic but given that Germany and in particular Berlin, where a large chunk of ME/CFS research in Germany is based, is severely cutting higher education funding especially for researchers and many very smart researchers are thinking about leaving academia as a consequence, it’s quite possible that some smart minds might be attracted by this funding.Auf Deutsch:
Nationale Dekade gegen Postinfektiöse Erkrankungen - BMFTR
Gegen postinfektiöse Erkrankungen wie Long COVID oder ME/CFS fehlen bislang wirksame Behandlungsmöglichkeiten. Die Nationale Dekade gegen Postinfektiöse Erkrankungen entschlüsselt Ursachen und Mechanismen und schafft Stück für Stück die Basis zur Entwicklung neuer Therapieoptionen.www.bmftr.bund.de
Google translation:
Nationale Dekade gegen Postinfektiöse Erkrankungen - BMFTR
Gegen postinfektiöse Erkrankungen wie Long COVID oder ME/CFS fehlen bislang wirksame Behandlungsmöglichkeiten. Die Nationale Dekade gegen Postinfektiöse Erkrankungen entschlüsselt Ursachen und Mechanismen und schafft Stück für Stück die Basis zur Entwicklung neuer Therapieoptionen.Post-infectious diseases
Medical research
Effective treatment options for post-infectious diseases such as Long COVID or ME/CFS are currently lacking. The National Decade Against Post-Infectious Diseases is elucidating the causes and mechanisms and gradually laying the foundation for the development of new therapeutic options.
Oscar220
Established Member
"Living with ME/CFS: My child has been lying in the dark for two years | Frau TV | WDR "
From German news broadcaster WDR about an 18-year-old woman with very severe ME/CFS and her family's experience of it. German language, with english subtitles only available through auto-translate.
Kalliope
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Medscape Biological Evidence May Reshape Long-COVID Diagnosis and Care
By 2024, more than 1.5 million people in Germany had been affected by long COVID and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS). Long COVID is recognized within postacute infection syndromes (PAIS).
At the 132nd Congress of the German Society for Internal Medicine in Wiesbaden, Germany, Christian Gogoll, MD, specialist in internal medicine and pulmonology and medical director of the outpatient services at the Evangelical Lung Clinic Berlin, and Carmen Scheibenbogen, MD, professor of clinical immunology and deputy head of the Institute of Medical Immunology, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, both in Berlin, Germany, reviewed current evidence on diagnosis and management.
Three years after the COVID pandemic, clinicians continued to encounter a condition that remained diagnostically and therapeutically challenging. Key questions focused on whether long COVID is a psychosomatic illness and which strategies effectively address its broad symptom profile.
www.medscape.com
By 2024, more than 1.5 million people in Germany had been affected by long COVID and myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS). Long COVID is recognized within postacute infection syndromes (PAIS).
At the 132nd Congress of the German Society for Internal Medicine in Wiesbaden, Germany, Christian Gogoll, MD, specialist in internal medicine and pulmonology and medical director of the outpatient services at the Evangelical Lung Clinic Berlin, and Carmen Scheibenbogen, MD, professor of clinical immunology and deputy head of the Institute of Medical Immunology, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin, both in Berlin, Germany, reviewed current evidence on diagnosis and management.
Three years after the COVID pandemic, clinicians continued to encounter a condition that remained diagnostically and therapeutically challenging. Key questions focused on whether long COVID is a psychosomatic illness and which strategies effectively address its broad symptom profile.
Biologic Evidence May Reshape Long-COVID Diagnosis and Care
Researchers have reported biologic abnormalities in long COVID, challenging the view that symptoms are primarily psychosomatic.
www.medscape.com
Chandelier
Senior Member (Voting Rights)
Sie nimmt wieder am Leben teil: Ärztin mit ME/CFS macht Hoffnung
Eine Ärztin erkrankt nach einer Corona-Infektion so schwer an ME/CFS, dass sie nicht mehr allein essen und zur Toilette gehen kann. Doch dann entdeckt sie nach und nach, was ihr hilft. Nun will sie anderen Betroffenen Mut machen.
www.faz.net
I‘m lacking the energy to summarize it properly. Here’s a short AI translated excerpt: