Occupational determinants of Long COVID in the population-based COVICAT cohort, 2025, Matteis et al.

[SNT Gatchaman]

Occupational determinants of Long COVID in the population-based COVICAT cohort

Spoiler: Authors

Sara De Matteis; Dario Consonni; Ana Espinosa; Rafael de Cid; Natalia Blay Magriña; Gemma Castaño-Vinyals; Marianna Karachaliou; Miguel Angel Alba Hidalgo; Kyriaki Papantoniou; Judith Garcia; Manolis Kogevinas; Kurt Straif

OBJECTIVES
Occupational factors affect SARS-CoV-2 infection risk, but the occupational factors associated with Long COVID (LC) are unknown. We aimed to address this issue using individual data in a population-based cohort.

METHODS
In the prospective COVICAT study, 2020–2023, Catalonia, Spain, we examined the association between occupational determinants and LC. Among subjects with previous SARS-CoV-2 infection, those employed in the pandemic and with occupational information were analysed. Different metrics, including four job-exposure matrices, were used to evaluate individual occupational risk factors for LC (postinfection symptoms ≥3 months). Poisson models were used to estimate adjusted risk ratios (RRs) and 95% CIs.

RESULTS
Among 2054 workers (1308 women, 746 men) aged 40–69 years, 486 developed LC (23.7%). Workers in jobs at high COVID-19 risk according to all metrics including health/social care, education, retail, transport and security showed higher LC risk. The main drivers of increased risk were close contact with colleagues and the public (RR up to 1.50; 95% CI 1.18 to 1.91), no social distance at workplace (up to 1.46; 95% CI 1.16 to 1.84), rare or no use of facemask (1.41; 95% CI 1.09 to 1.83) and commute by public transport (1.58; 95% CI 1.20 to 2.08). Working on-site during the pandemic was also associated with a higher LC risk compared with teleworking (1.57; 95% CI 1.19 to 2.09). Individual non-occupational risk factors for LC included female sex, comorbidities, obesity, number and severity of acute infections; vaccination and older age were protective.

CONCLUSIONS
In a population-based cohort, several occupational factors increased LC risk. Focused preventive strategies are warranted to avoid the associated public health burden. LC should be recognised and compensated as an occupational disease.

Web | DOI | PDF | Occupational and Environmental Medicine | Paywall

 

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The main drivers of increased risk were close contact with colleagues and the public (RR up to 1.50; 95% CI 1.18 to 1.91), no social distance at workplace (up to 1.46; 95% CI 1.16 to 1.84), rare or no use of facemask (1.41; 95% CI 1.09 to 1.83) and commute by public transport (1.58; 95% CI 1.20 to 2.08). Working on-site during the pandemic was also associated with a higher LC risk compared with teleworking (1.57; 95% CI 1.19 to 2.09).

All different ways of saying that infections are the only determinant. Can this profession move on from trying to find excuses otherwise? It's endemic, congratulations, you did it! Now what? Now this!

Focused preventive strategies

How Great Barrington Declaration of them. Let's protect, focusely. Or whatever. All protections have been removed because they were such a bummer. So, literally fantasy.

This means the only, and really absolutely the only, solution is to have treatments. No treatments exist. Rehabilitation is useless, even harmful. Prevention is now cringe, even discouraged, to maximize natural infections since the unvoiced strategy is to simply sacrifice the few so that most can just forget that this even happened.

Literally all the research points to infections as the only relevant thing. Even studies showing reduced rates from vaccinations are ultimately about that. But they keep trying to find whether people who get out of bed on their left foot, or maybe people who fancy flowers, or whatever, can be some risk factor.

None of this matters! I've never seen such a lack of coherent focus by any group of professionals, they have stuck themselves in a loop of failure out of multiple terrible decisions and refuse to back out of it.

 

[Utsikt]

All different ways of saying that infections are the only determinant. Can this profession move on from trying to find excuses otherwise? It's endemic, congratulations, you did it! Now what? Now this!

How Great Barrington Declaration of them. Let's protect, focusely. Or whatever. All protections have been removed because they were such a bummer. So, literally fantasy.

This means the only, and really absolutely the only, solution is to have treatments. No treatments exist. Rehabilitation is useless, even harmful. Prevention is now cringe, even discouraged, to maximize natural infections since the unvoiced strategy is to simply sacrifice the few so that most can just forget that this even happened.

Literally all the research points to infections as the only relevant thing. Even studies showing reduced rates from vaccinations are ultimately about that. But they keep trying to find whether people who get out of bed on their left foot, or maybe people who fancy flowers, or whatever, can be some risk factor.

None of this matters! I've never seen such a lack of coherent focus by any group of professionals, they have stuck themselves in a loop of failure out of multiple terrible decisions and refuse to back out of it.

Not to mention that limiting the spread of the infections is the only feasible intervention we have, other than vaccines to limit the impact of the infection.

People will never change anything else to limit the impact of covid, we know that because there are plenty of reasons to make those changes already, so people either don’t want to or are unable to do it - often for reasons outside their control.