https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/18/long-covid-women-symptoms-medical-misogynyMany are still reporting minimization of their long Covid symptoms – and it’s partially attributable to the fact that female patients are routinely dismissed
‘They can’t ignore us any more’: five women on long Covid and medical misogyny
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/18/long-covid-women-symptoms-medical-misogyny
PwME and LC get gaslighted regardless of gender, but I believe it's worse for men than women.
The mystery of long Covid: Inside the 21 October Guardian Weekly
Our cover story this week steps back from the news agenda to explore the impact of living with long Covid. For millions of people worldwide who have survived initial infection with the virus, recovery is slow. Symptoms such as breathlessness, fatigue and loss of smell or taste persist for months and, as our science editor Ian Sample explains, treatments that work for some may not be successful for others. Through case studies and data our main feature examines how patients are facing up to the long tail of infection and how research may lead to painting a fuller picture of the aftermath of such a debilitating illness and finding treatments.
I remain to be convinced that prejudice against long Covid is due to “medical misogyny” to use the language of this article as I’m not sure most doctors would know of any big gender differences in the numbers affected.The issue I always have with this argument is that men are being dismissed right alongside them, for ME/CFS and Long Covid. Its not like there aren't plenty of men as well that are getting anxiety and depression diagnoses, they are not receiving real treatment, that isn't happening.
This isn't a womens issue its a health care issue around an unknown neurological prejudice one where Psychiatry has built up high walls. Everytime these arguments are made it just makes me a little bit less welcome. About a year ago there was a post about this on /r/cfs where men were getting treated with prejudice by the women and the moderator (premium-cat) dismissed the lot and deleted the entire chain, all the evidence all gone. So misandry is to me common place in the CFS community already and dismissing one third of your fellow sufferers I don't think is a good strategy. Some of the worst offenders today in the field are female doctors. It might be the historical context but nowadays its just societies prejudices.
‘They can’t ignore us any more’: five women on long Covid and medical misogyny
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/18/long-covid-women-symptoms-medical-misogyny
I have seen a lot of media coverage over the years along with medical articles. I’m not sure ME/CFS was that often called or seen as a disease of “depressed menopausal women”.The language historically used to describe the illness – in the 1980s,
ME/CFS was called a disease of “depressed menopausal women” and widely
referred to in the media as “yuppie flu” – shows how it has been
disregarded because it mostly affects women, she says.
I’ve finished reading this now. Not convinced it showed their experiences were down to medical misogyny. Nearly all of it were just five random patients describing their experiences and they could have found men to say similar things.‘They can’t ignore us any more’: five women on long Covid and medical misogyny
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/18/long-covid-women-symptoms-medical-misogyny
I have seen a lot of media coverage over the years along with medical articles. I’m not sure ME/CFS was that often called or seen as a disease of “depressed menopausal women”.
Thanks. My point remains that the evidence they cite in this paragraph to explain why the illness has been disregarded is weak:It's a quote attributed to Stephen Straus (NIH) after the Incline Village Outbreak.
The language historically used to describe the illness – in the 1980s, ME/CFS was called a disease of “depressed menopausal women” and widely referred to in the media as “yuppie flu” – shows how it has been disregarded because it mostly affects women, she says.
Over 2,000 Guardian readers told us about their long Covid fight. Here are their stories
The chronic condition has an array of physical and neurological symptoms, but most remain misunderstood.
From overwhelming fatigue to brain fog that makes it impossible to complete daily tasks, long Covid is having a devastating impact on people’s lives around the world.
But with no test for the chronic condition, it has proven difficult to measure how many people are living with the syndrome weeks, months and even years after contracting the virus. It is an umbrella term describing an array of physical and neurological symptoms, including ones like memory issues.
A recent call out asking Guardian readers for their experience with long Covid received nearly 2,000 responses from people in the Americas, Asia, Africa, Europe and Oceania.
Many respondents described their struggle to have their condition taken seriously by doctors, family and friends; others spoke of difficulties getting an official diagnosis and being recognized as disabled by their workplace or government. Some also said they had been financially affected after having to take significant time off work, reduce their hours or stop working entirely, reflecting a survey that found one in five workers were not working as a result of illness, while almost half of those had reduced their hours.
Here, seven people from around the world share their experiences of living with long Covid, and the impact it has had on their physical and mental health, ability to work and relationships.
How does that even qualify as "getting help"? The mere act of seeing a "specialist" in sham clinics for a first assessment is not a serious definition of "getting help". That fraction is actually zero, because there is no evidence that anyone with LC is getting any help from those clinics that doesn't mostly constitute of undoing harm, say in the form of bad advice, from healthcare services in the first place, and even that is the exception, not the norm. Most of that advice was developed by patients and all the few clinics that aren't doing more harm than good do is pass those as their own.More than 60,000 people in England had a first assessment for post-Covid syndrome in an NHS specialist service between July 2021 and August 2022
How does that even qualify as "getting help"? The mere act of seeing a "specialist" in sham clinics for a first assessment is not a serious definition of "getting help". That fraction is actually zero, because there is no evidence that anyone with LC is getting any help from those clinics that doesn't mostly constitute of undoing harm, say in the form of bad advice, from healthcare services in the first place, and even that is the exception, not the norm. Most of that advice was developed by patients and all the few clinics that aren't doing more harm than good do is pass those as their own.
There is such a weird "build it and you're done" mentality in healthcare, where purely symbolic acts are essentially considered the exact same as effective and comprehensive healthcare. It's the main flaw in mental healthcare, that it's still so primitive and ineffective it barely qualifies as professional, but that's all people ever have to say: just see a professional. As if it's 100% effective, when it's basically less effective than a coin toss.
A system that can't assess its own performance is not able to perform.