Prevalence of long Covid

[TunMahla]

Is anyone on top of the literature regarding the prevalence of long Covid? I have only seen the value from the Zoe app with a whooping 10% of all symptomatic infections reporting long term symptoms. I can imagine that number is significantly upwardly biased by the fact that it is the most sick and concerned about their health who may be logging their daily symptoms... so do we have any other estimates of the frequency of long Covid? I am asking this as I have kids under 2 and I worry about caring for them should I get long term debilitating symptoms from the disease. It is reassuring that the risk of Covid death (in case of infection) is an additional year's worth of risk of death from all other causes (e.g. see recent article in BMJ from David Spiegelhalter) and I think most people can deal with that risk so I think the key impact of Covid could potentially be from long term damage.
TLDR: is there any good evidence regarding the prevalence of long Covid?

Link to the two studies is on the page below:

"Research to evaluate the long-term health and psychosocial effects of COVID-19 is continuing. Major studies include the Post-Hospitalisation COVID-19 study (PHOSP-COVID) in the UK and the International Severe Acute Respiratory and emerging Infection Consortium (ISARIC) global COVID-19 long-term follow-up study. "
www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-long-term-health-effects/covid-19-long-term-health-effects

I have seen a few people on twitter mention post covid glaucoma. I really am worried about the possible complications more than the risk of dying. Fit and healthy, slim forty something I know now with cardiac problems, and the possible brain damage as in someone else I know, is extremely frightening. The complications seem a mix of neurological and vascular ? it is so peculiar as yet not at all understood.

Yes I am mid forties but before Covid super fit. I had the initial illness reasonably mildly but developed breathing problems after 2 weeks and terrible chest pain that is still lingering 6 months on. Sometimes wonder if I am ever going to fully recover.

Is it just that people are expecting to recover too quickly following a serious respiratory illness?

Many viruses take a long time to recover from, with some symptoms dragging on for months.

I had pneumonia a few years ago. I was poorly for a long time despite only being in hospital for 4 days. I was off work for 7 weeks. Many symptoms were present for months. It was over a year before I was fully fit. Several years I'm still more susceptible to certain types of viruses. Fortunately I didn't have long term lunch damage though that is fairly common too. My type of recovery time was fairly normal for pneumonia.

Bearing in mind the type of virus Covid is I wouldn't be surprised with it being a lengthy recovery for some people.

I just think people don't fully realise how long it can take the human body to recover at times.

@Aragog I've had pneumonia before. But it didn't attack my heart, my eyes or my neurological system. Although not back to normal, I was back to work in 6 weeks with pneumonia. I'm still off work nearly 6 months after Covid. I can't drive or walk for more than 10 minutes. If I don't improve soon, I'm scared I'll have to admit that I'm now actually disabled. Pretty hard pill to swallow.

I read international group of doctors are calling for a name change as it is not just a respiratory disease but impacts many organs, so more whole system.

I think 10% is widely accepted, but of course these symptoms then clear up for many.

The heart impacts worry me mobile.twitter.com/DrZoeHyde/status/1305394267712450560 I've posted this clip elsewhere today.

I have been wondering about healthy youngsters. There was a sport team in the US and a third had heart inflammation.

We really need more from the government on this as pretending it doesn't happen fuels fear, clarity always helps.

Chronic Covid - but sadly I still think that as a nation we don't realise how long it takes to recover from some viruses.

I don't think Covid is any different in that sense.

Some people recover quickly and aren't even that ill at the time, for others it can take much much longer with far lasting effects. With pneumonia some people have severe effects for years after for example. And it's not the only virus that can cause long lasting and multiple types of after effects.

Time will tell if Covid is even worse than this but it's too early to know yet. 6 months since March is too short a time.

It doesn't help that we are still not fully able to know the very best treatments, though we are making some headway.

I hope in time your symptoms improve and you regain your health fully. It's a worry time, and being ill with this longer term must be awful.

I know three people including my cousin who have only had the vaccine because of the risk of long Covid. So I think more information would be helpful, as we tend to only get to read of the worst examples such as Derek Draper.

I have this but have found other post viral things worse for example shingles. For me it feels like having a cold / flu long term headaches chest pain etc, but the shingles was SO painful.

Both seem to be linked with feeling run down though,

I’ve had mild-moderate long covid for 14 months now, but I’ve been able to carry on working and caring for my DC. It’s still been pretty miserable at times, and if i had a chance to avoid it by taking a vaccine last year, I would have grabbed it with both hands.

But I do think the 1 in 10 quoted covers a huge range of people from those who are extremely unwell who have a few lingering symptoms. We definitely need more data on this.

I also agree with others that for many people is more complex than lingering respiratory symptoms - I’ve had heart, nerve, cognitive, hearing, vision etc problems.