What if numbers of people needing dialysis and kidney transplant increase signifcantly?

[AbsentmindedWoman]

In long covid patients, over the next few years? How will the world cope with this?

In high income countries, can dialysis units expand relatively easily to absorb this if enough money is thrown at it?

At a loss when I think about people in poverty in low income countries. At university I remember a case study, where people in kidney failure only could pay for perhaps two sessions of dialysis a week - so they were restricting their fluids and just so, so ill it was horrific.

Maybe they will finally start chucking some money at it. I have kidney failure and research and progress is way behind that of some of the more glamorous illnesses, yet it affects many more people than you would know. It is also a ticking time bomb with the rise of obesity and type 2 diabetes which can cause kidney failure. I do feel blessed to live in a country with access to dialysis though, I have seen the struggles of those in the developing world and it is awful

I also wish more people would consider altruistic kidney donation…if you are at a loss with your life and want to do the ultimate altruistic act, it is a hard one to beat!! You can literally completely transform someone’s life, which is a pretty incredible achievement if searching for meaning in life.

Most AKI (acute kidney injury) in Covid will recover and dialysis may only be a short term thing so until we see accurate figures, there is no point getting in a panic about it.

I had COVID in November and at the end of April my kidneys randomly completely and utterly just gave up.

Thankfully I'm on the mend now but had inpatient dialysis daily for a week and outpatient dialysis twice weekly for just over two weeks. I have never felt so ill. I can't fault the NHS and in particular the Renal unit that has been treating me.

I hadn't linked it to COVID due to the delay between November and April, but an old friend mentioned another case pretty much identical to mine in a colleague of hers which has been put down to COVID, and I'm now starting to wonder.

I fear the costs and impacts of long covid will be very large and varied.

I'm so tired of it being minimised!

I assume yes in the UK we would have to invest in more kit to treat this, but it's a dreadful prospect.