COVID is a generator of new unknowns.
The New York Times reported on the experience of some Italian citizens who have been infected by COVID and are no longer infected. However these folks are not seeing their health restored to their pre-COVID states:
Studies also point to kidney, heart, liver and neurological damage, often from secondary infections, and no one knows what the long-term prospects are for those patients.
But even some of the infected who have avoided pneumonia describe a maddeningly persistent and unpredictable illness, with unexpected symptoms. Bones feel broken. The senses dull. Stomachs are constantly upset…..
On the weekend of March 7, Mr. Cirielli ran a fever and suffered cold-like symptoms, and became convinced he had picked up the virus by touching an infected surface in the Parliament chamber. He tested positive that week….After 40 days of feeling lousy, he tested negative for the virus, but his eyes still burned and bouts of diarrhea continued, he said….
“It never finishes,” said Martina Sorlini, a 29-year-old math and physics high school teacher who has been running a low-grade fever since the beginning of March. She said that the cough and sore throat eventually went away, and that after three weeks she got her sense of taste and smell back, and even found enough energy to run and tend vegetables in her garden.
Then came stomach aches, fatigue and the return of fever. And it hasn’t left, making it extremely tiring to teach her online high school classes….
We don’t know what “typical” post-COVID looks like. We just don’t have the data as the first people who we know were infected with COVID and survived now have four months worth of follow-up.
We know enough to know that there are likely long term secondary effects from a COVID infection even after the virus has been rendered ineffective by the patient’s immune response. But we can not readily project in a year how many additional dialysis sessions are needed per 10,000 COVID infections stratified by age and controlled for pre-COVID observables. We can’t project how many physical therapy/rehab sessions will be needed.
One of my curiousities this summer will be tracking how insurers are trying to price COVID into their 2021 rates. Right now we know so little that almost any assumption is facially plausible. I expect that there will be huge variance among insurers in May and June and a decrease in variance by the time rates are finalized near Labor Day as the few extra months of knowledge generation will help us figure out what COVID actually does to people over the long term.
Right now, we just don’t know, but the early knowledge is that we can expect a lot of weird things to happen.
Brachiator
Do we know what the average medical cost of treating COVID has been, including length of stay in hospital, etc?
Obdurodon
Musing with my wife about the varied and often long-lasting effects the other day, I came to the conclusion that COVID-19 is for practical purposes less flu than polio. Others say smallpox. Whichever, I think it’s a handy metaphor to shock the “just a flu” folks out of their complacency. We’re going to be living with this for a long time, *even if* treatments and vaccines magically became available tomorrow.
lofgren
From what I have heard, it sounds like the idea that the virus ravages the immune system so that it takes months to return to pre-COVID effectiveness is plausible, which means a lot of secondary infections as people who think they are healthy go out and do things that would normally be perfectly safe, without realizing that they now have to adjust to living an immuno-compromised life. The 60-80 day convalescence is also consistent with what I have read, and that is terrifying. Even if it never gets bad enough to be life threatening, imagine having a bad flu for two months!
That said, it’s also very plausible that the hysteria around COVID is causing people to exaggerate the more subjective symptoms — the aches, pains, and fatigue. That doesn’t mean those symptoms aren’t real. People can’t just snap out of psychosomatic symptoms like they are a game of pretend. But it does mean that these, at least, may be less severe as time goes on and we adjust psychologically to a COVID world.
rikyrah
I keep on reading these stories and ????
Jeffery
I had pneumonia last November. A 5 day course of antibiotics and steroids kicked it out. The fatigue after lasted until March. I am only now having fairly good days. Covid-19 is worse from what I am reading.
Brachiator
@lofgren:
People never had COVID before. There wasn’t much to exaggerate. Most of the reporting about it was “you recover or you die,” without much reporting of post-recovering issues.
dr. bloor
@Brachiator: Whether this turns out to have a psychological component or not remains to be seen, but it’s not necessary to have a pre-existing list of symptoms in mind based on prior experience. It might not be anything more than a hypersensitivity to any kind of symptom during the recovery phase.
David Anderson
We have some hospital side utilization data (days in Bed of Type X) but no cost data that is reliable yet.
OzarkHillbilly
Oooo Ooooo… I know I know… call me call meeeeee!!!
Bankruptcy?
lofgren
@Brachiator: People report fatigue and nonspecific pain constantly, and it always gets worse if they’re asked to pay attention to it. That’s why it’s pretty much treated as background noise whenever they’re testing a new treatment. It’s a safe bet that at least some of it is psychosomatic. If everybody is freaking out about something, that psychosomatic factor is going to be worse. Basically just asking people to focus on their bodies is going to make them feel those symptoms to some degree.
OzarkHillbilly
As someone who lives with pain every day, I just want to say that it is not so much the level of pain as it is the relentlessness of it. I have bad days and I have worse days, but no matter which it is, it all wears me down.
planetjanet
@lofgren: I don’t think it is appropriate to explain away people’s lived experiences that they are simply imagining their feelings. It is certainly possible that there is long term damage to some tissues that take a long time to heal.
Ohio Mom
I hope someone is embarking on the very long term study of how much more this will cost, in money and suffering, in a country without universal coverage.
I imagine it will be a complicated endeavor. So many downstream effects. When someone is sicker, longer, because they didn’t have the coverage they needed, they will earn less money and spend less money, their families are stressed, and it cascades and cascades.
TaMara (HFG)
@lofgren: You can just fuck right off.
I’m exactly 31 days since my first symptoms and about 20 days since my last real symptoms. For me, the fatigue has been mindblowing. I had terrible fatigue after West Nile, I’m going to say this is much, much worse.
Yesterday was a very, very bad day. It’s hard to explain, like I was bleeding energy and oxygen. No amount of rest made it better. All my energy went to breathing. We’ll see how today goes.
ET
My mother in New Orleans got COVID fairly early and got a not so mild case though she never had to get admitted to a hospital. She is still feeling a little off and she has been “over it” for about a month. The first two weeks her mind was definitely not totally there and her taste/smell has taken a lot longer to come back – not sure if all is either. Since she didn’t get admitted or put on a respirator she doesn’t have some of those things to contend with but she is still worried that her lungs might have taken a hit.
cain
Wait till insurance companies start talking about how COVID-19 post symptoms are part of pre-existing conditions. This thing is going to make people more unhealthy in terms of a market. Something that should worry the insurance companies.
cain
@TaMara (HFG):
Sorry to hear this – I hope you can get back to normal and not a new normal soon.
Barbara
Assuming that over time some things will come into clearer focus, there are some really remarkable things about this disease:
1. Incubation time to symptoms can be really long — more than a week — during which you are contagious to others.
2. Variation of symptoms both in range and severity — cough, fever, aches and chills, all flu-like, but also respiratory distress, blood clots, kidney damage, and so on, which are not really flu-like and which vary tremendously between people; and
3. Duration of symptoms over the course of three weeks or even longer.
Considering the wide variability in people’s symptoms during illness, along with the varied intensity of those symptoms, I think it unsurprising that they would have post-disease symptoms that are also varied in severity and range. I would not discount anyone’s report of their follow on fatigue as psychosomatic or otherwise at this point.
MattF
The mode of action and the consequences of COVID are a real mystery, ranging from asymptomatic to devastating. There’s hardly an organ or system in the body that isn’t potentially harmed by it. One is reminded of the classic multiple-mystery symptom diseases like tuberculosis and syphilis. The questions here are hard; one hopes there is some unifying answer, but I don’t expect such an answer any time soon.
cain
BTW I think the number of deaths projected is not high enough, I think we are going to see a lot more especially in heavily red areas – sure – before it was poor areas and what not – but hopefully, we can help control that situation – because in general those people are not idiots and will follow guidance.
MAGA people are in fact idiots, and will absolutely do whatever is required because while like the poor they do what they are told, what they are told is bullshit and are totally willing to put their lives at risk, or their continuing health at risk just to ‘own the libs’ or not pay unemployment or whatever bullshit they think they are doing. Eventually, it will dawn on them that they’ve done fucked up.
Barbara
@MattF: But TB and syphilis do their work over a very long time, and if they are untreated they tend to behave similarly between people. But here, there is so much variability in how the disease behaves among people, over a fairly limited time range (less than 30 days). That does seem remarkable.
Le Comte de Monte Cristo, fka Edmund Dantes
@OzarkHillbilly:
Class suckup. ?
Never volunteer answers, never raise your hand. Only speak in class to make a joke or to make fun of some other kid….
Luther Siler
Jesus, what the hell does “bones feel broken” mean???
Mel
@lofgren: Rather than assuming that symptoms are psychosomatic in a fair percentage of people, why not assume, based upon the fact that the disease clearly stimulates excessive cytokine production and interleukin 1 and 6 activity, that the lingering symptoms are, in most cases, a lingering autoimmune over acctivation.
Autoimmune diisease can often occur in conjunction with lowered or less functional immune response. In other words, even while the body is less able to fight off bacterial, viral, or fungal infections, it is busily attacking its own tissues.
Autoimmune diseases developing in the wake of serious infection or other trauma is not unusual, nor is a flare of a current or in remission autoimmune condition. I think that it’s far more likely that this, rather than patients complaining of psychosomatic issues or malingering, is the cause of the fever, eye inflammation, achiness, exhaustion, rashes, and inflammatory signs and symptoms reported by so many Covid-19 survivors.
We know that the disease can mimic Kawasaki Disease (a body-wide vascular inflammatory illness), that it causes cytokine storms, triggers life-threatening immune- mediated clotting cascades, attacks the kidneys, and heart, and can cause viral meningitis in severe cases (meaning that it has the ability to enter the CNS).
The sooner that we start looking at how to effectively treat post Covid119 illness, the less likely it is that survivors will be facing a lifelong /disabling secondary illness after surviving Covid-19 .
Betty
@TaMara (HFG): Totally agree. If you haven’t had it, such speculation is insulting to those trying to recover. The damage to organs has been established to be REAL.
hitless
@TaMara (HFG): I’ve had issues with fatigue from illness myself, and it was tremendously frustrating feeling time slip by without the ability to do stuff my brain said needed to be done. I imagine that my experience is very mild compared to what you are going through.
I don’t know if it helps, but I wish you the best. Always look forward to your posts and your recipes have graced my table on many occasions. My thanks for all of that.
Jinchi
And because the discussions about these issues are primarily focused on death rates ‘98% survival!’, we get nonsense arguments like Rand Paul’s ‘children are immune, let them go to school’.
OzarkHillbilly
Not in my experience.
Nicole
@Mel: That’s really interesting about autoimmune issues getting triggered by a lowered immune system. I had a cancerous lymph node removed (along with 9 others, thankfully clean) from under my arm in December, and over the past few months I’ve had a couple of instances of what I assume is Raynaud’s Syndrome (two fingers on the hand of that side going numb in moderately, but not extremely, cold weather and taking a couple of hours to stop tingling once back indoors). I now wonder if the reduced immunity on that side is contributing (as I don’t have any other symptoms of an autoimmune disorder, which can trigger Raynaud’s).
I think Covid-19 will be the 21st century version of pre-vaccine polio, which sucks.
Ruckus
@Obdurodon:
How many people under say 50 or 60 would know how much polio affected it’s victims? I personally know 4 people who acquired it. All of them women, 2 of them my age. I imagine that the 2 mothers of friends I knew as a child have passed, they would be well over 90 now. The other 2 are my age, 70, I went to school with one, lived 10 miles from the one I know of currently and she lives in a wheelchair as her legs really don’t support her well. She can walk but not far or easy.
Your idea seems good, but I don’t think the majority of people alive today in the US would have much experience with contagious diseases that massively affect them for life and could have easily killed them.
Barbara
@Luther Siler: It could be a way of describing severe joint pain, when it can be agonizing to move your limbs.
cmorenc
@cain:
A key factor is how unfortunately effective the RW/GOP have been been in pushing misinformation and propaganda via social media to ordinary blue-collar-ish working folks who don’t closely follow politics or MSM themselves, via personal sharing of memes / stories from RW / GOP – leaning “friends” who are plugged into Fox or other RW spin sites.
For example, a male service technician visiting my house yesterday brought up the Tara Reade harassment allegation against Biden, mentioning that confirmation had turned up that Reade’s mother had called into Larry King in 1993 about a sexual assault allegation. However, he did not know that the sex assault allegations coincided with charged for check fraud back in California that were the actual reasons for her dismissal from Biden’s staff after she had only worked there a very short time (apx a week).
Barbara
@Ruckus: My best friend’s mother had polio right around the time the vaccine was being widely administered. Her dad kept her and her sister out of the first wave of recipients out of caution. She has never walked independently since having the disease at the age of 16.
ET
I have been sending my mother news pieces on recovery. They tend to be more mainstream and not scientific, but that is about what she wants to read.
She has found them helpful in making her feel that she isn’t weird or making shit up.
Mel
@TaMara (HFG): Your first line says exactly what I felt when I read the smug “psychosomatic “ comment. Come sit by me!!!
I am so sorry that you had this awful virus, and equally sorry that you are still having to battle through these symptoms.
I am 20 years in to a dreadful autoimmune disease that resulted after and in reaction to a life-threatening infection. I had a family history of autoimmune disease, genetic markers indicating a possible predisposition to developing autoimmune disease, and horrific symptoms.
But… because I was a woman, and because I had been previously very healthy, I heard every bit of nonsense in the book (“it’s probably menopause, even though you’re only 32 and your hormone tests are normal”; “maybe it’s work stress – not many women here have professional jobs; they prefer to be at home!”; “well, it’s probably just that you keep getting respiratory bugs because you work with high-risk populations”; “It’s probably arthritis because you did some sports” to the best one: “Have you thought about why you haven’t had your babies yet? Because some career ladies who don’t have their children early on get sad in their early thirties, and just don’t know they’re sad until they HAVE those beautiful babies!!”) I kid you not. When I asked how “baby sadness”, whatever the hell that’s supposed to be, could possibly cause 102 degree fevers, TIAs, erythema nodosum, vasculitis, loss of vision, extreme fatigue, low wbc counts, an ulcerated bladder , heart arrhythmias, etc. no answer was forthcoming, not surprisingly.
By the time good physicians in another state made the connection (3 years in to the nightmare) between the severe infection that started the whole horror show, the ensuing autoimmune symptoms, the family history, the genetic markers, etc., I had such severe brain hypoperfusion and CNS symptoms that I didn’t even know where my home was located and couldn’t safely boil water without supervision.
So, yeah – I am right there with you on this!!
Tossing people who have had Covid-19 and are now dealing with difficult symptoms into the “psychosomatic” diagnosis waste bin, especially in light of the overwhelming evidence that this disease has the capability to impact the immune system and multiple organ systems, is foolish and downright dangerous, not to mention terrifically insulting to and dismissive of patients.
ziggy
@OzarkHillbilly: Agree, I have a chronic pain condition also. Not high-level pain but just relentless. It would be totally bearable if I knew it was temporary, but going on 4 years, it isn’t. Wears you down completely.
I found my copy of The Great Influenza by John Barry and I’m reading it again. I have the say the parallels between this disease and the 1918 pandemic are really eerie, including most of the symptoms (for instance ARDS, organ damage, severe fatigue, neurological problems). Ongoing mystery illnesses included. Unfortunately they didn’t seem to keep very good records and many authorities tried to minimize it (due to war going on), so it’s harder to figure out what was really happening at the time.
Mel
@Nicole: I’m not sure which triggers which – several immunologists have told me that it’s viewed as more of a corollary effect, since the mexhanism is uncertain, and the cause might differ in different patients, But it’s well- documented that lupus patients, for example, can have low WBC counts even in the midst of active lupus flares and in the absence of immunosuppressive medications.
That leaves the door open to secondary infections, either acute or chronic. Some of those infections can cause additional damage on their own, but they can also further whip up an already dysfunctional immune response, triggering the body to blindly attack its own tissues in a misguided attempt to defeat the infection.
The ensuing overactive immune response can also lead to joint and tissue damage, nerve irritation or damage, vascular damage, etc. Some of it can heal, some might be long-term or chronic, or can lead to cumulative damage with repeated flares over time.
Raynaud’s is part of the vascular cascade of my illness. Wow, is it a pain both literally and figuratively!
blacque_jacques
@ziggy: “…and many authorities tried to minimize it…”
Another eerie parallel :-/
Nicole
@Mel:
Boy, is that the truth! Mine is pretty mild so far, and it’s incredibly aggravating. I’m sorry you deal with it.
Autoimmune doesn’t run in my family, but it does in my extended by marriage relations, and it really does seem like doctors don’t want to deal with it. My stepmom and the children of my uncle’s sister all have rheumatoid arthritis and boy, does it seem like their doctors eventually just toss their hands in the air and say, “Dunno.” The same uncle himself developed Meniere’s Disease (and lost the hearing in one ear as a result) and it was my aunt who nagged the very resistant doctor into testing him for it (she learned about it on the internet). When the results came back positive for it, the doctor actually said to her, “Well, you won this round.” FUUUUCCCCKKKK YOOOOOUUUUUU DOOOOCCCCCCTTTTTOOOOOORRRRRR.
If Covid-19 does lead to autoimmune issues long-term, there’s going to be such a lot of misery, and I am not hopeful that the medical field has enough doctors who will actually concern themselves with it.
cain
@cmorenc:
So, I’m not sure what’s going on with that check thing – I don’t think that was the reason that I’ve read. This whole Tara Reid thing is rat fuckery, but not sure what is accurate and what isn’t anymore.
ziggy
@blacque_jacques: yes, many political, sociological parallels also. I’m finding it MUCH more fascinating and understandable to read the second time (first reading @ 2 years ago, my take then–“that wouldn’t happen in this day and age”!).
Mel
@Nicole: Ohhhh, yes! When a friend who is a pharmacist told the physician who made the “you little gals just beed to have babies” comment that I had been diagnosed with a systemic autoimmune illness and had been transported out of state to Columbia Presbyterian in New York, his response was, “Oh my gosh. Well, that was weird that she was having high fever and all those other things. But so many women don’t get attention at home and, it’s just easy to assume it’s all in the lady’s head and miss things. I guess I shouldn’t have assumed!”
Gee, ya think?!?
I fear that this is the type of mindset that too many Covid-19 survivors will find themselves up against.
Nicole
@Mel: Oh my God. That is banana pants, and I’m glad your friend pointed out to him that you actually had an actual condition and had been sent to a facility with more knowledgable doctors than he. But the fact that he STILL brushed it off- ugh. Mr. Male Doctor, I have news for you- the LAST thing most women want is more “attention” at home. We’d like some time to be left the hell alone, actually, because you guys can be super tedious and needy.
PJ
@cmorenc: There were no sexual assault allegations in the call to Larry King. The woman who called in made non-specific allegations about problems (did not mention sexual harassment either) and stated that her daughter had not complained to anyone “out of respect” for the senator.
PJ
@cain: Sexual assault allegations were not made by Reade against Biden until this year. The one friend who now says that Reade told her about the sexual assault way back when, last year told journalists Reade’s problems with Biden has nothing to do with sexual misconduct.
I realize it can be difficult to keep the allegations straight because Reade keeps changing her story and the press by and large makes no attempt to lay out the history of allegations and the support, or lack thereof, for them, or the context for when and how the allegations were made, or Reade’s many misrepresentations about things peripheral to her animus against Biden, but it is frustrating when you see people who presumably do not want to spread Republican or Bernie Bro talking points actually do that in trying to defend against the BS.
Mel
@Nicole: ?!
Ohio Mom
Nicole: My rheumatologist told me at our first meeting that breast cancer patients/survivors are disproportionately diagnosed with RA. No one knows why — yet. But there does appear to be a relationship.
She also told me there is one rare type of arthritis that only presents in patients with a certain (I forget) type of cancer. One of her early successes as a doctor-in-training was diagnosing such a case.
Meanwhile, my oncologist was very skeptical when I told her I thought I had RA and could she please refer me to a rheumatologist. I guess she was elsewhere the day the relationship between the two conditions was discussed.
They are both fine doctors in their own ways. The Rheumatologist, who is thirty years younger than me, is quite the mother hen, which considering our age difference, amuses me.
The moral of this story is, no doctor is the be all or end all. They can be very narrowly focused so you must be your own advocate, which can mean demanding to be seen by a specialist.
Nicole
@Ohio Mom: That’s really interesting, and a good thing for me to keep in mind going forward, as someone who has had breast cancer (and a local recurrence).
My GP is an amazing doctor, and quick to refer me to a specialist whenever I’ve had an issue, but man, the oncologists- I don’t understand how, seeing as they’re all in the same building, they don’t seem to communicate with each other at all.
You’re very right about us needing to advocate for ourselves, and it’s really frustrating because I hate sitting on hold on a phone waiting for someone so I can chase down test results that the doctor who receives them isn’t going to bother to look at.
Seanly
Since this is an insurance thread & talking about COVID, I have some questions. I hope these don’t come across as trolling as it’s something I’ve been wondering about. This is not meant to be a sh!tpost…
If we’re mostly staying at home, how is the virus still spreading so much? Is it that even with restrictions there are still some people spreading it? Seems the odds of that happening would decrease? Is it possible there are some people who are asymptomatic carriers (like for weeks)?
While I hate, hate, hate the astroturfed moron labe protestors, at some point we will have to open things up a bit more (not now, not so fast). I’m not sure what that will look like. We’re going to still need some food production, still need to get teeth cleaned, and may need pants. How & when can we do this?
Weren’t there some experts who thought the way to proceed with effective testing, tracing, etc is that we’d have the country mostly open (with masks & social distancing) and then if a hotspot bloomed only that area would need the stricter lockdown?
Seanly
@lofgren:
My wife suffered an ARDS-type event at the end of her cancer treatments. She had a new immune system & it went haywire in her lungs in response to something.
She was going to be intubated for a while so they went ahead and did a tracheostomy. Intubation is only meant as a short-term means for breathing support. They also put her in a coma. One of the ICU nurses told me that 1 day of bed rest will mean 1 week of recovery. Muscle atrophy starts almost immediately.
She was in the coma for about 12 days and it did take her several months to recover through 2 different facilities. She also got C. diff at the rehab hospital.
So for someone who has moderate or severe respiratory issues w/ COVID, I can definitely see how even just a couple of weeks in the hospital can translate into 3 months of acute care then rehab.
Ohio Mom
Seanly: I have some of the same sorts of questions about what we can expect going forward. Based on what I’m seeing when I am grocery shopping and running the occasional errand, most people are not wearing masks. Which is not reassuring to me.
Also, what a horrible time your wife and you lived through! Can I assume that when you say she had a brand new immune system, that the roller-coaster of events you list were preceded by a bone marrow transplant? Which is a marathon in itself.
Nicole
@Seanly:
Yes, and they’re not necessarily wrong, but there’s been no attempt to do any of this yet.
I’m in NYC, where we’re taking this very, very seriously (after effing it up at the beginning, although I chalk that up to a lack of knowledge as much as I do political expediency- as Cuomo has said, until very recently we didn’t know the virus was coming to NYC from Europe, not Asia), but it’s a pretty contagious virus and even one person not doing what they should can cause a lot of trouble. One of the articles Anne Laurie posted followed 16 cases of it in Washington back to a single person.
Testing and tracing take resources, and the GOP is only interested in resources for Big Business.
Nicole
@Ohio Mom: I’m sorry people aren’t wearing masks where you are. It makes me crazy to read that if people would just wear the damn masks, transmission rate would drop by 80%. Good fucking God, people, you want things to open up, right?
Here in NYC, people are pretty good about it in stores (less so outside, but, as rude as I find that behavior, I think the risk of transmission to or from someone you’re passing on the street is fairly low, so, while I’m indignant, I’m not scared). But, we’re still losing between 150-200 people a day to Covid-19, so the fear is very real.
Seanly
@Ohio Mom:
Yes, she had acute lymphoblastic leukemia. She had a subtype that didn’t allow autologous blood stem cell transplant (they were worried the ALL could cross the blood/brain barrier which chemotherapy can’t). She was partway through her 3rd of 4 chemotherapy batches when they found a good bone marrow donor. So she finished that up & went to live w/ her parents in Nashville to get the transplant.
The ARDS event was horrible as I was back at home and thought it was just a minor setback. Got a call from the MCU doctor who told me I needed to get back to Nashville to make decisions in person. I asked if it could wait a couple of days and she said “Sooner rather than later” – I flew down the next day in a panic.
Ruckus
@Nicole:
I live in socal and there are a lot more people out an about and the majority are without masks. Our only real help is that any business in LA county that allows you inside must require you to be masked. I wear a mask whenever I’m out of the apartment so if nothing else, people will stay away from me, but also some may see it as a reminder.
Nicole
@Ruckus: I think it’s the best we can do, is try to set a good example. It’s frustrating that folks don’t, because it’s such an easy thing to do (and I say this is someone who hates wearing them because I wear glasses and masks fog my glasses all the time, but really, compared to being sick, it’s such an easy thing to do).
Another Scott
@lofgren: Not to pile on, but…
Last May I caught the flu in Nara, Japan. I didn’t realize it was the flu until I got home and was checked at a walk-in clinic. Fever, aches and pains, unable to eat much, the usual for a week. Once my fever went away, I envisioned going back to work pretty soon thereafter.
It took another week for me to be able to walk 10 steps without the back of my neck breaking out into a heavy, dripping-wet, sweat. It was startling to me – I don’t recall having that happen before. It took a few more weeks to feel “normal” again.
tl;dr – Fighting a virus is hard work. Recovery is hard work. This is a very nasty virus. Don’t minimize people’s experiences.
Cheers,
Scott.
Elie
@Luther Siler:
Just that.. deep deep pain in joints and all over. If you have ever had “ache all over” from a bad cold or flu — this is many times worse….
Elie
@Nicole:
So agree. I tell ya, I’m getting ready to confront these folks. When I am in our grocery store that has a mask only policy and I see some unthinking asshole flitting around maskless (not to speak of a PREGNANT WOMAN!!!!!), I feel its important to say something. I wear my mask to protect THEM. They shouldnt be allowed to be comfortable screwing my wellbeing. Of course, out here in WA state (rural), I’m a little nervous about inciting one of our gun toting assholes, but honestly, you have to start standing up to this shit!
Elie
@Seanly:
You are totally right on. My sister had a surgical bleed and several resuscitations afterwards. She was in the ICU 51 days and still in the inpatient area. She can barely sit on the edge of the bed or answer her cell phone. She is headed for rehab which will last weeks if not months. It is no exaggeration to talk about one month per week in ICU or urgent care. And it effects every system — from psychiatric, to musculoskeletal, to cardiovascular, and everything else. And anyone recovering these days (non-COVID), are in the covid environment where they never see the faces of their care givers and have only remote access to their loved ones by phone, facetime, Zoom etc — forget hugs and any flesh on flesh tactile stimulation. We will be getting over this for YEARS.
Obdurodon
@Ruckus: My wife raised the same point, and it’s a good one. Part of the reason we still have people taking this lightly is that we collectively have forgotten the horrors of infectious disease. The closest thing any significant number can remember is HIV/AIDS, which – for all its horrors – ended up being easier to avoid (mostly due to being only blood-borne). Now it’s practically invisible, and many people are too young to remember when it was worse. No more relevant than the Black Plague, in many minds.
Nonetheless, there might be *some* who might respond to historical analogy more than to raw numbers. Or not. Just as with the disease itself, I think we should try everything we can to limit the spread of misunderstanding or misinformation even if some of the things we try have only a small marginal effect.