New study on Covid Survivors With Lingering Worrisome Health Risks

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Thu, 2021-04-22 11:21 — mike kraft

The health effects of Covid-19 not only can stretch for months but appear to increase the risk of death and chronic medical conditions, even in people who were never sick enough to be hospitalized, a large new study finds.

In the study, published Thursday in the journal Nature, researchers looked at medical records of more than 73,000 people across the United States whose coronavirus infections did not require hospitalization. Between one and six months after becoming infected, those patients had a significantly greater risk of death — 60 percent higher — than people who had not been infected with the virus.

The research, based on records of patients in the Department of Veterans Affairs health system, also found that nonhospitalized Covid survivors had a 20 percent greater chance of needing outpatient medical care over those six months than people who had not contracted the coronavirus.

The Covid survivors experienced a vast array of long-term medical problems that they had never had before — not just lung issues from the respiratory effects of the virus, but symptoms that could affect virtually any organ system or part of the body, from neurological to cardiovascular to gastrointestinal. They were also at greater risk of mental health problems, including anxiety and sleep disorders.

“We found it all,” said an author of the study, Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly, chief of the research and development service at the VA St. Louis Health Care System.

“What was shocking about this when you put it all together was like ‘Oh my God,’ you see the scale,” he added. “It’s still jarring, honestly.”

What’s more, some of the patients’ post-Covid medical issues — like diabetes, kidney disease and some heart problems — could become chronic conditions that would require treatment for the rest of their lives.

“People have continued respiratory disease, continued headache, this, that and the next thing,” said Dr. Laurie Jacobs, chairwoman of internal medicine at Hackensack University Medical Center, who was not involved in the study. “It’s not gone away. And we don’t yet understand the underlying cause, and it’s become chronic in some cases, disabling in other cases. In some areas, people have gotten better, but it’s very variable.”

The study is believed to be the largest yet to evaluate such a comprehensive array of health conditions. The non-hospitalized Covid survivors in the study tested positive for the virus from March 1, 2020, through November. ....

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