Scientists from Hiroshima University found that having a mild case of COVID-19, smoking status, comorbidities, or your gender aren’t significant predictors to tell if you are less likely to develop long COVID, but age is.
The research is published in Scientific Reports and was conducted by Junko Tanaka et al.
In the study, the team examined four areas to see what recovery and community life are like for COVID-19 survivors.
These areas are the persistence of symptoms, psychological distress, impairments in work performance, and experiences of stigma and discrimination.
Some 127 patients who recovered from COVID-19 participated in the study between August 2020 to March 2021.
The team found persistent symptoms of COVID-19 in over half of the participants at a median of 29 days after onset. Meanwhile, half of those with mild cases experienced lingering symptoms.
The team found that smoking history and comorbidities were not strongly related to the long-term symptoms, but they believe that these factors should be continued to be examined in the future.
As for comorbidities, high blood pressure was reported only in 19 of the participants and diabetes in 13.
Their findings are consistent with previous studies reporting that 53% to 55% of non-hospitalized COVID-19 patients get lingering symptoms.
The prevalence of lingering symptoms varied by age group in the study, but the researchers found that older patients are much more likely to become long-haulers compared to those aged 40 and below.
In addition, patients aged 60 and above were more likely than other age groups to report fatigue, palpitations, dry eyes or mouth, dyspnea, and sputum production.
The researchers also found stigma and discrimination due to COVID-19 were reported by 43.3% of participants.
The most common complaints were being treated as contagious despite being cured (61.8%), harmful rumors (29.1%), and verbal harassment (25.5%).
Meanwhile, 29.1% of study participants had possible impairments in their job performance, suggesting that post–COVID-19 conditions may influence productivity at work to only a limited extent.
If you care about COVID, please read studies about how to avoid long COVID and herb rosemary could help fight COVID-19, Alzheimer’s disease.
For more information about COVID, please see recent studies about the key to stopping indoor COVID virus spread, and results showing this drug shows promise in treating long COVID-19 symptoms.
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