Analyses of the economic costs and impacts of chronic illnesses like ME/CFS and Long Covid

Although now some years ago there was some data suggesting that people treated by the UK ME specialist services went on to work less and to claim more benefits.

 

Let me guess the next move... "psychologically-led rehabilitation can lead to people being able to work more than they think, but it can't make them accept that they can".

Doesn't matter that it's literally all about the latter. By their own admission. In their own definitions. The quacks pushing this pseudoscience have an infinite number of cheap excuses they can throw at it and the systems that want this to be true don't care that it's not, they like the imaginary numbers promising them that it works and if reality disagrees then it's reality that is wrong.

 

"The economic burden of long COVID in Australia: more noise than signal?" (Med J Aust 2024; 221(9):S31-S39):

Link | PDF

 

Last year, Health Canada published an estimate of the cost of Long Covid and put it at between $8B and $50B up to 2023, so for the first 2-3 years, making it an absolute minimum of $1-2B per year, and likely a gross underestimate, and up to $15B/year.

https://www.s4me.info/threads/healt...s-of-post-covid-19-condition-in-canada.41323/

 

The relationship between long COVID, labor productivity, and socioeconomic losses in Japan: A cohort study (2025)
Konishi; Masaki; Shimamoto; Ibuka; Goto; Namkoong; Chubachi; Terai; Asakura; Miyata; Azekawa; Nakagawara; Tanaka; Morita; Harada; Sasano; Nakamura; Kusaka; Ohba; Nakano; Fukunaga

OBJECTIVES
We examined shifts in labor productivity and their economic ramifications among adult patients with long COVID in Japan.

METHODS
A total of 396 patients were categorized into three groups based on symptom progression: non-long COVID, long COVID recovered, and long COVID persistent. Patient-reported outcomes were assessed at three time intervals: 3, 6, and 12 months after COVID-19 diagnosis. Labor productivity was gauged through presenteeism and absenteeism, measured using the World Health Organization Health and Work Performance Questionnaire.

RESULTS
Long COVID was observed in 52.7% of patients, and 29.3% of all the patients continued to experience long COVID symptoms 1 year after diagnosis. At all three time points (3, 6, and 12 months after diagnosis), the long COVID persistent group showed a statistically significant difference in absolute presenteeism compared with the non-long COVID and long COVID recovered groups (P <0.01). Economic loss owing to decrease in labor productivity was calculated as $21,659 per year in the long COVID persistent group and $9008 per year in the long COVID recovered group (P <0.01).

CONCLUSIONS
The study’s results revealed a notable decline in labor productivity over time, underscoring the importance of early detection and intervention to mitigate the socio-economic repercussions of long COVID, in addition to its health implications.

Link (IJID Regions) | Thread

Spoiler: Concluding

In total, 29.3% of the patient cohort continued to experience long COVID symptoms 1 year after COVID-19 diagnosis. At 3, 6, and 12 months after diagnosis, patients with long COVID that persisted for 1 year were more prevalent than those with early resolution of long COVID or those without long COVID. Presenteeism, a key labor productivity indicator, exhibited a significant decrease in these patients, suggesting an association between reduced work productivity and long COVID that persisted for 1 year. For these patients, the annual economic loss attributed to diminished labor productivity amounted to $21,659. As the duration of COVID-19 persistence increased, the associated economic losses grew significantly higher. A substantial proportion of patients experiencing long COVID symptoms, such as fatigue, impaired cognitive function, and sleep disturbances, demonstrated a marked decline in presenteeism.

 

I find it amusing that the sentence is just as valid if you replace "long Covid" with "aging". Actually, it applies to social media, sports, computer games, etc.

 

See also: low pay, lack of agency, poor prospects, discrimination, bad management, insecure housing, lack of medical and dental care, living in the terrifying nightmare that is the mid-2020s...