Long Covid in the media and social media 2023

One in Five Doctors With Long COVID Can No Longer Work: Survey
Claire Sibonney

August 31, 2023
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/996030

 

Scientists are meeting in Santa Fe to unravel the mystery of long COVID

https://www.npr.org/2023/09/02/1197...santa-fe-to-unravel-the-mystery-of-long-covid

4 Minute listen

 

This is really good!

 

I don't know if I will remember to make this regular, but I decided to check up on Bing chat (ChatGPT back-end but up-to-date on web content) and ask for the most significant news and research on Long Covid in the last month.

I used Bing chat because ChatGPT doesn't browse the web and only has content up to September 2021. Google Gemini should be out in a few weeks, maybe months, and is rumored to be far more powerful, and is expected to be up-to-date on web content, given that Google pretty much holds most of it on their servers.

Most of those have been covered, but it's interesting to see the public takeaway of what's happening, through the filter of an AI that will answer a lot of those questions.

• A new study published in the prestigious journal Nature Medicine looked at data from patients two years after their initial infection. It contains some alarming figures—until you dig into them1.
• Scientists gathered this week to unpack what we know about the underlying cause of long COVID and potential treatments2.
• The first study to look at two years of data shows the devastating effects of long COVID-but there are still no validated treatments3.
• Two new large-scale reports are giving a clearer picture of the long-term impacts of COVID-19 infections on Canadians and the health-care system. One report, published by Statistics Canada, found that nearly 15 per cent of people who’ve contracted COVID-19 say they experienced lingering symptoms such as fatigue, shortness of breath or brain fog three months or more after their initial infection4.

Oh, actually I see that the first one is a Long Covid minimizing piece by some dude with the handle HealthNerd on twitter, who is always nitpicking about LC and clearly doesn't think much of it. I find him to be every bit as bad as the minimizers who are open and honest about their minimizing. He seems to think that evidence-based medicine can do no wrong, and find him very annoying.

 

Not quite long COVID - mods feel free to move if more appropriate thread .
" Immunity theft " as a concept highlighted in this mainstream article


https://calgaryherald.com/opinion/c...f-sick-kids-but-wed-better-figure-it-out-fast

 

And again Long COVID problems being picked up by financial media ...regulator backlog impacting research
(MHRA)

https://www.ft.com/content/49287f26-7aa6-4606-8c81-a2ebbe72247d?sharetype=blocked

 

From Dec 2022.

 

Archived at https://archive.ph/l6R9k

 

https://twitter.com/user/status/1698155646284337244

 

UK’s Long Covid research under threat from regulator backlog, warn scientists

"Scientists are warning that delays at the UK’s medicines regulator mean an important trial looking for ways of treating Long Covid risks running out of money before it finishes.

Researchers hunting for treatments that could benefit the millions of Long Covid patients, who currently have no approved drugs, have waited up to six months for the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency to approve adaptations that it is required to rule on within 35 days.

The Stimulate-ICP study is modelled on the UK’s flagship Recovery trial that found drugs to use against acute Covid-19. It has only enrolled 900 of the 4,200 participants that it aimed to recruit, and its funding from the UK’s National Institute for Health and Care Research runs out in March. "

https://www.ft.com/content/49287f26-7aa6-4606-8c81-a2ebbe72247d

 

There is a simple solution to this and if they aren’t allocated additional funding there will be a political reason.

 

John Snow Project
Perspective: I Did Everything Right and Things Still Went Wrong
https://johnsnowproject.org/perspec...everything-right-and-things-still-went-wrong/

Salvatore Mattera did everything right. He was fully vaccinated and boosted and even had the ‘hybrid immunity’ some commentators said would protect him, but his second and third COVID-19 infections turned his life upside down.
...
In the second in a series of personal perspectives, the John Snow Project talks to Salvatore Mattera, a young professional based in California, who developed Long COVID after his third SARS-CoV-2 infection.​

The John Snow project is named after famed UK epidemiologist John Snow, who pretty much started the concept of public health by tracing the source of a cholera outbreak in London to a water pump.

Here the article/interview talks mainly about the confusing message coming out of public health and most MDs, constantly minimizing or denying Long Covid, and how this false messaging is harmful.

“Government officials that downplay or ignore the risk of Long COVID are directly responsible for the suffering of millions of people. Even if there's nothing to be done about it, at least telling people the truth would give them a chance to make a decision about the amount of risk they're willing to take. Be honest with the public about Long COVID: stop downplaying it.”​

 

Star Tribune: "Frustrating futility on long COVID"

"So far, the National Institutes of Health's progress has left patient advocates and some scientists underwhelmed. Accountability and oversight are needed."

"It didn't seem to be a house-on-fire moment, which it should have been," Osterholm said.

"So far, it doesn't appear that Congress has held a hearing to scrutinize NIH's use of long COVID funding. Accountability and oversight are needed."

"Rep. Anna Eshoo, a California Democrat, deserves praise for her prominent advocacy for this. We'd also like to see Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith get involved, a view shared by Billy Hanlon, a prominent patient advocate for those struggling with post-COVID conditions. He is the director of advocacy and outreach for the Minnesota ME/CFS Alliance." "An independent expert review, one authorized and funded by Congress, of the NIH's strategy would be preferable to a politically infused congressional hearing."

"Confidence that initial long COVID funding was well spent is critical for future appropriations. Those struggling with long COVID, and those who will as the virus continues to circulate, deserve the nation's help in finding relief and reclaiming their lives.

 

The Irish Times: More than 5% of Irish adults living with long Covid symptoms

 

Anyone watching the US Open superspreader? There appears to be a mysterious "flu-like" and possible "food poisoning" going around. So so mysterious.

https://twitter.com/user/status/1697307352083361942

 

At the outset of the tournament, former tennis champion and ESPN sports commentator John McEnroe had to miss the event after testing positive for COVID-19. So far, this is the only official case of COVID-19 testing done on anyone at the tournament, with either a positive or negative result. USTA and event organizers have not even mentioned the word “COVID” or stated whether they have tested a single player for this or any other illness.

https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/09/05/gsjw-s05.html

 

It has unfortunately been made clear that there are no future planned appropriations. But wasting $1.15B with nothing to show for it, not even spurring more research out of it, is a major failure in itself, one that deserves to be investigated fully. Medicine is obviously reckless in how they waste funds, keeps using the "research is expensive" trope, as if their own wasteful mishandling is not a main reason for it.

And then they keep funding hundreds more pointless and redundant nonsense like the 559th trial of this nonsense or another form of "think different about your illness, or whatever". Major reforms are needed here, they cannot responsibly do this, have shown that they need a lot of oversight.

 

Trial By Error: Call for Retraction of Cochrane Review from Science For ME; Overview of Viral Persistence in Long Covid; Senators United on Long Covid

https://virology.ws/2023/09/07/tria...-in-long-covid-senators-united-on-long-covid/