News about Long Covid including its relationship to ME/CFS 2020 to 2021

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Sly Saint said:
Just wondering if there is any awareness campaign underway to further promote the
Myalgic Encephalomyelitis / Chronic Fatigue Syndrome CPD produced by Dr Muirhead ( @EducateME )?

I know that the MEA contacted GPs last July:
https://www.s4me.info/threads/uk-me-cfs-cpd-module-from-study-prn.15088/page-2

but a lot has happened since then including the rise in numbers of long-covid patients.

With all the current conflicting information from the likes of TC,CG and PG maybe a tagline somewhere along the lines of
"if you care about the future of long-covid patients you should spend an hour on this free online course"
https://www.studyprn.com/p/chronic-fatigue-syndrome

(btw I spotted a typo on the site and have contacted them to get it fixed)
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In the Republic of Ireland, we in the Irish ME/CFS Association have arranged a webinar for GPs for March on postviral fatigue syndrome and ME/CFS.

When we are emailing and posting information to GPs we are also going to give a link to that CPD module.
 
Covid: HSE refuses to close workplaces that are putting employees at risk
Employment minister Mims Davies last week said Covid had been classified as “significant” rather than “serious”, as it “best supports inspectors in making sensible, proportionate regulatory decisions”. She added that effects of Covid were “non-permanent or reversible, non-progressive and any disability is temporary” for the working population as a whole.
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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2...workplaces-that-are-putting-employees-at-risk
 
There seem to be two things wrong with that paragraph.

The grammar suggests that covid rather than the department is supporting the inspectors.

What possible evidence could be produced to support the claims as to permanence or reversibility?
 
It is hard to be certain, but it appaears that the words quoted were probbably extracted from the response to a Parliamentary question. It might be itersting to see the original. It could be that the full response is rather more nuanced. On the other hand...
 
Long COVID: a public health expert’s campaign to understand the disease
On March 20 2020, while the UK was anticipating its first national lockdown to control the coronavirus pandemic, I started feeling unwell with what felt like a COVID-19 infection.

Over the next couple of days, I developed a collection of symptoms: fever, chills, cough, chest heaviness, exhaustion, diarrhoea, abdominal pain and bad muscle aches, particularly in my legs. Since the UK government had stopped lab testing for those who were not hospitalised for COVID-19 on March 12, the vast majority of community infections in March remained unconfirmed by testing, including mine. The instruction then was that if you were not ill enough to go to hospital, you should stay at home and wait to get better.
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https://theconversation.com/long-co...rts-campaign-to-understand-the-disease-152212
 
Inside health on Radio 4 had an episode on Long Covid yesterday. I didn't catch all of it but the bit I did listen to involved a patient of the Leeds Long Covid service describing 'pacing' as including 10% increases in activity.:banghead:

Also it seems that they haven't been having much success in treating the patients as they haven't been able to discharge many people at all. You can listen to the episode here although I'm not sure if non-UK members will be able to (I think you need a UK TV licence to listen).

Edit: Clarity
Edit 2: I originally wrote that the leader of the service described pacing as including 10% increases in activity but then remembered if was a patient so I corrected myself.
 
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Long Covid: MPs call for compensation for key workers
Boris Johnson is facing fresh calls to compensate key workers suffering from "long Covid".

A total of 65 MPs and peers have signed a letter to the PM, asking for it to be recognised as an occupational disease.

Layla Moran, who chairs a committee of MPs looking into coronavirus, said the government should not abandon "the true heroes of the pandemic".
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-56090826
 
A clinical primer for the expected and potential post-COVID-19 syndromes
Brian Walitt & Elizabeth Bartrum


In late 2019, a novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) spread unchecked across the world's population. With tens of millions infected, the long-term consequences of COVID-19 infection will be a major health care focus for years after the contagion subsides.
Most complications stem from direct viral invasion provoking an over-exuberant inflammatory response driven by innate immune cells and activation of the clotting cascade causing thrombosis.
Injury to individual organs and their protective linings are frequent presentations in respiratory, cardiovascular, and neurological systems.
Reviewing the historical context of postviral fatiguing symptoms seems relevant to understanding reports of uneven recoveries and persistent symptoms that are emerging as “long-haul COVID-19.”
The pandemic is also an unprecedented sociocultural event, transforming how people consider their health, gather in groups, and navigate their daily lives.
The unprecedented sociocultural stresses of the pandemic will have an invisible, ubiquitous, and predictable impact on neurologic, endocrine, and immune functioning, even in people untouched by the virus.
COVID-19 may also have a surprise or two in store, with unique clinical presentations and novel mechanisms of injury which are yet to clearly emerge.
Although challenging and unfortunate, these times also represent a unique opportunity to start to unravel the physiology that underlie how viruses may trigger cancers, neurological disease, and postviral fatiguing syndromes.
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https://journals.lww.com/painrpts/F...primer_for_the_expected_and_potential.19.aspx


Discussed on this thread:
A clinical primer for the expected and potential post-COVID-19 syndromes, Wallit et al, 2021

 
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UCL researchers lead £11m projects to investigate Long Covid | UCL News - UCL – University College London

Professor Nishi Chaturvedi (MRC Unit for Lifelong Health & Ageing at UCL) and Professor Sir Terence Stephenson (UCL Great Ormond Street Institute of Child Health) are leading two new studies on Long Covid announced by the UK Government today.
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https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2021/feb/ucl-researchers-lead-ps11m-projects-investigate-long-covid

see also:
https://www.s4me.info/threads/non-h...clock-study-2021-stevenson-and-crawley.19061/
 
Long Covid: 'I can't walk 10m without a rest'

A midwife has told the BBC how "long Covid" left her in a wheelchair as Boris Johnson faces calls to compensate key workers suffering from the condition.

A total of 65 MPs and peers have signed a letter to the PM, asking for it to be recognised as an occupational disease.

Before June 2020, Jo Aitken was working as an NHS community midwife. She now needs a wheelchair to leave the house.

She says long Covid changed her life completely.

It can present as a range of different symptoms suffered by people weeks or months after being infected with the virus, even for those who weren't seriously ill when they had it.

According to the British Medical Journal, it is thought to occur in approximately 10% of people infected.

For Jo, 50, it has left her unable to work as a midwife since last June.

"It's not been easy," she said. "I hardly go out anymore because I just haven't got the energy.

"This weekend I succumbed and got a wheelchair. I can't walk more than 10 metres without needing a rest."

"I love my job, I don't like not being able to do it," she added. "But being a community midwife involves a lot of moving around, lifting babies and equipment.

"I've been getting really good care from the NHS and latterly from my employer as well."

But there is an end in sight for Jo, who was told by her doctor he expects her to make a full recovery.

"I cried with relief when he told me that," she said. "At the moment I can't really see an end to it, but him saying that, it kind of put the light at the end of the tunnel."
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https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-56113021
 
Just seen Dr David Strain on BBC News 24, explaining why Long Covid is different to other fatigue syndromes such as CFS.

Paraphrased:

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With LC, it's like having an out of date smartphone; no matter how well you charge it up, the battery isn't in good condition and it will be drained before you get to the end of the day. You need to make sure you stop before you reach that stage, to give your body time to recover.

Whereas with CFS, we encourage people to take part in structured exercise programmes to get well again, as you would with pulmonary or cardiac rehabilitation.

____________________

I'm afraid I'm shattered after having to get up at 6am for delivery of a new bed base, shifting a lot of stuff in and out of the bedroom, and making and remaking the bed – I just couldn't cope with watching any more.

But: :banghead::banghead::banghead:.
 
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