The Mysteries of Long COVID - Victor Davis Hanson

[Geee]

American Greatness

When the original strain of COVID-19 arrived in spring 2020, a pandemic soon swept the country. 

By far most survived COVID. But hundreds of thousands did not. American deaths now number well over 1 million.

Amid the tragedy, there initially was some hope that the pernicious effects of the disease would all disappear upon recovery among the nearly 99 percent who survived the initial infection. 

 

Vaccinations by late 2020 were promised to end the pandemic for good. But they did not. New mutant strains, while more infectious, were said to be less lethal, thus supposedly resulting in spreading natural immunity while causing fewer deaths from infection. 

But that too was not quite so. 

Instead, sometimes the original symptoms, sometimes frightening new ones, not only lingered after the acute phase, but were of increased morbidity. 

Now two-and-a-half years after the onset of the pandemic, there may be more than 20 million Americans who have had are are still suffering from what is currently known as “long COVID”—a less acute version but one ultimately as debilitating.

 

Some pessimistic analyses suggest well over 4 million once-active Americans are now disabled from this often-ignored pandemic and out of the workforce. 

Perhaps 10-30 percent of those originally infected with COVID-19 have some lingering symptoms six months to a year after the initial infection. And they are quite physically sick, desperate to get well, and certainly not crazy.

So far, no government Marshall plan exists to cure long COVID.