Covid-19 pandemic

[steveeeeeeeee]

A young, otherwise healthy colleague got it in January for the first time and was badly sick for a month. I’ve noticed she is constantly clearing her throat since..

I've only stopped doing this in the last couple of weeks, which would be 4 and a half months after catching COVID. I'd say I'm fully recovered now, although I still suffer from pain in my ribs after fracturing them as a result of severe coughing fits. I imagine that will last for some time.

[Patrick Thistle]

One of my nieces ended up in hospital this week, pretty poorly. After she got home the hospital phoned to say she also tested positive for covid.

[blameless]

I'm not in any danger (I know from experience that Covid doesn't ruin my lungs or give me a heart attack, unlike some horribly unlucky folk), but it does feel like I've got a nasty case of flu - hence my rant upthread.

[Sits]

Sorry about your colleague steveeeeeeeee and I hope blameless has a light or asymptomatic dose. This is another jurisdiction in which the powers that be proceed as though the virus doesn’t exist. If we test positive, nothing prevents us doing what the fuck we like, or going where the fuck we like. Home tests were never free, even in the darkest days of Delta, so now people buy them by choice or bury their heads in the sand. Masks elicit funny looks. Boosters are readily available but there is no official messaging about actually getting them.

It seems pot luck whether someone’s dose is asymptomatic or really nasty. A young, otherwise healthy colleague got it in January for the first time and was badly sick for a month. I’ve noticed she is constantly clearing her throat since. My daughter - who has potentially higher susceptibility to infection - got it for the first time in November and was asymptomatic and all clear inside six days.

[blameless]

RE tests, personally speaking I bought some last year when I was struggling to get hold of free ones - even after yesterday, I've still got 3 tests left out of the box of 10.

[Janik]

Which obviously works if you have symptoms. But we know Covid can be infectious but asymptomatic. We also know more about other respiratory diseases this is true of as well (asymptomatic transmission is now better appreciated to be an important vector for ‘flu, for instance), which is why I’m very dubious that an eradication programme, on either Covid of ‘flu, can ever work.

Obviously the people coughing and snuffling in public are more likely to have been the spreader than someone apparently perfectly healthy. But one cannot be certain of that - it could be anyone who shared an enclosed space with blameless that passed it on to him.

[Wouter D]

The expiration date printed on the box is estimated conservatively, so 'expired' tests may not be actually expired. There seem to be some resources online for investigating the true expiry date of your tests.

Tests that are past their real expiration date are not instantly useless:
- the further a test is beyond its expiration date, the higher the probability becomes that it throws a false negative. You can fight the risk of drawing a false conclusion by testing more than once.
- the probability of false positives does not change over time.

So if you feel under the weather, and have an expired test in the house, you can take one. Is the test positive? Now you know that you have Covid. Is the test negative? Proceed with caution, and perhaps repeat the experiment to reduce uncertainty.

[Capybara]

Bloody hellfire, I've caught the fucking bug again.

But then again I live in a country where the ringpieces that run the place have taken a "don't take any precautions, it's all gone away" attitude, and where I've not had access to any booster jabs since 2022; so I was right in the crosshairs for another dose.

How do people know they have it these days? I mean people in the UK, especially England, that is, given that you actually have to buy tests now and any left over from when they were free are likely to be out of date by now.

[steveeeeeeeee]

A work colleague of mine died last month, I believe from COVID related complications, he was in his fifties. He was becoming a world leader in his field of work, but most importantly, he was one of the loveliest people you could hope to work with, the type of person who constantly offered praise and made you feel like anything could be achieved. A massive loss and another wake up call to me after my own brush with ill health at the same time.

I'll be getting my booster jab in the next couple of weeks.

[ursus arctos]

I still haven't had it.

On Jamie's point, I think that there is a real question as to whether eradication is still possible given societal/political attitudes and the mobility of populations.

[Janik]

Most of us will probably get it again at some point in our lives. For some, it will be part of what eventually kills us, as well.* It's endemic now, absolutely and for the decades to come - quite possiblyy for the entire future of the human species.
There is an argument to be had about whether this was avoidable at all. And if it was potentially avoidable, which is dubious, whether the measures required to eradicate it would have produced a greater amount of suffering than not doing so. But proving any of the viewpoints will be difficult - everything but the situation we actually have is speculation about a very complex situation. We are where we are, and this is what it is and will be from now on. Covid isn't going away, it has become part of the standard infectious disease set that humanity lives (...or not...) with.

* - According to the UK Health Security Agency 128 death certificates issued over the last 7 days to 22nd March mentioned Covid-19.

[Lang Spoon]

I really thought folk wpuld maybe wear a mask if they had a cold and had to use public transport post pandemic, but nah, its cough into the air again, dont even cover your mouth. A culture of selfish ignorant shitebags. A mask is somehow a hellish encumberance on liberty.

[blameless]

Bloody hellfire, I've caught the fucking bug again.

But then again I live in a country where the ringpieces that run the place have taken a "don't take any precautions, it's all gone away" attitude, and where I've not had access to any booster jabs since 2022; so I was right in the crosshairs for another dose.

[ursus arctos]

Four major nonprofits that rose to prominence during the coronavirus pandemic by capitalizing on the spread of medical misinformation collectively gained more than $118 million between 2020 and 2022, enabling the organizations to deepen their influence in statehouses, courtrooms and communities across the country, a Washington Post analysis of tax records shows.

Children’s Health Defense, an anti-vaccine group founded by Robert F. Kennedy Jr., received $23.5 million in contributions, grants and other revenue in 2022 alone — eight times what it collected the year before the pandemic began — allowing it to expand its state-based lobbying operations to cover half the country.

Another influential anti-vaccine group, Informed Consent Action Network, nearly quadrupled its revenue during that time to about $13.4 million in 2022, giving it the resources to finance lawsuits seeking to roll back vaccine requirements as Americans’ faith in vaccines drops.

Two other groups, Front Line Covid-19 Critical Care Alliance and America’s Frontline Doctors, went from receiving $1 million combined when they formed in 2020 to collecting more than $21 million combined in 2022, according to the latest tax filings available for the groups.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2024/02/21/covid-misinformation-earnings/?pwapi_token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9. eyJyZWFzb24iOiJnaWZ0IiwibmJmIjoxNzA4NTc4MDAwLCJpc3 MiOiJzdWJzY3JpcHRpb25zIiwiZXhwIjoxNzA5OTYwMzk5LCJp YXQiOjE3MDg1NzgwMDAsImp0aSI6Ijc1NDdmMWJkLWYxOGItND Y1OS1iMzliLTA2MWM3NDhmODlhMSIsInVybCI6Imh0dHBzOi8v d3d3Lndhc2hpbmd0b25wb3N0LmNvbS9uYXRpb24vMjAyNC8wMi 8yMS9jb3ZpZC1taXNpbmZvcm1hdGlvbi1lYXJuaW5ncy8ifQ.D 6S9chkyfYHgYaDOI5boCCkkUvhGPyemrryN7vmOVGg&itid=gf ta

(should be a gift article)

[Furtho]

Positive test yesterday. It felt like a heavy cold, but then the sweats and the stomach cramps kicked in. Very unpleasant indeed.

[Janik]

Going off everything I've read that's written by people who are taking the pandemic seriously, my advice would be to wait a little longer before you start exercising, and to start very lightly when you do take it up again. This seems to be the advice even for people who've had a mild or asymptomatic case, never mind what you're hopefully now coming out of.

Whilst that definitely is the advice from some quarters, and in a situation like stev9e's (which sounds very long Covid-y) being cautious is definitely wise, there is something of an over-abundance of caution involved there. Going back to exercise too fast can and has caused some people problems, serious and long-term problems as well, but that really remains the exception rather than the rule.

Consider that approximately a third of people with the initial variant were asymptomatic carriers. Something we always knew intellectually happened with viruses, but had never had data to properly quantify as we basically had never mass screened a population with a diagnostic test including people who had no reason to think they were ill. And we still didn't have that in the first half of 2020, until the tests came along. When they arrived that is when we found the ~33% number, which we then assumed was the initial rate. And yet, prior to the home testing coming along, there were thousands of people who were infected, asymptomatic and unaware so had no reason to alter their behaviours (i.e. avoid intense exercise for those who like to do that). But despite this we didn't suddenly get a rush of cases where people were becoming mysteriously and seemingly chronically ill with no apparent cause.
The same is true now when we are no longer mass screening and yet Covid is still very much around. Once again, due to the lack of wide-spread testing, our knowledge of the ratio of asymptomatic to symptomatic cases is more sketchy and for individuals they are much more likely to be infected and just not know it. And whilst we do have some people now who get long Covid after minor or not-even-detected cases it is still a vanishingly small proportion of those with minimal symptoms, all of whom just want to get back to their regular activities as soon as poss.

My guess (and it very much is a guess) is the post-infection pathway is massively individual, and also very significantly linked to where the disease resides in the host. We know (see ursus graph above) that Covid can be in the gastrointestinal system as well as the respiratory one. It is probably not just and 'and' but an 'and/or', i.e. it can be exclusively gastrointestinal in some cases. Even if its in the respiratory tract, it depends where in that it sits - is it just in the throat or down to the lungs. My speculation is its the people where Covid has established itself in the lung who the key risk group in terms of taking exercise back up too quickly.


For instance, purely anecdotally, the story of my own one known infection. I had two days of minor symptoms, followed by another four days asymptomatic but still returning positive lateral flows for Covid. By the end of that 'feeling fine but stuck inside' period I was getting decidedly itchy feet, so went out for a run on the very first day of testing negative. A very cautious run, going slow enough to keep my breathing very light and so on. No problems. Day two I was out again, going a bit less cautiously. Still no problem. By day 5 I felt ready to try running 'properly' and wanted to know what 'damage' being ill had done to my fitness so headed for a parkrun I'd been at before. Away I went, pushing on but without flogging myself into the ground... and promptly posted a lifetime PB for 5k (21:22 since you ask). It's still the fastest I've ever managed. All without any sign of a long-term consequence.

[Sam]

Finally, I need to start exercising again, I've basically done none since my daughter was born. I don't want to sound like super dad, but I do most of the heavy daily lifting (school runs post school care, make lunch and dinner, after school club runs, visits to parks and playgrounds) and I can't carry on this way. I wake up at 5am every day and collapse in bed at about 8:30. Without sounding a twat, I need more time for me. This health scare has really shaken me up, but it's happened at a time in my life when I can still act on it.

Going off everything I've read that's written by people who are taking the pandemic seriously, my advice would be to wait a little longer before you start exercising, and to start very lightly when you do take it up again. This seems to be the advice even for people who've had a mild or asymptomatic case, never mind what you're hopefully now coming out of.

I'll also leave this Twitter thread here. It doesn't make for happy reading given that pretty much every government (of a country anyone on here lives in, at least) seems to have long ago taken the attitude that it's just up to us all to live with it. But it's worth bearing in mind, I think.

https://twitter.com/Fab_Fwd/status/1747025342617821376

[ursus arctos]

[diggedy derek]

Glad to hear you're on the mend Steveeeeeeeee, that sounds quite an ordeal.

[Janik]

That all sounds very encouraging. Fingers crossed it stays on track from here on out.

[S. aureus]

That’s great news, it must have been a complete, and rather long, nightmare, both for you and the senhora.

[steveeeeeeeee]

I'm feeling much better in terms of breathing and energy and pneumologist visit confirmed this, this morning. My CT scan shows only signs of inflammation in my right lung, no scarring nothing to be worried about. My blood oxygen levels were at 101, which is incredible, I was at 88 when I was really sick and getting about 94 when I was recovering. The slightly high glucose levels are probably due to my medication, but I'm going to take better care of myself whatever.

He's given me strong pain + muscle relaxant medication, which has taken a much bigger edge off the pain from my ribs. I am continuing on the pneumonia recovery medication for the next 2 weeks as it is working so well. Once that is finished, I may attend lung rehabilitation if I still have any issues once the medication ends, but he seemed to think it won't be needed.

So, feeling pretty relieved, senhora stev9e was in tears when she got the news everything was fine, so I guess it's been as hard and worrying for those around me.

My mum's symptoms never got anywhere near as bad as mine, but she was vaccinated in October. God knows what would have happened were that not the case.

[Moonlight Shadow]

Don't feel guilty about changing things, it gets harder with age and your daughter and wife will benefit from a healthier you as well!

[steveeeeeeeee]

Woke up this morning in pain rather than agony from the muscle pop of yesterday. Being economical with my coughing has made a big difference too, starting to really feel better lung and breathing wise, new medication definitely working.

CT scan reflected how I feel, right lung shows clear signs of having pneumonia, but no scarring, so the pulmonary fibrosis scare is exactly that. Blood tests however, are a worry, literally everything related to fighting infection is through the roof, I've been really f*cking ill and when I look back at the way i acted over the last couple of months, trying to just carry on as normal, i feel a total idiot.

Finally, my cholesterol and glucose are over the normal limits, which I would have guessed anyway. Neither are red alerts, but I need to make some serious lifestyle changes. I haven't drunk alcohol since November and I've decided to stop drinking at home. I didn't drink much, but I was drinking every day, that's over. I would give it up completely, but I really enjoy a beer when I watch football (just the one, every fortnight) so I don't want to totally end a couple of very rare pleasures.

Finally, I need to start exercising again, I've basically done none since my daughter was born. I don't want to sound like super dad, but I do most of the heavy daily lifting (school runs post school care, make lunch and dinner, after school club runs, visits to parks and playgrounds) and I can't carry on this way. I wake up at 5am every day and collapse in bed at about 8:30. Without sounding a twat, I need more time for me. This health scare has really shaken me up, but it's happened at a time in my life when I can still act on it.

[Sam]

Bloody hell steveeeeeeeee. 'Get well soon' seems like such a platitude, but I really hope you do. And I wish more people still took this thing seriously. As I saw on Twitter a few months ago, 'we've tried everything from pretending it's over to pretending it never happened'.