A not-yet-published report on covid re-infection raises some troubling questions. Data were drawn from US Veterans' Administration records and reflected 5.4 million people who had not had covid, about 250,000 people who had had covid once, and about 39,000 people who had had covid two or more times. Comparing people with multiple infections to those with single ones suggests that all-cause mortality as well as adverse cardiovascular and lung-adverse outcomes doubled for those infected more than once. There was also a three-fold risk of hospitalization for those infected more than once. Increased risk persisted for six months following infection. Through the Delta wave, the rate for re-infections was one percent or less. From Omicron BA.2 and following subvariants, re-infections are increasing due to the progressively increased immune escape of each subvariant. Finally, the current BA.4 and BA.5 subvariants are different enough form the original BA.1 that the BA.1-specific vaccine expected to be released come fall suggests that the vaccine will not be as protective as anticipated.
The European CDC says that BA.4 and BA.5 will soon become dominant in Europe and lead to a summer surge. The French vaccination chief says that the question is not whether such a surge is coming but how intense it might be and when it might start. Right now, the highest wave is in Portugal.
The BBC website had quite the article on long covid. Fascinating even if it wasn't all good news. Right now, 20 percent of covid sufferers have symptoms that last between five and 12 weeks. Ten percent have symptoms that last longer. It's estimated that 31 million Americans may have had long covid at some point in the last two years. According to the British Office for National Statistics, long covid affects more women than men, more people living in "deprived areas," more social and healthcare workers as well as teachers, and more people in their 30s and 40s.
As might be expected, long covid has serious implications when it comes to employment. Eighty-five percent of people with long covid said their symptoms worsened after increased stress and increased mental or physical activity. In the UK, only 44 percent of people requesting job accommodations due to long covid reported receiving them. Some experts think that long covid could be responsible for 15 percent of the US's 11.4 million unfilled jobs. Employers are working to adapt to this new normal. Some experts advise using symptoms rather than diagnoses to determine appropriate job accommodations. This makes sense to me given that the symptoms of long covid vary a lot from person to person.
And the beat goes on ...
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