Experts explain why COVID- 19 survivors
MEDICAL experts have alerted to deadly complications in ‘ long COVID’ survivors. They said the situation is dire because over 80 per cent of patients are not aware because they never knew they had COVID- 19, they were not tested. The experts said the patients could be at risk of sudden death due to collapse of vital organs such as the lungs, heart, kidney, lever, brain and nervous system.
While COVID- 19 can cause a period of acute illness, some people continue to experience symptoms, such as breathlessness, muscle aches and fatigue, for months or even years – a condition that has been labelled long COVID.
Studies have suggested COVID may have a lingering impact, including through damage to organs such as the heart and lungs, while research has suggested less than a third of patients who have ongoing COVID symptoms after being hospitalised with the disease feel fully recovered a year later.
Head of Infectious Disease Unit and COVID 19 response team at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital ( LUTH), Dr. Iorhen Akase, and a consultant neurologist, member of the LUTH COVID response team and consultant in the post COVID long- haul clinic at LUTH, Dr. Agabi Osigwe, told The Guardian that any organ system can be affected and the commonest symptoms they see is when people are still feeling tired, having headaches and difficulty in thinking clearly.
Akase and Osigwe said LUTH has created special clinic for long COVID due to the overwhelming influx of patients.
On prospective look at the COVID pandemic, how it occurred and the impact on Nigerians, Akase said: “COVID19 was first reported in December 2019 and January 2020, and we had our first case in February 28, 2020. Over the course of two years, we have had a total of over 260,000 confirm cases and over 3,000 deaths so far.
“We do know that this is an underestimation of what the true picture is because many people who were ill did not come to the hospital and of course the impact of COVID has been huge because death of 3,000 people at a time is quite significant even against the total population of 200 million.
“Additionally, the effect of COVID on education, economy, travel, tourism and many areas of life was significant. If you look at it from all these aspect, it was quite a significant event for all of us as a whole country.”
On whether COVID- 19 is a one- off illness, Akase said: “There are two ways to look at this, the first way is that people that have COVID- 19 can have it over and over again. People can have COVID- 19 infection once and they can get infected again, twice or a number of times.
“The second aspect of this is that we have seen that COVID has acute that is the immediate aspect of it where people are ill with fever, cough and all what we know as COVID- 19 symptoms and can recover. But now what we are saying is, that might not be the end of COVID illness itself. We are saying that after that immediate period of some people being ill, in fact, some had COVID but they did not experience any symptoms until maybe when they want to travel and are asked to go for testing then discover they are positive but they had no idea about it. Whether people were ill or they had mild illness or they had the severe one known as acute COVID, we are saying that after that period, which is called acute COVID travails, they eventually still have issues with that initial COVID that they had. Clearly, we now know that COVID- 19 is not a one- off illness, it can happen again and again. Also, we now know that even when it happens once after that initial illness, other issues can come up later, which is as a result of that first infection that they had.
“In other words, if somebody has COVID- 19 now, the COVID can potentially affect some of his organ system and some tissues in his body: it can affect the lungs that aids breathing, it can affect the heart that pumps blood to the body, it might affect the muscles thereby causing weakness. So, on a long term though the person has become apparently well, he or she is not back to his functioning capacity as at that time.
“We get to hear of patients that had COVID and before they could run maybe like five kilometres, but these days they can only run maybe like one kilometre and they get tired; all of these is coming on the grounds of the COVID- 19 they have had before.
“We are saying that COVID is not a one- off illness though the acute and serious phase may have gone, it still leaves some damages behind.”
On the meaning and implications of COVID long- haul, Akase said: “Firstly, we have seen that COVID- 19 is not a one- off illness; secondly, COVID- 19 affects more than just the lungs. I know cough is the commonest symptoms of COVID- 19 but it is not just the lungs that COVID affects, it affects the brain, liver, kidney, and almost any tissue in the body.
“We have said that the initial COVID- 19 infection is called acute because it doesn’t last long, we do not expect it to last for more than four weeks.
Most people recover within four weeks of getting COVID, that is the acute COVID that they have, but we are now saying that after that four weeks, some people’s COVID extends, they have symptoms and complications beyond this four weeks.
“Sometimes it is the breathing problems, sometimes when the breathing problems stops, other problems will come in but this is traceable to that COVID- 19 that they had and it keeps going on and on.
“Some of the symptoms can be traceable to any organ system in the body, it can occur from the head. If we are talking about the head then we are talking about the brain. For example, they keep having headaches, they find it difficult to think clearly, they cannot make decisions, they are easily tired and some times they have problem sleeping, it is either they sleep too much or they sleep too little. Some have problems remembering things; some have pains, inability to move; weaknesses in other parts of the body. Some people can have problems in the heart, which makes their heart beat too fast or they are easily panicked when something happens. For some people, it is in the kidneys.
“What I am trying to say is that any organ system can be affected, the commonest symptoms we can see is when people are still feeling tired, headaches, having difficulty in thinking clearly.
“This is what long COVID is and we can say this happens when these symptoms go on for more than four weeks. Some people can have these symptoms for up to a year. We have colleagues who are working on something similar elsewhere, this is not just reported in Nigeria alone, it has been reported in United States and other countries and we are going to hear more about this consequently.”
On who can have long COVID, Osigwe said: “Anybody who has had COVID- 19 before whether they were physically ill or not, whether they had just simple illness like malaria, can have longhaul COVID. You know some people had COVID and they thought they had malaria because that is how it came ( fever, joint pains and all of that). They would think they had just malaria but they didn’t know that what they had at that time was COVID.
“The long and short of this is that anybody who has had COVID before, whether they had severe symptoms or mild symptoms, any of these people can have long- haul COVID.”
On whether the symptoms
• LUTH sets up post COVID long- haul clinic to address situation • Medical experts say COVID- 19 is not a one- off illness, still leaves some damages behind • New study shows how having had COVID- 19 may negatively impact performance at work • COVID- 19 infections can trigger lingering, severe symptoms of long COVID even in vaccinated people • New study paves way to better understand, treat those suffering from long COVID
“Medical experts have alerted to deadly complications in long COVID survivors. They said the situation is dire because over 80 per cent of patients are not aware because they never knew they had COVID- 19, they were not tested. The experts said the patients are “at risk of sudden death due to collapse of vital organs such as the lungs, heart, kidney, lever, brain and nervous system. While COVID- 19 can cause a period of acute illness, some people continue to experience symptoms, such as breathlessness, muscle aches and fatigue, for months or even years – a condition that has been labelled long COVID.