Exhaustion, uncertainty mark survivors’ journeys
An angelic voice singing “Hallelujah” echoes off the stately stone and brick canyons of a narrow Paris street.
Still struggling with COVID-19 complications two months after falling ill, soprano Veronica Antonelli wanted the impromptu performance from her thirdfloor balcony to project hope. Hours earlier, her doctor had delivered troubling news: The lung scarring that sometimes makes her too tired to sing may last for months. Or maybe years.
“It makes things a bit complicated, given my profession,” Antonelli said sadly.
The virus that has sickened over 4 million people around the world and killed more than 280,000 others is so new that patients face considerable uncertainty about what they can expect in recovery and beyond.
“The short answer is that we’re still learning,” said Dr. Jay Varkey, an infectious disease specialist at Emory University in Atlanta. “What we know has been gathered mostly by anecdotal reports from COVID-19 survivors.”
In support groups created on social media sites, survivors post head-to-toe complaints that read like a medical encyclopedia: anxiety, heart palpitations, muscle aches, bluish toes. It’s hard to know which ones are clearly related to the virus, but the accounts help fuel doctors’ increasing belief that COVID-19 is not just a respiratory disease.
Persistent exhaustion is a common theme, but every survivor’s story is different, said Brandy Swayze, a coronavirus sufferer who created a Facebook survivors group after developing pneumonia. She was hospitalized in late March and early
April. Her fatigue comes and goes. Insomnia is another concern.
“We’re just people who have more questions than anybody else about this thing because we’re going through it,” said Swayze, 43, of Cabin John, Md.
On top of her lung damage and fatigue, Antonelli has issues with her memory and a diminished sense of taste and smell — a common early symptom that lingers for many, which doctors say stems from the virus attacking nerves.
Two-thirds of patients in a study in Italy had a loss of smell and taste. Some reports suggest these problems last only a few weeks, but it’s been almost two months for Antonelli. She said that when she asked a voice specialist when she would be able to smell again, his answer was “‘We know nothing. We just have to be patient. We have no solution.’ ”