After a through corona infection, half of all affected people report on continuing complaints for six months. The team led by Vernon Chinchilli from Penn State College of Medicine in the US Pennsylvania in the specialist journal "Jama Network Open" came to this result.
The researchers had evaluated the data of 57 studies published between December 2019 and March 2021; it included over 250,000 adults and children who had been infected with Covid-19. Half a year after the acute infection, 54 percent of the patients suffered from at least one of the symptoms summarized under the term "Long Covid". In percentage terms, the same number reported persistent symptoms in the first month after the illness: The number of those affected seems to remain at a steady level in the months following the acute phase. A stay in hospital due to the infection had only a minor influence on whether long-term symptoms occurred afterwards.
According to the patients, generalized symptoms, such as pain, fever and weight loss, breathing difficulties and cough as well as mental disorders, were most common. Fatigue and muscle weakness accompanied over 37 percent of those surveyed, and almost a quarter complained of concentration disorders. Anxiety disorders in particular affect the mental health of those affected: for example, one of three people was diagnosed after infection with a generalized anxiety disorder. In addition, every fourth reported about sleep disorders, every fifth received depression. The patients also told about cardiovascular complaints, skin and the digestive tract disorders.
A corona infection can go through several phases. The acute disease lasts about two weeks. It is rarely followed by a four-week phase of the disease, in which sometimes strong inflammatory processes are in the foreground. This is followed by a phase in which long-term complaints can occur. Some of these symptoms, such as difficulty concentrating or memory problems, could be due to minor damage to nerve fibers in the brain.
