A new investigation led by researchers from the University College London and Dartmouth College suggests 14% of Americans had long COVID by the end of 2022. The details of the investigation are published in PLOS One.
Moreover, Americans who report having experienced long COVID said they also experienced more anxiety, low mood, and difficulty with memory.
All data was based on 461,550 respondents to the US Census Bureau’s Household Pulse Survey, conducted from June 2022 to December 2022. Researchers compared survey answers among those who said they have had long COVID, those who said they have had COVID-19 but no lingering symptoms, and those who had never had COVID-19.
Things are going great!
Rates of disability are not decreasing or levelling off, so I doubt the new variants are less dangerous in this regard, but I guess we'll see.
Please take care of yourselves, everyone. Covid is still going, still a threat, and can still kill or disable you and your loved ones. Please, do everything you can- wear a mask- an N95 or a KN95, filter your air with a hepa filter, ventilate your air, socialize carefully, get the vaccine, try to work remotely or at least away from other people if you can, use a nasal spray, avoid crowds. I know that not everyone can do these things but please do as many as you can. Assume that you and people around you are asymptomatically infectious, and take precautions as if that's the case.
Don't give up. Even a single case prevented is worth it. Even if you are exposed, if you can be exposed to a lower viral load that will be better- so precautions count. Think of your loved ones, your friends, yourself, your communities. You are protecting everyone each time you take protective steps. The government has failed us utterly and now it's time to take matters into our own hands and slow this down as much as possible. The fewer people infected means that fewer variants develop. Fewer variants mean that future vaccines are more likely to protect us.
Getting disabled can happen to anyone. No matter your age or level of health, getting covid can make things worse. Some people get permanent conditions from covid, like heart problems, diabetes, and autoimmune diseases. Please, do everything you can to protect yourself. Good health is temporary, and sometimes when you lose it it never comes back. If you can save yourself from a getting a permanent disability, you should.