As time passes, a growing number of survivors of COVID-19 infection are found to be suffering long-lasting damage — some mild, but some more significant — to the lungs, heart, and nervous system, as well as to the kidneys, liver, and gastrointestinal tract.
These long-term sequelae challenge the discourse in which fatality rates are used as the primary, or even sole metric in assessing the health impacts of the disease.
Londfonds (the Dutch Lung Foundation), Maastricht University, and the CIRO treatment center in Netherlands, surveyed 1,600 people who reported they had symptoms after recovering from the coronavirus. Those recovered patients told researchers that they still suffer from symptoms such as tightness in the chest, fatigue, headaches, or shortness of breath almost three months after recovering. Neatly 60% said they have breathing symptoms that make it difficult to take a walk. “We find this really shocking,” said Longfonds director Michael Rutgers.
