Covid-19 takes serious toll on heart health–a full year after recovery

https://www.science.org/content/article/covid-19-takes-serious-toll-heart-health-full-year-after-recovery

by bookofjoe • 4 years ago

57 157 4 years ago

dhosek3• 4 years ago

This is the thing that drives me the most nuts about so many people's reactions to this disease who treat infection as a binary: You die or you don't die and the latter is just as good as not getting it, ignoring the (a) social/medical/emotional costs of a person being sick and (2) the fact that we have just been learning about the long-term effects of infection. From the beginning I've been worried that we're going to see a generations-long impact on overall health just from people who were infected and then "got better." There's so much unknown about this disease but we've let a bunch of politicians and cable TV/internet/podcast hacks claim that it's not serious so that a significant fraction of the population ends up actively spreading the disease and providing reservoirs for it to mutate.

giantg28• 4 years ago

" we've let a bunch of politicians and cable TV/internet/podcast hacks claim that it's not serious so that a significant fraction of the population ends up actively spreading the disease and providing reservoirs for it to mutate."

This is sort of a half truth. You can still spread it if vaccinated.

davrosthedalek• 4 years ago

Yes, and you can still die with a seatbelt on. But a vaccine makes it less likely that you get it (can't spread it if you didn't get it), less likely to spread it (fewer days sick, smaller viral load, ability to self isolate because still functioning, not requiring outside assistance to not die).

Day1• 4 years ago

The thing is, I’m not sure preventing the spread is realistic. Unless you move to the country or to outer space, and never receive any mail or goods, you will always be in contact with, or in the vicinity of, something that has been in contact with, or in the vicinity of, someone else.

marricks• 4 years ago

It wasn't always the case. Time and time again the US government in particular chose the economy over people's lives. Or even people's live over having to do something.

Counties like S. Korea, had bold actions like contact tracing and lockdowns. Many many countries covered pay for folks to stay home. The US initially had a lock down then just quit acting really.

Sure, preventing ANYONE from getting COVID was unrealistically, but preventing most people from getting it was always possible.

ajross2• 4 years ago

I’m not sure preventing the spread is realistic.

South Korea has a total confirmed case rate 10x lower than the USA, and a death rate 20x lower. It's absolutely realistic. It just requires serious effort on the part of everyone to follow straightforward rules about testing/tracing/mitigation. Korea hasn't been shut down for two years. They've just been smarter about it.

guelo3• 4 years ago

It's not that hard. The risk is highest when we have these waves from new variants. There are forecasts that predict them with weeks lead time. And then the wave comes and goes over a few weeks. You just have to up your defenses during those weeks.

adrr• 4 years ago

Studies aren’t the best but it looks like vaccination significantly reduces the risk of these issues. Just hold off infections till the population can get vaccinated.

Bigger issue is getting people to vaccinate especially since long Covid will cost billions in increased insurance premiums and Medicare costs.

Brian_K_White• 4 years ago

Even that Antarctic research station that's the next best thing to the moon, staffed 100% by scientists and professionals who take it seriously and did everything better than any of us do, evereyone got it.

tharne3• 4 years ago

This is the thing that drives me the most nuts about so many people's reactions to this disease who treat infection as a binary: You die or you don't die and the latter is just as good as not getting it

When I hear folks say that, I always ask them, "Herpes has a 100% survival rate, does that mean you'd shrug it off as no big deal if someone gave you herpes?".

JSavageOne4• 4 years ago

Ok but herpes never shut down the world. We never shut down or severely restricted capacity in restaurants, gyms, stores, hotels, etc. over herpes, or required a herpes test to leave the house or get on an airplane. There is no herpes vaccine, but I imagine that even if there were, you'd never be required to show your proof of recent herpes vaccination to go to a restaurant or even ride public transportation or stay at a hotel (the situation in Italy).

Nobody is denying that COVID causes problems for some people, the argument is that it doesn't justify forcing everyone to wear masks everywhere, get vaccinated multiple times to do anything in society, get COVID tested anytime one needs to travel (for countries that haven't shut down borders), and force remote learning on children. Maybe it's possible that the side effects from these authoritarian policies don't outweigh the benefits, and disproportionately harm the youth for the benefit of the elderly since COVID is only statistically dangerous for those close to the median age of life expectancy. Perhaps people should be able to vote with their feet.

unethical_ban• 4 years ago

Actually, yes, you can basically shrug it off. It rarely poses any issue for people and the stigma around it is worse than the disease.

kyrra• 4 years ago

This is the thing that drives me the most nuts about many policy makers: they ignored natural immunity. They ignored that cloth masks (and likely surgical) would do nothing against an aerosol born disease. They ignored the impact of lockdown of society to everyone. The US masking 2 year old kids when the rest of the world masked starting at 6 year old or older.

EDIT: just to add: from what we can see, vaccines help cut down on adverse outcomes due to a covid infection, which is why I'm still pro-vaccine. But many other policies out there are just nonsense.

aardvarkr5• 4 years ago

FYI Natural immunity provides a fraction of the immune response that being vaccinated does. People were getting reinfected with Covid after six months during the initial wave before any mutations cropped up.

throw__away7391• 4 years ago

This is basically standard practice now for some time in medicine, at least in the United States. Every time I or my partner have ever been to the doctor for any kind of concern, they always focus exclusively on life threatening conditions. The moment that cancer or such is ruled out (even when I've insisted I didn't think that was a likely possibility), care basically stops, any further inquiry is like pulling teeth. We joke that this is like the "Not Hotdog" app from the Silicon Valley series, "Not Cancer".

managerclass4• 4 years ago

My cynical view is that it's more profitable to treat life threatening issues than trying to keep you healthy which would only result in less profits for hospitals. The whole incentive structure of health care leads to very bad outcomes.

calyth20183• 4 years ago

Well, the original SARS in 2003 had some interesting long term effects: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SARS#Prognosis

Some of the HK doctors that got infected had some of these long term effects, IIRC.

There's a reason why they don't fuck around in trying to limit the spread over there.

ceejayoz14• 4 years ago

This is one of the reasons the "we don't know the long-term effects of the vaccines" argument was always silly. We don't know the long-term effects of COVID, either. They're likely to be bigger than a small dose of mRNA that breaks down in a matter of minutes/hours.

It'll be interesting to see what we think of the "let it rip" strategy for Omicron a lot of areas used a decade from now.

mistrial9• 4 years ago

was always silly. That statement is in the same line as "we really dont know" ?

ceejayoz14• 4 years ago

The long-term impact of either one cannot be conclusively determined in the short-term, barring the invention of time travel.

"I will not take the vaccine because there are no long-term studies" is silly because it's inconsistent. "I will not take the vaccine and I will not get COVID" isn't a reliable option, so it's largely a choice between two unknowns.

That leaves us having to make educated guesses. Based on the history of vaccination, the safety thus far of nearly 10 billion doses of vaccine administered, and stuff like the biology and half-life of mRNA, the choice seems fairly clear.

tazjin2• 4 years ago

It'll be interesting to see what we think of the "let's destroy the livelihoods of a huge fraction of the population for unproven benefits" strategy a lot of areas used a decade from now.

zephyrthenoble• 4 years ago

What are you referencing here?

kaesar145• 4 years ago

Agreed - lockdowns are the novel strategy being used for COVID, whereas "let er' rip" which is just protecting the most vulnerable population while minimizing disruptions for everyone else has been the status quo.

We didn't shut down society for polio before the vaccine. That was an exponentially more fucked up disease.

guelo3• 4 years ago

Unemployment has pretty much recovered. Nobody is going to remember this time the way you're suggesting.

The way I'm going to remember it is that when this country had a crisis, instead of us coming together it caused division vitriol and hatred

ravenstine2• 4 years ago

Why can't they both not be silly?

ceejayoz14• 4 years ago

Because "I'll just try not to get it for a decade" probably isn't viable.

BunsanSpace3• 4 years ago

It'll be interesting to see what we think of the "let it rip" strategy for Omicron a lot of areas used a decade from now.

1. Omnicron is so infectious no public health measures can prevent it. 2. Omnicron infects the upper air ways NOT the lungs like previous strains, this prevents it from easily spreading to other organs.

Omnicron should really be thought of as a different but adjacent virus because of how differently it attacks our bodies.

Thankfully "let it rip" is paying off with infections plummeting around the world after an 8 week~ wave of it.

IE6• 4 years ago

1. Omnicron is so infectious no public health measures can prevent it.

Source?

sweetheart3• 4 years ago

Thankfully "let it rip" is paying off

Let's see if the cardiologists agree next year.

andruc• 4 years ago

Thankfully "let it rip" is paying off with infections plummeting around the world after an 8 week~ wave of it.

Our reported cases here in Canada are only plummeting since restrictions have been placed on who can actually have a PCR test scheduled, and these are the only results that are reported.

The emphasis has been put on handing out rapid tests, which aren't tracked. As expected, cases started dropping immediately alongside the number of PCR tests performed. We're not past the spike, we're just ignoring it.

VoodooJuJu2• 4 years ago

"we don't know the long-term effects of the vaccines"
We don't know the long-term effects of COVID, either
They're [the long-term effects] likely to be bigger

How were you able to determine that last quote?

ceejayoz14• 4 years ago

How were you able to determine that last quote?

We know, for example, that the incidence of myocarditis from COVID infection is substantially higher than the incidence induced by vaccination.

cfn• 4 years ago

That would be a reasonable statement if these vaccines imunized and stopped the spread.

poorjohnmacafee2• 4 years ago

Except there are too many cases of healthy young people having myocarditis related reactions soon after the vaccine, and that's not documented for covid. Is why discussion about vaccine related myocarditis centers on lipid nano particles having a strong uptake effect by heart and other tissues. Yes, yes nothing is "settled" because everything is so new. Just can't ignore that my family knows more people who died or went to hospital related to second dose/booster than covid itself.

ceejayoz14• 4 years ago

Myocarditis is absolutely documented in COVID.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33088905/

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/70/wr/mm7035e5.htm

During March 2020–January 2021, patients with COVID-19 had nearly 16 times the risk for myocarditis compared with patients who did not have COVID-19, and risk varied by sex and age.

noxer4• 4 years ago

So if I dont know the long-term effect of COVID and I dont know the long-term effect of the vaccine the logical thing is to intentionally get the vaccine and deal with whatever may be the long-term effects later?

You didn't notice but your argument is actually one against being the first to take the vaccine. Since it is perfectly reasonable to assume that one can avoid getting COVID for a long time long enough to make a decision on actual numbers later on.

ceejayoz14• 4 years ago

So if I dont know the long-term effect of COVID and I dont know the long-term effect of the vaccine the logical thing is to intentionally get the vaccine and deal with whatever may be the long-term effects later?

Yes, considering the vaccine's mechanism - causing your body to produce a SARS-CoV-2 viral protein that an active infection would also cause you to produce. Worrying about the vaccine while getting infected with SARS-CoV-2 is like worrying about getting wet in a swimming pool; you're already wet.

Since it is perfectly reasonable to assume that one can avoid getting COVID for a long time long enough to make a decision on actual numbers later on.

I do not think that's perfectly reasonable to assume in the days of Omicron.

walterbell5• 4 years ago

the veteran population skews older, white, and male: In all three groups, about 90% of patients were men and 71% to 76% were white. Patients were in their early 60s

How many patients received early treatment? It is well understood that outcomes are worse, and treatment more difficult, the further Covid progressed before treatment begins.

satokema• 4 years ago

Does this control for the long-term effects of closing gyms and rec centers and having people live more sedentary lives to avoid COVID (which they got anyway)?

I'm surprised that exercise is mentioned all the time for heart health - but the word doesn't appear even once in the article.

datavirtue• 4 years ago

We're you driving toward a point?

wang_li• 4 years ago

I'm not them, but I think they probably are referring to the fact that sitting on your ass eating cheetos for a year also takes a serious toll on heart health.

managerclass4• 4 years ago

I personally don't see that many 60 year old white men flexing at the gym before/during Covid but then again I'm from Texas.

tharne3• 4 years ago

This is terrifying. I wonder how this will pan out with all the children who got COVID in the last two years.

walterbell5• 4 years ago

This is a study of veterans, average age in their 60's.

tharne3• 4 years ago

I get that part, what I'm wondering now is that in light of those findings, are we concerned that there is a similar risk to younger folks who got COVID?

stuff4ben2• 4 years ago

I didn't see it in this article but I wonder if they took into account vaccinated people who had breakthrough infections? Or vaccinated people who were exposed but didn't get sick (although I don't know how you find those people). Does the vaccine and your primed immune system negate the effects of "long COVID"?

dangoor• 4 years ago

There was a study out of Israel[1] and another out of the UK[2] that both showed some effectiveness against long COVID for those who are vaccinated. (Reddit links provided because those often have useful summaries of the studies.)

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19/comments/sd32t3/association... [2]: https://www.reddit.com/r/COVID19/comments/sdugl1/selfreporte...

adhoc_slime• 4 years ago

After reading this article this was my question as well, it seems like a very relevant point considering a majority of the population (in my country at least) is vaccinated twice, and getting up on their booster too now.

walterbell5• 4 years ago

According to Figure 1, https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-01689-3#Sec2

  First COVID-19-positive
  test (T,) between 1 March 2020
  and 15 January 2021
  n = 162.690

VA vaccination began in late December 2020, hence some of the veterans may have received at least one injection, but would not have been considered vaccinated until 14 days after their second injection, https://blogs.va.gov/VAntage/82728/va-begin-covid-19-vaccina...

stuff4ben2• 4 years ago

That's kind of meaningless because we don't actually know the vaccination status of those in the study.

VoodooJuJu2• 4 years ago

I wonder as well. I'm baffled the article made no mention of vaccination status.

umvi• 4 years ago

Note only veterans were studied here (i.e. the most vulnerable demographic anyway).

thenerdhead• 4 years ago

I saw a cardiologist 11 months after my infection (Jan 2021 prior to vaccine availability to public). I had a small heart scare at the end of Thanksgiving break where I went to the ER out of precaution and discharged immediately as nothing was wrong, but to me felt like I was going to die.

They were not concerned that COVID had any play in heart health after that many months. Of course, more and more articles and studies are coming out regarding the actual short term & longer term effects accompanied with the unknowns. My story related very closely to these young people who woke up feeling like they are in their 50s/60s and scared they will croak any given moment.

After going through a year of hell, I'm quite optimistic and more aware of my heart health than ever.

This is another article I found last year that really resonated with my story and gave me lots of hope for answers. No doctor was able to give me one, so I had to experiment and try lots of stuff over the last year.

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/how-covid...

nhance2• 4 years ago

I feel like I should weigh in on this because I seem to be one of the unlucky ones with heart impact.

I'm 40 years old and prior to catching covid on Jan 1st I was in the best shape of my life. I ran 9 ultramarathons last year, including a 40 mile run on my birthday. I was double vaccinated and boosted on December 7th, all Moderna. I do 100 pushups and 100 squats a day and was regularly running 30 miles per week. (50km)

Covid took me out for 3 full weeks and my fitness wasn't enough to power through it. The first symptoms were extreme fatigue but what is hanging on is chest pain. I have had to significantly cut back my training.

Only in the last week do I feel like I can get back to a more normal pace and that's with a measured concern to not overdo it. I always feel great at the time, but afterwards I'm paying the price.

I plan to continue training at a reduced effort to try and bring back my fitness. I've never had something that holds on for so long before.

the_doctah5• 4 years ago

You were overtraining and covid forced you to rest for once. No 40 year old should be doing 100 pushups per day 7 days a week. That's ridiculous.

aardvarkr5• 4 years ago

That’s a ridiculous assertion to make

xboxnolifes• 4 years ago

If you're in shape, 100 pushups in a day isn't crazy...

nhance2• 4 years ago

No embellishment here. Today is 879 days in a row and I've tracked them all in an app I wrote.

The last 6 months, minus a week has been with 25 of them in burpee form.

I break them up throughout the day, it's not a lot of exercise at all. It feels like the bare minimum to stay in overall functional fitness shape. It's nice to have the strength to do whatever I'd like to do on tap anytime.

9 ultramarathons in a year may have been over-training however. (Towards the end it was getting to be one every other weekend just for kicks.)

hwillis• 4 years ago

I was 28 when I got it (alpha flavor). Resting heart rate rose by ~20 bpm, blood pressure went from <120/<80 to stage 2 hypertension (>140/>90). High enough that it gave me dizzy spells and chest pains. Two years later I've got my blood pressure mostly under control (2L+ water daily, low sodium, high fiber, no NSAIDs) but my pulse is still elevated.

Lungs also took a serious beating, but mostly recovered. I had a bronchoscopy and was the youngest patient they had seen in years. Bronchoscopy showed an absurdly high number of white blood cells in my lungs ~18 months post-covid- evidence of inflammation and extremely reactive tissue.

It likes to make sure you remember it, that's for sure.

dplgk• 4 years ago

Were you vaccinated?

dukeofdoom2• 4 years ago

I was waiting in line yesterday at Costco to return something. The return line was packed and clerk came by and ordered people to wait outside. There was a guy that took issue with this because it was cold outside. The clerk called the manager. The manager came over and he said, "Look I got 2 shoots and a booster. Why do you want to make me wait outside when it's cold" The manager smoothed things over, and let the guy wait inside. But over the entire commotion I ended up talking to a guy behind me. This was a man in his 70s. He was returning a chrome book. He bought it to stream TV and the thing couldn't play back smoothly, and he didn't like the quality of the speakers. He started complaining about whats going in the world. How he feels sorry for the new generation. Seeing kids masked up and not able to communicate and play freely. How expensive things are, especially housing. How expensive organic food is now, and how it was the common food back before. And he concluded that what we are seeing is Bill Gates and tech companies take over the world. For his age, he looked very fit and healthy. Maybe this was just a rant, but I can't help that this is a pretty common sentiment now.

People got the shots, and things still didn't change. People feel lied to. The tolerance for mandates is eroding quick. Willingness to take more booster shots is not there, people are dropping out. And its questionable if more booster shots will even work.

Mental health, and well being of society needs to be the much bigger consideration. Also you can't look at covid in isolation. Look at the overall mortality rate. And those numbers are up. Deaths unrelated to covid are up too.

disambiguation3• 4 years ago

My casual (non-expert) observation is that covid disproportionately affects the heart more than other viruses we're familiar with.

We know its related to the spike protein, but do we know why? What makes it harmful (is it basically protein-sized shrapnel?) and why does it prefer the heart? (maybe there is no preference and effects on the heart are just easier to observe)

Further, if the spike is whats dangerous, what are the effects on people who have had 2 shots, a booster, AND then got covid anyway? This makes up the majority of my friends and family.

aardvarkr5• 4 years ago

Thankfully the new omicron variant isn’t very good at infecting the lungs and stats in the upper respiratory tract. This means it doesn’t enter the blood and doesn’t have a chance to wreak havoc on the rest of the body. Since vaccinated people are primarily getting omicron and the booster is able to drastically improve the immune response I wouldn’t be overly worried.

disambiguation3• 4 years ago

Fair enough. The vaccine point is a bit of a tangent, I'm not really worried.

I wanted to get more at the "why and how" of the spike's impact. AFAIK there's no real explanation.

sumosudo2• 4 years ago

Ha! Seems this problem is in only highly vaccinated countries. I work in Nigeria. No covid. No problems, no heart troubles. Hmmm, wonder why? No vaxx.

JoeAltmaier2• 4 years ago

3 million cases is 'no covid'? Dream on.

sumosudo2• 4 years ago

3,200 deaths. Cases are bullshit pal. The first world is going loony. Face it you're all off your rockers.

t0bia_s2• 4 years ago

Oh wait, there is nothing about vaccines? So suddenly there is increased risk of heart failure, myocarditis and so on, but it has nothing to do with vaccines.

Isn't that same study that referred to reduced effectiveness of vaccines among veterans?

https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abm0620

Covid-19 takes serious toll on heart health–a full year after recovery

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