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Consequences of Long Covid: suffering for months - and sometimes longer.
Photo: fizkes / iStockphoto / Getty Images
Only 5 more sleeps until Freedom Day!
Or for anyone with Long Covid: sleep 5 more times and lie down and stare at the ceiling about 15 times.
Speaking of lying, I know I've been bugging you for two years now about how wrong I find Germany's corona policy.
Too short-sighted, too interested in the well-being of the so-called economy and not enough in children, the elderly, the poor, the sick, women, the homeless, the dead, medical staff, you know.
But you know what else is killing me?
That in all the political decisions that are now being made, against our better knowledge, the fact that so many people often suffer from Long Covid or Post Covid for a very long time after an infection plays no role at all.
10 to 15 percent of people who become infected suffer from Long Covid after the acute infection, sometimes for a few months, sometimes for much longer.
10 to 15 percent doesn't sound like much at first, but unfortunately 10 to 15 percent of over 17 million infections (in Germany) is a lot overall.
An information page from the Ministry of Health states: »The only way to protect yourself from Long-COVID is to avoid infection with the Sars-CoV-2 coronavirus.« You know it.
And they accept it.
Long Covid is a disease that has not been researched enough because it has not been around for very long, on the one hand.
On the other hand, Long Covid shares a lot of similarities with ME/CFS, also known as "chronic fatigue syndrome," which to many people, "fatigue" just sounds like being a little tired, even though people with the condition are often severely disabled.
ME/CFS has been around longer, and people who suffer from it have been asking for more research into it for years.
But above all: Even if - or: precisely because - you don't know much about Long Covid yet, you know enough to be able to say that the idea of an infection is something that you can actually put up with quite well if you're halfway healthy and vaccinated three times doesn't quite work, to say the least.
more on the subject
Long Covid in study: "After a crash, only lying and waiting helps" Recorded by Ruth Eisenreich
I was reasonably healthy and vaccinated three times and now have Long Covid.
And from the conversations I've had over the past few weeks, I can tell you that there are broadly two groups: people who have or know someone who has Long Covid and those who don't take seriously.
And unfortunately there are also some doctors in the second group.
Even if there is not much that doctors can do at times, the least that can be done is to examine people thoroughly.
The first doctor I saw thought that I didn't need it, an infection like that could last six weeks, I should just drink enough water and take painkillers.
I then went to another doctor who examined me extensively.
The long-Covid clinics and consultation hours are meanwhile so busy that many people only get an appointment when they have been ill for six months.
Six months during which one might be unable to work, so much for »but the economy!«.
It's also not good for the economy when hundreds of thousands between the ages of 20 and 50 become long Covid zombies.
"The longer patients suffer with these symptoms,
the sooner there is a risk of chronification, and the more difficult it is for these people to reintegrate into their everyday lives and their jobs," explained the doctor and long-Covid expert Jördis Frommhold recently at the federal press conference.
That means: The more often you overexert yourself, the more often you have so-called "crashes" (collapses), the more likely it is that the matter will become chronic.
The fact that it is often women who suffer from Long Covid does not make things any easier.
As soon as women are over forty and report long-Covid symptoms, they can expect to be told that maybe it's just menopause.
silly!
There are doctors, but often other people too, who completely underestimate the matter and say things like: "Oh man yes, I'm often tired too, but such a little nap works wonders".
Something with "psychosomatic" is also welcome, although in this case it is used synonymously with "you make that up" or "don't whine".
Or: "You probably just have an iron deficiency" / "Aren't we all exhausted after two years of pandemic and now there's also war..." / "Well, I ride my bike every day and my infection was over after three days!" — Yes, great, mine stop it.
Long Covid is as little fatigue as depression is just bad mood.
In case you're interested: I've had a headache every day for almost two months now and I'm exhausted from every little thing, I keep having bouts of weakness for several hours and a feverish tingling, zero hunger or appetite, my brain doesn't work properly (forgetfulness, , word-finding difficulties) and I often sleep 14 hours and then I'm absolutely not recovered, but just as exhausted as the day before, and no, coffee doesn't help and neither does green tea.
I only take a lukewarm shower because a hot shower is too strenuous, I can't think of sports or cycling, sometimes I walk to the supermarket, which takes me 10 minutes to get to, and then lie in bed for two hours completely exhausted and can't do anything except maybe get up and to have a sip of water and otherwise wait.
Things that I used to do in one day I now have to spread over a whole week.
I'm always cold, maybe because I've lost weight involuntarily, and my focus is so good I just checked to make sure I didn't write about the chills above.
I laugh when I think of being considered "recovered," and I laugh when people recommend books because I have so much free time now.
Or advise me to just have a nice trip, because then I immediately ask myself who would then carry my luggage — I certainly won't.
Reading texts is extremely limited and never longer than half an hour, and when I listen to audio books I have to rewind them all the time because I can't concentrate enough.
Before, I often listened to audio books at twice the speed and easily managed twenty books a month, now more like one in ten days (bad for the audio book industry!).
If I can't open a bottle, I ask my friend (Bad for feminism! Joke.).
Others have depression, hair loss, lung problems, body aches, smell or taste disorders, sleep disorders.
They set up self-help groups online to talk about what helps or that they finally managed to go for a walk for half an hour without collapsing.
I'm on sick leave, but because I work freelance and don't have any additional insurance, I only get sick pay from the 7th week, which means the whole thing is not only unpleasant, but also really expensive and, in my case, still bearable because I earned well beforehand have, but really problematic for others.
And the golden age of corona aid is over.
As I write all this, the nationwide incidence is over 1500 and rising, and easing is coming soon.
That means more people will get infected again and even more people will get Long Covid and lie in bed like brain dead.
Freedom!
A reader who also has Long Covid wrote me to please alert the federal government to speed up research into the drug BC 007, which may help with Long Covid, but I couldn't focus enough to read it there, so at this point I can only ask the federal government to google it themselves.
All serious experts warn against believing that when the measures end on March 20, the pandemic will be over.
It's nice when people can go to the concert again without a mask, of course.
Not nice if they pay for it by lying on the sofa half a year later with Long Covid.
Germany has the highest incidence in Europe and "vaccinated people are often careless now," warned Karl Lauterbach on Twitter a few days ago.
Yes, because your politics make people think Corona is over.
"Finally!
On March 20th we will return to normality,« recently tweeted FDP politician Olaf in der Beek.
A very mysterious "we"!
We, who have Long Covid, don't belong there.