It’s probably bad for a mod to be posting this. To be fair, I’m still 100% doing covid precautions, including N95 masking and boosters. I’m still actively very covid conscious.
I’m aware that there hasn’t been much new research on long covid numbers after 2024, or at least nothing that I can find. Trump taking over the presidency hasn’t helped. I’m very much a sciency kind of person, and I could always pinpoint a study as to why I’m still masking and being extra cautious.
Obviously caring about the vulnerable is still a very good reason to keep being cautious.
A lot of libs have been saying that “well we’re all immune from multiple infections, so long covid is over”. Clearly the opinions of libs should be discarded, and their thoughts are anecdotal af, but still I would appreciate some facts to keep me cautious through this difficult time.
BTW CDC pulse survey data still shows that around 10% of US adults have long covid.
Yes, very much so.
Long COVID is Now the Number One Chronic Illness in Children
Wear an n95 whenever you are indoors in public places.
Lot of really good studies in this article. Thank you.
KN94s are good too. Honestly everybody wearing a shitty surgical mask is better than 70% wearing N95s but I understand we’re way past that ever being possible
IDK what thee current wisdom is about masks as source control. They do stop droplets from spewing when the person coughs, but the idea is to filter airborne virus. Anyway, maybe 10% of people around here wear masks.
First of all, Libs were saying this in 2021. And 2022. And 2023. And 2024. And each year I saw more and more people I knew develop very clear Long Covid, (although only a few acknowledged that’s what it was, but they’d get covid for the 3rd or more time and complain about sudden onset of symptoms that were consistent with LC). I expect 2025 would be the same but I’m more isolated now and don’t hear about it as much, plus the testing infrastructure has gotten so much worse that people aren’t necessarily going to know if they got covid or something else.
There’s no mechanism or selection pressure for covid to get less damaging, so there’s no reason to think it’s gotten better. The damage comes from the virus getting everywhere since it binds to a receptor that is in every cell, and the immune system fighting it off, which is what causes the damage that gives Long Covid such an incredibly broad range of symptoms. Yes it mutates constantly, but that part stays the same.
And the “multiple infections makes you immune” thing is hopium. Antibody efficacy for covid (whether from vaccine or infection) wanes fast because it mutates so quickly, like how getting the flu one year may not prevent a flu infection the next year, but worse. Much hay was made in crunchy circles about “natural immunity” (the idea that getting covid would confer better immunity to future variants than getting vaccinated) which has been thoroughly debunked by the fact that people keep getting infected over and over again.
I remember hearing that covid damages the immune system too so people who get it are actually more susceptible to other infection in general but I didn’t follow if that was true or not. Seems like there was some impact but it didn’t end up being as bad as HIV.
I remember hearing that covid damages the immune system too so people who get it are actually more susceptible to other infection in general but I didn’t follow if that was true or not. Seems like there was some impact but it didn’t end up being as bad as HIV.
It’s true, it opens us up to opportunistic infections. This also happens after a flu infection, which has led to some doctors dismissing it as a concern, but people don’t get the flu every 4-6 months or develop persistent flu infections like they do with covid.
For an example, here is a chart showing the rate of bacterial infections for which there are no vaccines in the UK, showing the impact covid had:
Not as bad as HIV, but not great and more widespread among the population.
We’ve also just had one of the worst flu seasons in 15 years, one of the worst whooping cough seasons since the 50’s, and here’s a chart that lists strep cases in the US:
This happened after the covid restrictions were removed, and it was blamed on “people catching up on infections they missed during the lockdown”, but it’s been three years of this shit and if anything the problem is getting worse. The rise in the number of people who have anti-vax brainworms doesn’t help, but it doesn’t explain all of it.
That is bleak. And the immunity debt myth has been debunked but still won’t die because Capital needed the status who to remain. Thank you for the clarification and the charts!
There’s no mechanism or selection pressure for covid to get less damaging, so there’s no reason to think it’s gotten better.
I fucking hate ppl stating that covid is less dangerous only on vibes. Like if you’re not a medical professional or quoting a medical body, stfu.
I get that people are busy and don’t have the time to read up on all the research, but damn I wish that average Joe liberal office worker had a bit more humility on something not simple such as fucking medicine.
Yes, ask me how I know!
My neurologist told me that it might be hard to find a specialist in long covid bc research grants are gone!
That sucks. Ya that’s my thinking about the lack of hard numbers recently.
Also AFAIK there’s still no cure or even decent treatment for long covid.
My most reliable treatment is smoking weed. Really helps me reset my mindset when dealing with brainfog, and helps me relax and get the true rest that I need. Also improves my mood and appetite and takes the edge off the headaches.
It’s not perfect and it’s not a cure, but it helps me!
This is one of many disappointing downsides of :amerikkka: having made weed illegal for so long. Researchers could have spent decades studying the effects of cannabis on the brain and better understood it as a treatment option, and the fact that weed helps me could have given me some insight into what’s happening in my brain. But no.
Anyway
There’s a new Nimbus NB1.8.1 variant currently making the rounds that’s been nicknamed ‘razor blade throat’
Ya that sounds like something worth getting.
I’m reading the comments on
. People saying they feel like absolute shit.Someone recently hit me with the “it’s normal to get sick a couple times a year”… I guess the brain damage from multiple infections made them forget everything before 2020, because I was a frequent convention/concert/restaurant attendee back in the beforetimes and would maybe catch a cold every 3-5 years before all this. Still have only gotten a single sinus infection in the last 5 years (when a former friend hid they’d been sick) and I’ve never had covid. I’m a lot more isolated now, but it’s still worth it. I posted this in another comm recently but I’ll leave it here for the people reading this:
When I despair/ my kind friend reminds me/ that wearing a mask/ is an act of love/ and when I tell her/ there are days/ when I wear it/ not out of love/ but out of anger and spite/ my kind friend responds/ isn’t it wonderful/ to turn your anger and spite/ into an act of love
Every year I used to get a head cold that would last a month, and that month would absolutely suck. I’d megadose vitamin C, take lots of liquids, or do steam shit. I fucking hated that feeling so god damn much. I also had the flu in 2019 and I thought I was going to die.
Now I haven’t been sick in 5 years. I see normies suffering with respiratory illness all the time, and although I empathise, that shit is often very preventable. My body feels great, and I don’t want to be part of libs’ death cult.
Great poem!
yes, long covid is still around and your risk of getting is still increases with each following infection. I have an increasing number of close friends on disability due to long covid, and several just got exposed to it last week.
Libs, as usual, have no idea what the fuck they are talking about.
True all around. Thanks for the reassurance.
This new one just popped in my feed. Even without symptoms, it’s giving people brain damage.
Multimodal MRI Reveals Consistent Basal Ganglia and Limbic System Alterations in COVID-19 Survivors
Damn a lot of good studies in the lit review as well. Thank you for this!
Oh, yes, I um totally knew that.
Lol. Hang in there, the libs are relentless with their bullshit.
Have a friend that caught what she thought was just the flu a few months back. Since then, her sense of taste has been completely fucked. Any food with flavor tastes like literal garbage to her. So yeah, long COVID is still wrecking people.
OMG that sucks. I’m so sorry for your friend.
Ya I can keep masking to avoid that (for me and my loved ones)
COVID is basically the same as it has been. Libs are just committed to normalization.
One constant thought I’ve had for the past decade is to not trust liberals on anything. Even for shit I’m too lazy to read up on, I just don’t buy their opinion on stuff.
A lot of libs have been saying that “well we’re all immune from multiple infections, so long covid is over”
For people who kept on banging on about “listen to the science” this sure is one fucking stupid assertion.
Well it was supposed to be over after vaccines, yet ppl are still getting sick.
“We discovered germ theory for illnesses, but they will never forgive us for it” - Louis Pasteur probably.
Yes. It’s been relatively quiet since winter because there haven’t been any new strains, but that just changed. One of the new variants that appeared (in Asia and Australia soon to be everywhere else) is more contagious due to better ACE2 binding, which is main reason why this virus is so dangerous and has so many long term effects. Every organ in our body has ACE2 receptors and once it’s in our bloodstream covid can cause damage to all of them, or get in places that are hard for our immune system to clear, leading to a persistent infection. It will never be “just a cold” until we can develop a vaccine or otherwise prevent it from entering our bloodstream.
I’ve heard there is some evidence that with multiple vaccinations and/or infections, that people are better able to fight off new variants, which may lower the risk, but nothing definitive. It sounds more like hopium to me. Last I checked the disability rate is still shooting up.
Here’s a chart tracking covid hospitalizations the past year and a half in Australia. There is a new covid wave every 4-6 months, which tracks with about how long immunity to the virus lasts and the rate of mutation. For the past few years it’s been on track to be about 4x as damaging as some of the worst flu years, and that’s probably about as good as it’s going to get.
The blue line is covid. Orange is the flu. For every major flu wave, there are four covid ones.
Good effort post. Thank you so much.
I’ve heard there is some evidence that with multiple vaccinations and/or infections, that people are better able to fight off new variants, which may lower the risk, but nothing definitive. It sounds more like hopium to me. Last I checked the disability rate is still shooting up.
very true
Here is a video that goes into the current understanding of covid and addresses some of the myths about it: Covid for Doctors - Dr Nancy Malek
Here is the timestamp where she talks about long covid risk.
Great video. Thank you!!!
I found YouTube links in your comment. Here are links to the same videos on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Link 1:
Link 2:
