Studies show long-haul COVID-19 afflicts 1 in 4 COVID-19 patients, regardless of severity

More than one in four COVID-19 patients develop long-haul symptoms lasting for months – even if they had mild cases, according to a handful of studies that have emerged recently.

Now, four studies published since February confirm that range. They show that 27% to nearly 33% of patients who had COVID-19 but did not need to be hospitalized later developed some form of long-haul COVID.

In rare cases, coronavirus vaccines may cause Long Covid like symptoms

In late 2020, Brianne Dressen began to spend hours in online communities for people with Long Covid, a chronic, disabling syndrome that can follow a bout with the virus. “For months, I just lurked there,” says Dressen, a former preschool teacher in Saratoga Springs, Utah, “reviewing post after post of symptoms that were just like my own.”

Dressen had never had COVID-19. But that November, she’d received a dose of AstraZeneca’s vaccine as a volunteer in a clinical trial. By that evening, her vision blurred and sound became distorted—“I felt like I had two seashells on my ears,” she says. Her symptoms rapidly worsened and multiplied, ultimately including heart rate fluctuations, severe muscle weakness, and what she describes as debilitating internal electric shocks.

Myocarditis is even happening in asymptomatic cases, so how much is not being picked up yet?