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posted by martyb on Monday July 13 2020, @10:50PM   Printer-friendly

The SARS-CoV-2 / COVID-19 pandemic has been with us for over six months. A recent check of https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ reveals just over 13 million cases, with over a half million deaths, and 4.9 million of which are listed as active. On a positive note, 7.6 million are listed as recovered.

Unfortunately, recovered does not necessarily mean being back to the same shape someone was in pre-infection (see below).

Statistically, there are bound to be some Soylentils who have been infected (or had friends or family members who were).

I'd like to offer an opportunity for us to pull together and share our collective experiences. If you've made it through, telling others of how it went can be helpful both for the one who shares, and also for those who were recently diagnosed. Fears, doubts, and worries act to drain energy better directed to recovery.

NB: Please be mindful that "the internet never forgets". I encourage all who respond to make use of posting anonymously.

With that caution, what has been your experience? How long between time of infection and onset of symptoms? How bad was it? How are things now? What do you know now that you wish you knew earlier? What did you hear about earlier but didn't realize they meant that?

Penultimately, I realize words are inadequate, but I sincerely wish and hope that all can be spared from this malady, and those who have been afflicted may have a speedy and full recovery.

Unfortunately, it looks like that may not be as likely as we would all hope and wish for...

Ars Technica has results of an analysis of COVID-19 victims' recovery. Be aware it was from a relatively small sample of patients who had been infected and then deemed to be recovered. Two months after infection, COVID-19 symptoms persist:

As the COVID-19 pandemic continues unabated in many countries, an ever-growing group of people is being shifted from the "infected" to the "recovered" category. But are they truly recovered? A lot of anecdotal reports have indicated that many of those with severe infections are experiencing a difficult recovery, with lingering symptoms, some of which remain debilitating. Now, there's a small study out of Italy in which a group of infected people was tracked for an average of 60 days after their infection was discovered. And the study confirms that symptoms remain long after there's no detectable virus.

[...] Roughly 60 days later, the researchers followed up with an assessment of these patients. Two months after there was no detectable virus, only 13 percent of the study group was free of any COVID-19 symptoms. By contrast, a bit over half still had at least three symptoms typical of the disease.

The most common symptom was fatigue, followed by difficulty breathing, joint pain, and chest pain. Over 10 percent were still coughing, and similar numbers hadn't seen their sense of smell return. A large range of other symptoms were also present.

Journal Reference:
Angelo Carfì, Roberto Bernabei, Francesco Landi. Persistent Symptoms in Patients After Acute COVID-19 [open], JAMA (DOI: 10.1001/jama.2020.12603)


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  • (Score: 2) by NickM on Tuesday July 14 2020, @02:02AM (4 children)

    by NickM (2867) on Tuesday July 14 2020, @02:02AM (#1020929) Journal

    Do you take K2 with your D3 ? I ask caused I have read that D3 is really good at pumping calcium into the blood stream but that without vitamin K it is not so great at making the osteoblasts use that calcium and that a nonegligeable part of that calcium end up hardening the arteries. The literature seems to be clear on the effects of vitamin K on bone production but it's effect on the arteries seems more dubious, do you have a non professional opinion on vitamin K ?

    Also 30mg of zinc a day seems to be on the high side of a daily dose but well below the 100mg/day where it augments risk of copper deficiency and prostate cancer¹ (not that you have to worry about that) still I would like to know why did you settle on 30mg a day, is it because Zn has 30 protons ;)

    One last question, is there a real difference in the bioavailability of magnesium citrate and magnesium glycinate ? I personally take 200mg of Mg glycinate a day but I wonder if I am not wasting money by buying this more expensive salt over the cheaper citrate...

    Anyway may you not catch that disease!

    1- https://academic.oup.com/jnci/article/95/13/1004/2520319 [oup.com]

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  • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Tuesday July 14 2020, @03:23AM (2 children)

    by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Tuesday July 14 2020, @03:23AM (#1021005) Journal

    The magnesium is intended to prevent that, as well as for its own useful effects. I do have menaquinone pills but am wary of taking them because I don't know their effects on blood clotting and suspect very strongly that one of the milder thrombophilias, likely G20210A, runs in my family. My sister has had multiple miscarriages attributed to clotting, so yeah. I'd like to take K2 but am unable to find any conclusive information as to whether it's a VTE risk, and for now am erring on the side of caution.

    Regarding zinc, 30mg is definitely high and i skip days sometimes for that reason. As for magnesium, I honestly do not know if there's much difference, and the one that *really* surprised me is that apparently the oxide--which you'd think would be about as useful as chowing down on a ceramic tile--actually is plenty bioavailable. Citrate is what I can afford and seems to work, so...

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    • (Score: 2) by choose another one on Tuesday July 14 2020, @05:03PM (1 child)

      by choose another one (515) Subscriber Badge on Tuesday July 14 2020, @05:03PM (#1021351)

      I have one of the not-so-mild thrombophilias, so I tend to keep up on clotting stuff and from what I have read if you do get hit (with bad covid), a "light dose of blood thinners" is not going to be anywhere near enough. Standard prophylactic doses are said to be inadequate and some places are using (high) treatment doses for prophylaxis. For me, since I am already on a standard prophylactic dose (with some of my doctors wanting me on higher) for the not-covid condition, I really really don't want covid thrombophilia on top.

      D and K2 is a worry for me too, particularly since I am on a VKA, it is known that taking K2 will mess with the INR, which can be balanced by changing dose but once you've done that are you just effectively pissing away your (expensive) K2? Maybe you'd still improve the ratio of K2 to K and that'd be beneficial, or maybe it depends on which type of K2, or maybe your body sorts that out anyway and it's being K-deficient which is dangerous - but I am running K-deficient by design. Like you say, there is too little evidence on this and too much we don't know.

      I've decided that because I can't take K I will only take D when the doctor says I am low, but funnily enough haven't been tested for a few months so don't know where I am with it, but it's sunny so probably ok, maybe. Ideally I'd get off the rat poison, but the DOACs aren't approved or licensed for the condition, again because too little evidence.

      • (Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Wednesday July 15 2020, @12:55AM

        by Azuma Hazuki (5086) on Wednesday July 15 2020, @12:55AM (#1021593) Journal

        Ohhhhh, Madokami, I was thinking "why not try apixaban or rivaroxaban?" right until the last sentence of that post...you have my sympathy (and a few nightmares). I've been reading that some haematologists are experimenting with high-dose warfarin *and* a steady intake of vitamin K as a possible means of preventing the systemic dysfunctions caused by chronic low K levels. You maybe could ask your doctor? But off the top of my head there's very little data on that regimen...

        --
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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 14 2020, @11:53AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 14 2020, @11:53AM (#1021170)

    One of the big things that magnesium does is help the body to keep calcium where it belongs rather than hanging out in the cardiovascular system.