# 7.5% of the people suffer from long COVID-19



## M.C.A. (Feb 24, 2013)

*At least 7 million people have long COVID*


David Barnett was a bartender in March 2020 when he contracted COVID-19.

At first, Barnett could barely walk and had trouble breathing. As he recovered and quarantined, he felt like he was starting to get better.

After about a week of progress, "I stood up from my couch and I collapsed ... it was the weirdest feeling I've ever felt in my life. I felt like I was dying," he told ABC News.

It was the start of what Barnett calls a nightmare.

"I was developing a really high heart rate," he said. "I couldn't balance. I couldn't sit up anymore. I couldn't do anything."

He continued, "My heart rate will shoot up to 140 after I eat breakfast. In the mornings, I'm too confused to make my smoothies sometimes."

He is one of millions of Americans experiencing long COVID-19 symptoms across the country.

Long COVID is a condition that occurs when patients still have symptoms at least four weeks after they have cleared the infection. In some cases, symptoms can be experienced for months or years.

Symptoms vary and can include fatigue, difficulty breathing, headaches, brain fog, joint and muscle pain and continued loss of taste and smell, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

It's unclear what causes people to develop long COVID but research is ongoing.

According to the CDC, about 1 in 13 Americans, or 7.5% of people who have previously contracted COVID-19, have developed long COVID.

"It can be anywhere from patients who are critically ill in the hospital who required ventilation … down to patients who may have been mild at first, treated at home, felt flu-like symptoms and never really got over those initial symptoms. So it is really a broad spectrum," Dr. Benjamin Abramoff, director of the Post COVID Assessment and Recovery Clinic and an assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation at Penn Medicine, told ABC News.

David Speal, 40, from New York City, also contracted COVID-19 in March 2020 and became seriously ill, ending up in the hospital with a pulmonary embolism -- a blood clot that gets trapped in an artery going to the lung.

After he left the hospital, Speal was plagued by a consistently high heart rate.

'My heart just continued to race, just trying to talk on the phone, move around, use the restroom and it was really becoming an issue for me," he told ABC News. "The issue continued. I remember just trying to eat a meal. I got up and my heart was racing 160 beats a minute."

It took about another six months before Speal was diagnosed with long COVID.

Similarly, Barnett, who is in his 40s and was considered quite healthy by his doctors, never expected to become so debilitatingly ill.

It can be hard to know what to do when someone you know or love has long COVID. Here are some ways to support them through it: Article continues-

MSNBC full story on Long Covid


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## grahamw57 (May 27, 2018)

A shame more info' wasn't given about the previous health/condition of such people. 
Existing comorbidities ?


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## Gary D (Oct 28, 2013)

grahamw57 said:


> A shame more info' wasn't given about the previous health/condition of such people.
> Existing comorbidities ?


Wouldn't be newsworthy if we knew all the facts.


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## Zep (Jun 8, 2017)

How do they know it is 7.5%. That is of the people that the CDC knows had covid. I bet 80% of the people that get covid now do not even take a test or care if they have covid.


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