As if post-covid syndrome weren’t confusing enough, its prediction data is all over the shop.
Risk predictions for long covid have been as nebulous as the disease itself, leaving GPs in a predicament when counselling patients over boosters.
In this long covid special we hear from Nature journalist Heidi Ledford, who unravels the tangle of long covid research and finds the common threads of risk prediction.
Ledford’s investigation into long covid statistics explores how well vaccination protects against the condition and why discordant studies create confusion.
“Different studies suggest long covid risk is somewhere between 5% and 50%. If I’m an individual trying to make a decision, it’s hard to calculate the personal risk-benefit,” she says.
One of the problems with discordant results is the broad definition of long covid. Ledford also lists other challenges including how to define a control group, and the reality that national medical records do not fully represent underserved communities.
Ultimately, it’s still hard to predict how many people will get long covid. In June this year over 30,000 new cases of covid were detected each day in Australia. The likely impact of long covid is growing, but by how much?
You can listen and subscribe to the show by searching for “The Tea Room Medical Republic” in your favourite podcast player.
