House Hearing on Long Covid Reveals Widespread and Serious Crisis in US

 

How widespread is long COVID? It’s put millions of US adults out of work, expert says By Julia Marnin July 19, 2022 5:31 PM (Fr. Miami Herald)

How widespread in long COVID? It’s put millions of U.S. adults who were previously infected with COVID-19 out of work, an expert testified at a House hearing. If you have heard about long COVID — a condition in which symptoms of a coronavirus infection can linger for weeks, months or years — you may wonder how widespread it is.

By February, more than half of the U.S. population was estimated to have already been infected with COVID-19, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Long COVID may occur at least four weeks after a COVID-19 infection, the agency notes.

About 28 million working-age adults in the U.S., and likely more to date, have developed the condition after testing positive for the virus, workforce expert Katie Bach, a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, testified at a House subcommittee hearing on Tuesday, July 19.

“Long Covid is leading millions of Americans to reduce their work schedules or stop working,” Bach wrote in testimony ahead of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis hearing.

Currently, about 16 million people in the U.S. are estimated to have long COVID, according to federal data, and 3.3 million adults are estimated to be out of work full-time because of how the condition has affected their health, Bach said. This is 2.4% of full-time workers in the U.S.

Additionally, an estimated 2.6 million more workers dealing with long COVID symptoms have had their work hours reduced by 25%, Bach testified.

Among affected workers are those in health care, according to written testimony by Dr. Monica Verduzco-Gutierrez, a physiatrist and professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio, who spoke at the hearing.

Verduzco-Gutierrez said she has treated a number of nurses and physicians experiencing long COVID, including some who “have not been able to return to the operating room or to the frontline or the patient bedside.”

Meanwhile, Bach said “the number of people not working due to long COVID will likely continue to grow as more people become infected.”

The hearing was held as the infectious omicron subvariant BA.5 made up roughly 78% of COVID-19 cases nationwide for the week ending July 16, CDC data estimates show. UC Davis Health has described it as the “most easily transmissible” subvariant.

In May, the CDC estimated 1 in 5 adults may develop at least one post-COVID symptom following a COVID-19 infection, McClatchy News previously reported. For those 65 and older, the risk is slightly higher.

 Of the Americans currently out of work because of long COVID, “many of these impacted families lose necessary income and employer-based health insurance at a time when they need it the most,” House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn, D-S.C., the subcommittee chairman, said in his opening remarks at the hearing.

Symptoms of Long COVID

 “Each of these persons with Long COVID are suffering and has a story that needs to be heard. Each of them has a different course – some even starting as asymptomatic or mild COVID-19 – with lingering and debilitating symptoms,” Verduzco-Gutierrez wrote.

Most people diagnosed with long COVID were never hospitalized due to their initial infection, a study published as a white paper in May found, McClatchy News previously reported.

Long COVID patients can have “a wide range of symptoms,” according to the CDC, and some include:

Fatigue

Fever

Breathing troubles

Cough

Chest pain

Heart palpitations

Brain fog

Headache

Dizziness

Digestive issues

Depression or anxiety

Muscle pain

“I have had cancer survivors get Long COVID. They tell me that their post-COVID fatigue is 100-times worse than their cancer fatigue ever was,” Verduzco-Gutierrez said.

Another witness at the long COVID hearing, Cynthia Adinig, who described herself as a formerly “mulitasking supermom,” said before her COVID-19 infection in March 2020, she ran two businesses while homeschooling her child, was involved in her local church and volunteered for a charity, according to her written testimony.

“Unfortunately, I can no longer be part of those spaces in the capacity that I used to because from time to time now my body becomes overwhelmed with nausea, dizziness, intermittent paralysis, fluctuating oxygen levels, crippling joint pain and unexpected high heart rate.”

‘Immediate changes’needed

Another witness who testified at the hearing, Hannah Davis, a co-founder of the Patient-Led Research Collaborative, called for “immediate changes” when it comes to long COVID, according to her written testimony.

“We need an urgent public information campaign on Long Covid, to explain that it happens after mild cases and to all ages, is debilitating, and requires immediate pacing and rest.” In terms of lessening long COVID’s “economic burden,” Bach named at least “five critical interventions that the government can support.” They include:

Better long COVID treatment

Improved sick leave

Greater access to Social Security Disability Insurance benefits

Improved employer accommodation

Better data collection

“To fully assess the labor market impact of long Covid, and to track the efficacy of any interventions, better data collection is required,” Bach wrote.

In Clyburn’s opening statement, he acknowledged that there is still more to learn about long COVID.

“The millions of Americans experiencing Long COVID, and their families, are desperate for answers and support,” he said

 

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