Living with ‘long Covid’

Worrying after-effects: According to the CDC, even people who did not have Covid-19 symptoms in the days or weeks after they were infected can still have post-Covid conditions. — Filepic/The Star

WEEKS following the end of his quarantine, a twenty-five-year-old lawyer who only wishes to be known as Syamil is still struggling with the after-effects of Covid-19. It has taken such a toll on his health that Syamil has resigned from work to focus on recovery.

During his battle with category 2 Covid-19, Syamil experienced breathing difficulties, low oxygen, diarrhoea, loss of smell and a sore throat. Although he has recovered from the initial infection and is no longer contagious, Syamil is still struggling with shortness of breath and a high heart rate.

“If I’m doing nothing, it’s OK but once I start doing something like going up and down the stairs, I would feel like I’d run a marathon. There was a period of time where I had to sit down to pray, because if I stood up for too long, I would feel like I was going to faint,” he explains.

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“I was diagnosed with Covid-19 on July 24 and was quarantined at home until Aug 3. I then went to the Covid Assessment Centre (CAC) to get my quarantine release letter. During the consultation, the doctor told me that I have ‘long Covid’. So even if the virus is ineffective in my body, I may still be suffering from symptoms for an indefinite amount of time.”

The term “long Covid” is commonly used to describe the post-Covid syndrome where symptoms of Covid-19 such as persistent fatigue, breathlessness and brain fog continue or develop long after one has recovered from the disease. It is reported that long Covid has debilitated and is debilitating millions of people globally.

For Syamil, who went back to work two days after he was officially declared “Covid-free”, he soon realised that his irregular breathing was taking a toll on his body when working.

“I also have brain fog which severely hampers what I can normally do prior to Covid-19.

“If I have a number of things to do in a day, I have to write it all down otherwise I would forget. When someone explains something to me, I end up asking them two or three times when I’m already supposed to be familiar with the subject matter,” he says, adding that he even had difficulty recollecting things and topics which he was very familiar with before catching Covid-19.

In follow-up consultations, doctors told Syamil that his body is weak and he most likely has lung scarring and/or high toxicity in his blood. After taking into consideration his current state, Syamil tendered his resignation.

“I’ve tried to cope with it using supplements and exercise but the nature of my job was too demanding for my current condition,” he says.

Syamil shares that some of his friends who are dealing with long Covid have felt stigmatised due to their condition.

“Some of their friends and family say that since their Covid-19 has gone, they should be feeling better,” says Syamil, who explains that a common and harmful misconception is that those who have long Covid are just being lazy or overly anxious.

Although Syamil received his second dose of the Astrazeneca vaccine on July 10, he caught Covid-19 before he was deemed fully vaccinated, which is 14 days after the second dose. Taking his experience into account, Syamil suggests introducing a policy for those who recently took their vaccines to be quarantined until their bodies are able to build immunity against the virus that causes Covid-19.

Double-dose vaccines like Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Sinovac typically take two weeks after the second dose for the body to build protection. For single-shot vaccines like Cansino and Johnson & Johnson, it is 28 days post-vaccination.

A recently published research led by King’s College London suggests that being fully vaccinated against Covid-19 also cuts the risk of an infection turning into long Covid.

Syamil admits he is concerned about his long Covid treatment.

“I am immensely worried about future healthcare treatment because there is no true standard way of curing long Covid as the doctor prescribes treatments based on the symptoms I have,” he explains.

Fortunately, his recovery is going well, and he attributes this to his ability to take time off from work and heal his body.

“As someone who already had a hard time finding a job after the first movement control order, I wish to recover as much as possible so that when I re-enter the workforce, I am able to answer questions like whether I’ve fully recovered, and whether my condition would affect my ability to work,” Syamil says.

Ongoing symptoms

Early research suggested that it could take two weeks to recover from a mild Covid-19 and up to six weeks for severe or critical cases. Newer data show that recovery varies for different people, depending on age and overall health.

Unlike reinfection, where those who caught Covid-19 recovered and then later became infected again, individuals suffering from long Covid experience prolonged symptoms from their initial infection.

Experts estimate that millions are suffering from long Covid around the world but there is still not enough information on the condition. As medical journal The Lancet points out, there is not even an agreed upon global definition.

The United States’ Centers for Disease Control (CDC) defines post-Covid syndrome as “a wide range of new, returning, or ongoing health problems people can experience four or more weeks after first being infected with the virus that causes Covid-19.” Meanwhile, the United Kingdom’s National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) defines Acute Covid-19 as signs and symptoms of Covid-19 that remain for up to four weeks, and post-Covid syndrome as symptoms that continue for more than 12 weeks.

According to the CDC, even people who did not have Covid-19 symptoms in the days or weeks after they were infected can still have post-Covid conditions.

A recent clinical study conducted by the Health Ministry on 1,004 category 4 and 5 Covid-19 patients found that 66% had long Covid, where patients continue to show symptoms for 12 weeks or more.

A 27-year-old aviation production planner Dahlan (not his real name) spent about ten days in hospital to treat stage three Covid-19. Although he was discharged in July, like Syamil, Dahlan is also still grappling with Long Covid.

Dahlan continues to experience chest pain, back pain, headaches, bodily chills, and breathing difficulties which appear suddenly without warning. These symptoms come and go randomly, he says.

“The symptoms of long Covid differ according to the person, their antibodies, and the stages of Covid-19 they experienced. I thought that since I have been discharged, everything is now OK. But only a few days ago I was eating satay and I found that I couldn’t taste anything,” says Dahlan, who sometimes wakes up in the middle of the night because of shortness of breath.

Fortunately, Dahlan is now in a managerial role and is no longer doing technical on-site work. He says that if he had remained as a technician, his work would be affected.

“I get tired easily. Even while talking on the phone to you right now, I feel that my body is suffocating,” he tells Sunday Star. Dahlan is trying his best to adapt, and monitors his oxygen level every day with an oximeter. He is also concerned about the long-term psychological impact long Covid might have on him.

When he was diagnosed, Dahlan had only received his first dose of the Astrazeneca vaccine. He is thankful that he had received at least one jab, as he believes this may have reduced the potential severity of his condition.

“Most of those who were hospitalised with me had not been vaccinated. Although it may seem like my Covid-19 was bad, I was actually one of the healthiest there because I had at least one dose of the vaccine. A few others who had a history of vaccination were also hospitalised, but their severity was generally lower than those without vaccines.”