With people across the world reporting symptoms even after they are free of SARS-CoV-2, an all-India survey showed fatigue, headache and hair loss among the most common long-term side effects of Covid-19.
Pronto Consult, which specialises in doctor perception studies and pharma market insights in India and West Asia, revealed at least 75% of people, who were infected with Covid-19, faced long-term effects.
While the most common long term side-effect was fatigue, which 63% of the sample of 20,000 respondents reported, headache (53%) and hair loss (29%) were among the top three.
The data that was collected in July and August and released in September showed that the other effects were throat pain, intermittent fever, joint pain, skin discoloration, increase in perspiration and depression amongst others.
At least 9% of the infected respondents, that is, 1,800 of the 20,000, were diagnosed with high glucose levels, and 16% had increased blood pressure levels post Covid-19. Before the onset of Covid-19 infection, they had no history of sugar or hypertension.
The study was conducted through a questionnaire followed by in-person meetings.
Dr Hari Natarajan, founder of Pronto Consult, said, “Multiple health experts believe that the long-term Covid-19 may result in a new kind of health crisis, if left unattended. India is now coming out of the second wave, we must not leave this unattended as it may have long term health consequences globally.”
Dr Karishma Shah, co-founder, Pronto Consult, said, “Lots of people were confused as there were no such experiences earlier and people are getting accustomed to this new set of effects.”
Fatigue, Headache Top Side Effects: Global Findings
Similar findings were reported by a study published in Nature’s Scientific Reports which reviewed several publications for studies of long-term Covid-19 effects. The study conducted a meta-analysis of 47,910 patients aged between 17 and 87.
The most common long-term side effect was fatigue, affecting 58% followed by headache (44%), attention disorder (27%), hair loss (25%), and dyspnoea (24%).
It suggested formation of multi-disciplinary teams, which would be crucial for “developing preventive measures, rehabilitation techniques, and clinical management strategies with whole-patient perspectives designed to address long Covid-19 care.”
Another study conducted in Italy found 87% of people hospitalised due to Covid-19 were struggling with health issues even two months after release.
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