"Long COVID Persists as a Mass Disabling Event"

Karen Bonuck, PhD is a pediatric health researcher and a professor of family and social medicine, has an opinion piece on the debilitating Long COVID. Here are some excerpts.

"The latest CDC data on long COVID in U.S. adults and an alarming World Health Organization (WHO) statement about its long-term impact underscore the pandemic's lingering and debilitating effects. Like the satirical film 'Don't Look Up,' in which scientists couldn't focus media or politicians on the climate crisis, most Americans are content to avert their eyes from the long COVID crisis. Meanwhile, the millions now missing from public life because of it have no choice but to stare down the gamut of its sweep.

"Leaning into my disability advocacy hat, I have been reaching out to people across disciplines and government to sound the alarm that long COVID is a mass disabling event. And it is not going to disappear, as much as media outlets and policymakers want to move on and ignore it.

So, what can you do as a healthcare professional? Listen to your patients -- and believe them."

Those suffering from Long COVID need to be taken seriously at last.