COVID-19 and its long-term sequelae: what do we know in 2023?

Abstract

vaccine -elicited, or both) or the virus attenuation, 3 the overall number of deaths and the mortality rate are also substantially underestimated. According to recent epidemiologic evidence from the WHO, the global number of COVID -19-related deaths may be up to 3 -fold higher than officially reported, 4 with ample variations in the volume of excess deaths worldwide (eg, the underestimation bias may even exceed 50% in certain South American regions). Likewise, a debate is fueling over the fact that the way COVID -19-related deaths are counted in some countries may not reflect the real scenario, with several million deaths missed by official statistics. 5 That said, and with the apparent preamble that pandemic numbers are largely biased and will continue to grow in the foreseeable future (COVID -19 seems now Current epidemiology of COVID -19 COVID -19 is a life -threatening infectious disease sustained by SARS -CoV -2, the virus first identified in the Chinese town of Wuhan in November 2019. Thereafter, it has spread rapidly worldwide, and the World Health Organization (WHO) has finally classified it as a pandemic disease in March 2020. 1 The accurate characterization of the ongoing COVID -19 epidemic is challenging for countless reasons. First, the number of official cases of SARS -CoV -2 infection is underestimated mainly because of under testing and under -reporting all around the world, making it impossible to provide accurate measures of its current frequency. 2 Then, although it is undeniable that the clinical severity of COVID -19 has considerably declined over time due to either immunity (natural,

Aging and long COVID-19 syndrome: what’s new in 2023?

“…However, among these varied consistently reported symptoms, it is especially noteworthy that no unique symptom or body of symptoms has yet been observed, and the link of any COVID 19 syndrome to any pre existing health indicator is generally not evident. 10 As well, age alone cannot be a factor because the condition appears to randomly affect older as well as younger COVID survivors, regardless of vaccination or health status. Key findings echoed in most publications as of February 2023 are: perceptions of persistent fatigue and/or cognitive impairments and sleep challenges that may prove to be of a highly debilitating interactive nature.…”

COVID-19 epidemiology and rural healthcare: a survey in a Spanish village

“…The duration of symptoms was driven by sex, age, risk group, as well as by the time period. Thus, a longer duration of disease-associated symptoms was related to older ages, female sex, and the presence of comorbidities [35–37]. The effect of the period and the fact that the duration of symptoms was higher during period 1 point to a positive effect of vaccination or variant-related differences in pathogenicity [38].…”

Ribavirin’s Daily Dose Growth Determined as the Result of Medicament Testing May Be a Predictor of the Chronic Course of the Disease in Long COVID Syndrome Patients

“…Currently, long COVID-19 is de ned as a condition after recovery from acute COVID-19 infection for more than 12 weeks, persisting for at least 2 months, when the severity of the acute infection is not important, or when the patient has unresolved COVID-19 illness with symptoms not associated with any other condition [14]. To date, data have been accumulated from various studies regarding the nature of the disease, clinical manifestations of long COVID-19 and other conditions [15,16,17,18,19,20,21]. Notably, a large number of studies indicate damage to the nervous system in patients with long COVID syndrome.…”