Severe COVID-19 still affects patients a year later

Among 1,276 COVID-19 patients hospitalized in China early in the pandemic, 49% still had at least one symptom 12 months after first becoming ill, researchers reported on Friday in The Lancet . Most common were fatigue or muscle weakness.

About a third still had shortness of breath or other lung problems, especially those who had been the most severely ill. In some patients, doctors saw a reduced flow of oxygen from the lungs to the bloodstream. Roughly one in four survivors reported depression.

Among patients who had been employed before they were hospitalized, 88% had returned to work by 12 months – but overall, the survivors were not as healthy as people from the community who had not been infected with the coronavirus.

The study only looked at patients from one hospital, and not many of them had been sick enough to require intensive care. Nevertheless, the fact that some patients still had symptoms “should be taken into account when planning delivery of healthcare services post-pandemic,” coauthor Bin Cao from the China-Japan Friendship Hospital said in a statement.