More COVID resources

Pandemic Patients

Our understanding of the association between COVID-19 infection and long-term health complications is continually evolving, and this document will be updated as new information becomes available. While the intent of this document is to provide an extensive overview, it should not be considered a comprehensive list of the potential consequences of COVID-19 infections.

This document reviews literature published up until February 25, 2024.

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the damage done by COVID-19 is cumulative (Bowe et al., 2022). Even someone who recovers from an asymptomatic (Ma et al., 2023) or mild case (Novak et al., 2022) of COVID-19 is at risk of developing one or more PCCs.

In fact, a recent review by Boufidou et al. (2023) noted that those who were reinfected were more prone to developing long-term symptoms—in comparison to those who were only infected once—and more prone to “various complications, including potential cardiac, pulmonary, or neurological problems” (p. 7). Even asymptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infections can result in long-term symptoms such as fatigue, loss of taste or smell, or chronic cough (Ma et al., 2023).

Critically, the increased risk of developing PCCs after reinfection may represent a more recent change in the pathology of SARS-CoV-2; in contrast to earlier variants of COVID-19, which had lower rates of reinfection and a higher risk of developing chronic symptoms after the first infection relative to reinfection. The emergence of Omicron BA variants appears to represent a shift in this pattern (Hadley et al., 2023).

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everyone is at higher risk of adverse health effects after SARS-CoV-2 infection. For example, even mild to moderate cases of COVID-19 are leaving firefighters with long-term deficits in their cardiorespiratory fitness (D’Isabel et al., 2023).