Since a good fraction of COVID-19 people are getting ‘Long COVID’, even a little bit of good news would be of great interest to them.
In the first large-scale study published in Lancet to examine the risk of developing ‘Long-COVID’ from an Omicron infection, scientists showed that COVID-19 cases caused by the Delta variant were 2.4 times more likely to result in ‘Long-COVID’ than those caused by the Omicron.
In a case-controlled observation study, researchers from the UK obtained data from 56,003 people who tested positive for COVID-19 during the Omicron wave (December 20, 2021–March 9, 2022) and 41,361 who tested positive during the Delta wave (June 1, 2021–November 27, 2021).
They used this self-reported data to identify the relative odds of ‘Long-COVID’ (Reported symptoms such as fatigue, brain fog, or heart problems more than four weeks after COVID-19 onset) during the Omicron vs. the Delta period.
Although experts warn not to interpret the findings to underestimate the potential for disability stemming from COVID-19, since Omicron is the dominant variant in the current circulation, we can take a sigh of relief that the odds of getting ‘Long-COVID’ is relatively lower than before when the Delta was the dominating variant.
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