The one thing that is somewhat reassuring is that the number of people who developed full-blown ME is lower in people who were recruited during acute infection. This is not discussed in the article (that I could see—might have missed it) but it shows up in a graph.

Of all the people infected, six months later:
- 4.5% had full-blown ME
- 39.8% had ME-like illness
- 55.7% did not have any ME symptoms

This is much higher than the numbers among uninfected people (0.6%, 16.1%, and 83.3% respectively)

Note that someone could not be diagnosed as having ME according to this definition if they were not moderately, mostly, or completely impaired in their ability to WALK, climb stairs, move a chair, and carry groceries.

ME was defined according to the IOM criteria, which requires fatigue, “moderate to complete” functional impairment, PEM, sleep dysfunction, and either orthostatic intolerance or cogn. impairment (or both).

ME-like illness was defined as at least one but not all these symptoms

People had a study visit six months after the infection. At this visit, they were classified as 1) having ME, 2) having ME-like illness, or 3) not having any ME symptoms

This studied how many people went on to develop ME after COVID. 4.5% developed full-blown ME, incl. moderate to complete interference with ability to walk, climb stairs, carry groceries, or move a chair. 39.5% developed an ME-like illness.

A thread on these alarming findings

Here is the conclusion of our rapid response: we need serious, well-designed and ambitious clinical trials that target the mechanisms which have already been shown to dysfunction in people with Long COVID

Excellent presentation from @patientled.bsky.social at the Demystifying Long COVID conference, where they show the dangers of reinfections for people with and without LC. Interesting that a second reinfection doesn’t increase odds of reporting PEM!

making extremely sick people spend their dwindling savings to travel to a clinical trial site for a drug sold by Pfizer is beyond ghoulish