Doctors Worry COVID-19 Effects Could Last For Survivors

For some COVID-19 survivors, the worst may not be over, some doctors fear.

According to the Los Angeles Times, the infection has proved to be a full-body assault for some patients, causing damage beyond the lungs, and lingering after recovery.

In a new study, scientists in China examined the blood test results of 34 COVID-19 patients while hospitalized. In those who survived mild and severe disease alike, the researchers found many of the biological measures had “failed to return to normal.”

Particularly worrisome were readings that showed recovered patients continued to have impaired liver function. Also, cardiologists are worried damage to the heart could be long-lasting, the news outlet reported.

In an early study of COVID-19 patients in China, heart failure was seen in nearly 12% of those who survived, including in some who had shown no signs of respiratory distress.

“COVID-19 is not just a respiratory disorder,” Harlan Krumholtz, a cardiologist at Yale University, told the LA Times. “It can affect the heart, the liver, the kidneys, the brain, the endocrine system and the blood system.”

There are no long-term survivors of the new disease, and doctors worry in its wake, some organs whose function has been impaired won't recover quickly or completely.

Another question that could take years to answer is whether the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 may lie dormant in the body for years and spring back later in different form, the LA Times reported.

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