We continued to feel a deep sigh within us when we hear the word COVID in just about any context, but hearing it connected with our children provokes an even deeper frustration with 2020’s ongoing gift to the world. In this study, British researchers aimed to pin down better statistics on how Long COVID was affecting British children ages 11 to 17 years when measured at 3, 6, 12, and 24 months after the initial infection. With a retrospective survey of over 12,000 youth (or their parents), we see that a significant minority of children had symptoms meeting the definition of post COVID syndrome.
Prior studies had been less conclusive due to small numbers and inconsistent definitions of what constituted post-COVID syndrome (or Long-Hauler COVID). Adult studies were more detailed and helpful, but better understanding of the statistics in children was needed. The short answer is that 25-30% of the children reported symptoms that met the PCC (Post COVID Condition) Delphi criteria (see link) at 24 months post infection.
While this looks alarming, another data point is less alarming: Only 7.2% of the children met the criteria at all 4 time points, meaning they were consistently symptomatic the entire time period. In other words, most of the 25-30% seem to have had fluctuating symptoms, not continuous. There was no attempt to determine whether this was secondary to repeated COVID infections or not, although those who reported repeated infections did have higher rates of meeting Long-Hauler criteria and a higher number of symptoms in total.
As mentioned, other studies had used a mixture of symptoms in their definitions of Post COVID syndrome. This study used the following symptoms in their PCC Delphi definition: See this link: https://www.nature.com/articles/s43856-024-00657-x/tables/2 The most commonly reported symptoms, to no one’s surprise, was being tired. This was followed by trouble sleeping, shortness of breath, headaches, and cough as the next four in order of prevalence.
Thankfully, they did attempt to assess whether vaccination status played any role in altering the course of the disease. At least in terms of symptoms reported at 24 months, they found no statistically significant difference between vaccinated and unvaccinated children.
Stepping back from this data, you might ask what the big deal is about teens reporting being tired. You might think about how many times your own teen has complained of fatigue in the past month when they went to bed too late. This study required more than that one symptom to qualify as meeting the disease criteria. Many of these children actually reported more than 5 of these symptoms. Validated surveys also indicated that these symptoms correlated with a measurably poorer quality of life. Further, the children with higher symptom scores reported overall poorer mental and physical health.
This phenomenon of post viral symptoms is not new to the world of medicine even in conventional circles. The authors note in their discussion section:
“Post-viral fatigue has also been described after the 1918 influenza pandemic, ‘swine flu’ epidemic of influenza A (H1N1), Ebolavirus, and tick-borne encephalitis. After mononucleosis, Q-fever, and giardiasis, prospective cohort studies report that 10–15% of patients experience moderate to severe disability, meeting the diagnostic criteria for post-infective fatigue syndrome.”
Clearly, post-viral syndromes are something that any medical provider faces if they are seeing more than a handful of patients. In functional medicine, we have been dealing with these issues for years in both adults and children. While conventional medicine continues not only to debate about how prevalent this condition is but also to scratch their heads about how to treat it in the patient actually suffering from it, we in functional medicine keep helping our patients return to healthier, more abundant lives.
Original Article:
Terence Stephenson, Snehal M. Pinto Pereira, Manjula D. Nugawela, Emma Dalrymple, Anthony Harnden, Elizabeth Whittaker, Isobel Heyman, Tamsin Ford, Terry Segal, Trudie Chalder, Shamez N. Ladhani, Kelsey McOwat, Ruth Simmons, Laila Xu, Lana Fox-Smith, Marta Buszewicz, Esther Crawley, Bianca De Stavola, Shruti Garg, Dougal Hargreaves, Michael Levin, Vanessa Poustie, Malcolm Semple, Kishan Sharma, Olivia Swann, Roz Shafran. A 24-month National Cohort Study examining long-term effects of COVID-19 in children and young people. Communications Medicine, 2024; 4 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s43856-024-00657-x
Thanks to Science Daily:
University College London. “70 percent of young people with long Covid recover within two years, study finds.” ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 4 December 2024. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2024/12/241204114312.htm>.
Sanctuary Functional Medicine, under the direction of Dr Eric Potter, IFMCP MD, provides functional medicine services to Nashville, Middle Tennessee and beyond. We frequently treat patients from Kentucky, Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, Ohio, Indiana, and more... offering the hope of healthier more abundant lives to those with chronic illness.
