September 28, 2021

Occurrence of long-COVID symptoms after COVID-19 infection compared with flu

Research from the University of Oxford and the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre (BRC) has used a US-based electronic health record network (TriNetX) to assess how common 9 of the core long-COVID symptoms are in those with a previous positive COVID test up to 180 days after infection and compared this to a population with a previous flu infection. They also looked at which groups of patients were at higher risk of reporting any long-COVID symptoms, how often patients had multiple long-COVID symptoms, and if certain groups were at higher risk of specific symptoms.

The findings have been published in PLOS Medicine. Four of the study authors went through the findings and answer journalists’ questions. 

Speakers included:

Prof Paul Harrison, Professor of Psychiatry, University of Oxford

Dr Max Taquet, NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow in Psychiatry, University of Oxford

Prof Masud Husain, Professor of Neurology & Cognitive Neuroscience, University of Oxford

This Briefing was accompanied by an SMC Roundup of Comments.