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Co has reshaped our relationship with work in so many ways and for people suffering from long covid career paths
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have been dramatically derailed according to a new article in the journal um e economists estimate that
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long Co has pushed about 1 million Americans out of the labor force more than 5% of adults in the US have long Co
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and is the most prevalent among people in their Prime working years the federal government has said long Co can be
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classified as a disability allowing workers to seek accommodations like remote work and flexible hours Jeff talk
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a little bit about it CU it's back CO's back I went to the Democrat naal imtion has gotten Co I still have not gotten
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covid which is astonishing yeah it's amazing I know I'm a unicorn um but talk a little bit about what's happening on
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the ground now and then long covid in in specifics then George as someone who's experienced long covid I'd love to hear
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from you go ahead so so first let me just briefly talk about the vaccine is available soon um it's the um the the
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new vaccine covers the most common variant right now it's the Omicron uh KP uh 21 that's the vaccine that's the
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variant that the vaccine now covers which is going to cover the most common forms of covid the most common 37% of
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covid cases are uh KP 311 um and um you know like the influenza virus the covid virus changes
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its uh surface proteins it's called the spike proteins and so you need to be updated on the vaccine uh vaccines give
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you about four months of durable uh immunity that's why it's important to get your boosters as well but uh
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everybody 6 months or older should get uh this new vaccine um and the issue of long Co is really important they
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estimate that 30% of people have some form of long covid symptoms who've had covid and about 1 to 5% of people have
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serious long-term covid symptoms um and I think a lot of it goes unrecognized as
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uh just depression fatigue anxiety but these are all possibly um elements of long Co and it affects literally every
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body system every organ system is affected by long Co it's your neurologic system it's your kidneys it's your liver
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it's your skin it's your joints all these things um and it's a real thing I I have I can I can off the top of my
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head I have two colleagues Who I Really respect and admire one is a surgeon and one is a nurse that I work with who have
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basically uh been unable to work one retired they basically just uh felt that uh he couldn't continue uh feeling the
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way he was feeling brain fog is a really important element of long Co um and uh you know Ely for him he's got so many
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hobbies and interests and he you know he's my age and so it's you know maybe it was time take it seriously correct
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George I mean this is something you you had I have several friends uh who have it who've written about it Jen Senor
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Laura holsen um and very severe and a lot of people they still suffer from people not believing them in some like
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it same thing with Lyme disease or uh some of the other um diseases in this genre of I'm tired right essentially uh
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talk a little a little bit about your experience oh Jeff you just brought me back to some of the things that I were
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was feeling at the time neurological I couldn't go out in certain public I would start to have a like a nervous
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system breakdown uh on a Subway or in a theater that's where I had my first panic attack and this was this had never
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I know history of this whatsoever and then the feeling that I'm having a heart attack I couldn't be around other people
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which just sort of added crowds of people I should say which just sort of added to uh the loneliness isolation
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aspect which is part of this um you know long covid effect go what happened like
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how did it progress I the heart attack feeling the uh Panic feeling the neurological all of that stuff and the
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fatigue there was brain fog and eventually we're going back two years and eventually just kind of
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um over time when I went to the covid Care Center at Mount Si the doctor with whom I spoke believed me and as I gave
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her my Litany of symptoms knotted her head she was the first one she kind of knotted her head and she said we're
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seeing a ton of this uh so if it makes you feel less lonely in your experience let that be a comfort which it was and
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she said the bad news is that there is nothing we can do you just kind of have to ride it out and that was a pain in
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the ass but eventually she was right she said it could be 6 months could be a year it
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was out a year out before I started to feel sort of normal when you're in uh medical school one of the things you
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learn uh to differentiate and understand the difference between signs and symptoms right so symptoms are things
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like that you're feeling like fatigue uh my muscles hurt you know these are more
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of the subjective things there are actually signs of of as well and signs are things like fever you know elevated
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heart rate um you know laboratory studies elevation sedimentation rate uh in your blood Etc and more and more as
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people are studying this they're really understanding that uh long covid has sign both signs and symptoms and so
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doctors are more astute now about looking for those signs because they're objective as well as the subjective
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Sensations and believing people when they say exactly what I could not have worked in an office I I was I had the
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Good Fortune of doing whatever I do to make a living from home or wherever but working in an office would have been a
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problem so when should people take these Lou I'm just curious you you are going to get your covid-19 vaccine I hope um
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but you're an adult um how do younger people I don't think younger people are thinking about this it's sort of like a
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flu vac vaccine or whatever um the CDC will recommend that adults and children six months and older get updated
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vaccines um are you how do you look at it well I mean I think for a lot of people my age um and maybe more people
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people in general uh we every once in a while we get a little bit of a cold or cough or something like that and we're
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all like oh oh wait could it be the old friend you know is are they back um but yeah I think there's definitely um
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especially people with someone important in their lives or some kind of purpose um if they go to work if they have uh
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they live with their grandparents or they have people within their Network that are more susceptible I think people
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who care care and people who don't don't um so I'm definitely a bit behind I probably definitely do for a new vaccine
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so I actually you know what maybe even to answer your question even better I didn't even know there was a new vaccine
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till just now so okay maybe maybe that's an answer itself yeah this is well they
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need to roll out that information thing people ignore Co at their own RIS Ry campaign or something like that a nice
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like handsome advertisement to grab all our attention yeah when should you take it Jeff I've been told by my doctors
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that you should take it later in this later in September not to wait and then again the booster again and the flu
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vaccine again in January February yes so so a couple things you can take multi you can take several vaccines at the
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same time there's no Contra indication to getting the flu vaccine and the covid vaccine at the same time um the um if
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you've had covid in the last 3 months uh don't get the vaccine until about 3 months have expired and not that it's
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dangerous to get it the thing is that the actual fact of having covid is going to give you immunity so you want to it's
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like putting gas in your car after you went you know like one one exit there's no point in doing that wait till your
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gas tank is low and then fill it up again with your vaccine um so you should get it I mean the the there's a spike in
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the winter of Co and it's for several reasons one is temperature uh and the other is that people are tend to be
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inside more and it's more transmissible you know between people so you should get it as soon as it's available
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provided that you haven't had Co in the last 3 months