People who have had Covid-19 more than once are at greater risk of developing a range of serious health problems than people who have had the coronavirus only once, according to the first major study on the topic.
Frequent infections increased as the virus mutated, but the long-term health effects of the infection were not yet clear. A new study, published Thursday in Nature Medicine, examined for the first time how reinfection increases the risk of long-term health problems and the virus (‘lung disease’).
US researchers analyzed the anonymous medical records of 5.8 million people in the US Department of Veterans Affairs health care database. More than 443,000 people tested positive for coronavirus at least once between March 2020 and April 2022. Among them, 41,000 were infected with Covid-19 more than once. Another 5.3 million people have never been infected with the Corona virus.
Heart and lung problems
Ziad Al-Aly, an epidemiologist at Washington University in St. Louis and lead author of the study.
For example, heart and lung problems were three times more common in people affected more than once. Re-infection also contributed to brain and kidney disease and diabetes, according to the study.
The researchers acknowledged that the study included mainly older white men.
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