The C.D.C. adds mental health conditions to its high-risk Covid list.
Source: New York Times
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has amended its website to add mental health illnesses, including depression and schizophrenia, to its list of health conditions that make people of any age more likely to become severely ill from Covid-19. The change, which the agencys website registered as having occurred on Oct. 14, makes about 85 percent of the adult U.S. population eligible for booster shots, said Dr. Paul Offit, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the Food and Drug Administrations vaccine advisory panel.
The door just keeps getting wider and wider, he said. The C.D.C. recommends boosters for people 18 or over with certain underlying health issues. According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness, about one in five American adults experience some form of mental illness each year. Preliminary research has shown an association between mental health disorders and hospitalization and severe sickness from Covid.
A study published in January in JAMA Psychiatry found that Covid patients with schizophrenia were nearly three times more likely to die from the virus, although people with mood and anxiety disorders were not at an increased risk of death from coronavirus infection. Research published in The Lancet Psychiatry last November suggested that a psychiatric diagnosis might be an independent risk factor for contracting the virus.
Not only would it increase the risk of Covid, said Maxime Taquet, the lead author of the study and a psychiatry researcher at Oxford University, it would increase the severity of Covid once you have it. Chronic mental health conditions can exact a physical toll and wreak havoc on the bodys immune system, making people who suffer them more vulnerable to diseases like Covid, said Dr. Christine Crawford, an associate medical director at the National Alliance on Mental Illness. Theyre at increased risk, just because of the impact the stress response has on the body, Dr. Crawford said.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/28/well/cdc-mental-health-covid.html
abqtommy
(14,118 posts)BumRushDaShow
(129,441 posts)bucolic_frolic
(43,281 posts)BumRushDaShow
(129,441 posts)I think it is more that many manifestations of mental illness are due to biochemical imbalances and since there are ACE2 receptors that the COVID-19 virus can attach to, just about everywhere "critical" in the body (including in the neural system), then that can make things worse.
I_UndergroundPanther
(12,480 posts)I have for severe covid risks keeps growing.
Now I really regret getting the j and j booster by mistake. Fuck.
SheltieLover
(57,073 posts)ananda
(28,876 posts)Just sayin
IronLionZion
(45,528 posts)moreland01
(742 posts)doesn't it?
BigmanPigman
(51,627 posts)No wonder 85% of US adults qualify for a booster.
BumRushDaShow
(129,441 posts)and it makes sense because of how this virus can move through the body and where it can attach. It is often just called a "respiratory virus" (primarily impact the nose and lungs). But the actual viral particles can land and replicate in all sorts of locations of the body like the kidneys, liver, brain, gastrointestinal system, heart, etc. And wherever it does land, it can cause symptoms consistent with infection and disruptions of, and damage to those parts of the body.
BigmanPigman
(51,627 posts)I saw a trade paper on his desk and saw "Covid" on a headline. I asked him if Covid causes brain damage and I knew the answer before he said it, "We don't know yet" and I added that we probably won't know for 50 years. Time will tell but I doubt if the results will be good news.
Response to BumRushDaShow (Original post)
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