1/ NEW- “What does severe COVID really look like?”

- primarily a respiratory disease
- severe COVID invariably requires mechanical ventilation
- Around 50% will survive ICU https://link.medium.com/OzYiZKWSjfb 

2/ Between 5-10% of ICU patients are 20-40 years old - https://www.icnarc.org/DataServices/Attachments/Download/2d288f8e-728e-eb11-912f-00505601089b

And frontline healthcare workers are over represented compared to the general population.

3/ In it’s severest form we can’t physically get enough oxygen into patients to keep them live, so we use a device to infuse oxygen directly into their blood, known as ExtraCorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO).

4/We really only have two good treatments for severe COVID-
1/ steroids and 2/ “proning”- which is flipping the patient lying on their back to lying on their front.

All of the other “wonder drugs” didn’t really pan out:

5/ As anyone who’s actually looked after severe COVID will tell you, this isn’t flu. And COVID itself is quite easy to spot on blood tests:
- high CRP
- a specifically low white cell count (lymphocytes)
- low platelets
- very high d-dimer

X-rays show severe changes in lungs:

6/ At 33 my risk of during from COVID is 5x higher than dying from flu.
When I get to my 80s it’s 25x higher.
This is not flu.
HT @zorinaq

7/ And once patients get out of hospital it isn’t over for them.

1 in 3 will be readmitted and 1 in 10 will die within 3 months, a risk 8 times higher than those discharged with non-COVID diseases.

https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.01.15.21249885v1.full.pdf

8/ So it really isn’t flu. Wherever you are in the world and however your country is doing, take care and stay safe. https://link.medium.com/WOBwaCkYjfb