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Comment by Taek | Hacker News Reader

Covid19 is closer to SARS than the flu, and is known to cause permanent lung, kidney, and testicle damage, even in young and healthy patients.

Even among young patients, the ICU rate is as high as 10%. A low mortality rate for young people assumes access to an ICU.

All of New York State only has about 600 unoccupied ICU beds. If the number of infections in New York breaches 6,000, the fatality rate among young people is likely to be 10-20x that of the flu.

Young people need to worry about Covid19/SARS2

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Also if the healthcare system is overloaded it is also overloaded for young people that get another disease or have an accident.

Yep, I am in the unfortunate situation of being an Oregon trying to arrange public health insurance and make doctor's appointments as soon as possible for a worsening long-term digestive condition. I'm definitely concerned about being put off or crowded out of hospitals.

I've never seen studies that say anything about "permanent lung, kidney, and testicle damage, even in young and healthy patients". Where did you read this?

"young patients, the ICU rate is as high as 10%."

Any links?

Even the very first COVID-19 study [1] showed that 42% of the survivors (and _all_ of the deceased) treated in the Wuhan pulmonary hospitals experienced sepsis. Sepsis [3] causes tissue death all around the body, leading to permanent decrease in the function of the affected organs. Our ways of mitigating sepsis work only for bacterial infections, which COVID-19 isn't [2].

Sepsis aside, just plain pneumonia in adults is no laughing matter: pneumonia survivors are twice as likely to die as others in their demographic, be they rich, poor, old or young [4]. See the long term effects of SARS: if you survive, your health status and exercise capacity will be impaired for a long time, potentially for the rest of your life [5].

[1] https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6...

[2] https://www.epmmagazine.com/news/new-drug-could-stop-sepsis-...

[3] https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/sepsis

[4] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4066634/

[5] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/20337995

Quotes from link 1

> Sepsis was a common complication, which might be directly caused by SARS-CoV-2 infection, but further research is needed to investigate the pathogenesis of sepsis in COVID-19 illness.

> 91 (48%) patients had a comorbidity, with hypertension being the most common (58 [30%] patients), followed by diabetes (36 [19%] patients) and coronary heart disease (15 [8%] patients).

>I've never seen studies that say anything about "permanent lung, kidney, and testicle damage, even in young and healthy patients". Where did you read this?

It's obviously bullshit. How would we know about "permanent" damage from a disease a few months old.

Ya know, because we humans can't regenerate organs at the drop of a hat... or at all. So if your lung tissue starts dying, that's it. The best you can hope for is permanent scarring to replace the dead tissue. Scar tissue is a poor replacement for the original by many measures.

>regenerate organs

Some organs can and others can grow in size to compensate for reduce efficiency. Plus, there's no real evidence that Covid is causing organ damage.

> if your lung tissue starts dying, that's it

That's definitely not "it". Your lungs can repair damaged tissue and the system as a whole can adapt to compensate for portions that can't be repaired. And also no real evidence that long term damage is being done.

I don't have any links handy but I've seen reports that in a few cases covid19 has indeed caused permanent lung damage after the infection subsided. Apparently it's rare but possible but don't take my word for it.

I don't think any other organs growing in size are going to compensate for reduced lung function. It's true our bodies adapt to damage but once the tissue is dead it's not coming back.

Sorry to be that person, but citation needed? Where is a reputible source for this information?

Nobody know where a reputable source is. It’s just a laundry list of all the ‘talking points’. I keep hearing people say this stuff, but nobody knows where it came from.

It is certainly not the message the CDC is putting out in the USA.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/summ...

The Seattle Times ‘Fact sheet’ is also singing a different tune.

https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/health/facts-about...

Those are some important facts, thanks for sharing. I’d like to see the probability of healthy people getting permanent damage however. That would change my mind. Until then the extremely low fatality and infection rate for average people, as well as the incubation period being so long that it’s unrealistic to contain it, is enough for me not to worry about it.

You're being selfish. Everything isn't just about you.

reedx8's post is about reedx8's level of worry and personal risk assessment, which is 100% about reedx8.

reedx8's personal risk assessment is only 100% about reedx8 if they have no loved ones, and don't care for any lives other than their own.

Still fair to callout someone that only considers personal risk for being selfish.

Yes. That's selfish, because their actions have effects on others and they need to take that into consideration too.

AIUI, SARS did cause permanent damage because many people were treated with strong anti-inflammatory drugs that suppress the immune system, despite the ongoing viral infection. These will probably be used against COVID-19 as well, especially given ICU shortages. Hopefully we will gain a better understanding over time of how to properly balance the avoidance of life-threatening damage from the immune response (e.g. due to CRS) with still countering the virus effectively.

"as well as the incubation period being so long that it’s unrealistic to contain it, is enough for me not to worry about it."

Remember that low-risk people still get infected, and still infect others. The evidence is fairly conclusive at this point that you're infections even if you lack symptoms, so you can easily be putting the at-risk people in your life (or in communities around you) in significant peril by being careless and thoughtless.

Please be extremely careful with this disease. If you're not going to self-isolate or be more cautious and normal, please do not visit any at-risk people in your life

Uh well it causes bilateral interstitial pneumonia which is inflammation that causes irreversible scarring around the air sacs. If you get it you will have scarring. If you get it badly you will have bad scarring that will impact your future health. If you have an underlying health problem esp if it involves your respiratory system you are fucked. Combine all of this with thousands of your neighbors Unable to breath creates a very interesting union in the ER.

Maybe the Wikipedia article on bilateral interstitial pneumonia will change your mind?

You may have to worry about rioting and looting however.

> low fatality and infection rate for average people

Could you say how're defining "average" because right now it just sounds like "me". There's a lot of people who are non-average and have the very same right to live as the average.

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