>Remember, this isn't a simple pneumonia bug. It's a virus that attacks the RAAS/ACE2 system, in particular all the epithelial tissues, and any other cells that express ACE2 receptors on their surfaces. It can mess with your kidneys. It can mess with fat cells, changing their response to insulin. It apparently shows up in brain tissue.

Long Covid is my new normal. If 15% of everyone who gets Covid ends up like me, heck even if it's 1%, we're in for a wave of hurt.

If we assume it becomes endemic, and we all just treat it like the flu, then assume 1% of cases for each new variant also end up like me. At one variant/year, we're looking at decimating the working population before 2030.

This alone is a big enough shift, in our "just in time" world, to set of societal changes like the end of the feudalism and the beginning of the enlightenment.

> it may have long-term sequelae, like Shingles, which only show up years to decades later.

It is important at this point to remember that the first wave of the 1918 pandemic was much like the first wave of Covid, it mostly effected the old. The second wave of the pandemic was the one that killed more people than WWI, mostly the young and healthy.