Persistent COVID-19 symptoms in a community study of 606,434 people in England

• Main Authors: Chadeau-Hyam, M. (Author), Cooke, G. (Author), Darzi, A. (Author), Elliott, J. (Author), Elliott, P. (Author), Riley, S. (Author), Ward, H. (Author), Whitaker, M. (Author)
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Nature Research 2022
• Subjects: adult; Adult; complication; COVID-19; England; epidemiology; female; Female; human; Humans; SARS-CoV-2
• Online Access: View Fulltext in Publisher

 Long COVID remains a broadly defined syndrome, with estimates of prevalence and duration varying widely. We use data from rounds 3–5 of the REACT-2 study (n = 508,707; September 2020 – February 2021), a representative community survey of adults in England, and replication data from round 6 (n = 97,717; May 2021) to estimate the prevalence and identify predictors of persistent symptoms lasting 12 weeks or more; and unsupervised learning to cluster individuals by reported symptoms. At 12 weeks in rounds 3–5, 37.7% experienced at least one symptom, falling to 21.6% in round 6. Female sex, increasing age, obesity, smoking, vaping, hospitalisation with COVID-19, deprivation, and being a healthcare worker are associated with higher probability of persistent symptoms in rounds 3–5, and Asian ethnicity with lower probability. Clustering analysis identifies a subset of participants with predominantly respiratory symptoms. Managing the long-term sequelae of COVID-19 will remain a major challenge for affected individuals and their families and for health services. © 2022, The Author(s).