![]() ![]() Long-haulers have banded together in online groups and new initiatives such as Survivor Corps and the Patient-Led Research Collaborative. "And I am just so relieved to have the stronger protection that vaccines provide above natural immunity." Not All Long-Haulers Are Opting For Vaccine, And Some Who Do See Little ChangeĪ billboard on the side of Highway 26 in Rock County encourages people to get the COVID-19 vaccine. we'll be able to really put this behind us," she said. Giblin has had less of the skin flushing as well, and her headaches have been less severe. She's continued to improve in the weeks since. "Maybe a week after her first vaccine, she said, 'Mom, I can smell your coffee,'" Giblin said. But her daughter did experience the persistent loss of taste and smell. Giblin's 17-year-old daughter was nowhere near as sick as Giblin was when the illness moved through her family. "I'll take a one-in-three chance that it might help along the way." "Some of these cursory reports were saying maybe one-third (improved)," she said. As vaccinations became more widespread earlier this year, she started to see reports that some long-haulers were seeing improvements. I was sicker than I've ever been in my entire life."įor Giblin, the lingering symptoms have been headaches, facial flushing, fatigue and a cough. "I was very, very, very sick with COVID-19," Giblin said. They both continued to go to work through the pandemic, and she said she spent all of 2020 "just stressed out all the time" because she knew, with her pre-existing condition, that catching COVID-19 would likely be serious for her. ![]() She works with older adults and adults with disabilities in Portage County, and her husband is a firefighter. Giblin already had one chronic condition, diabetes, before she became afflicted with post-acute COVID-19 syndrome. "I'm really sick of this pandemic," said Giblin, 44, of Stevens Point. That meant she had to wait 90 days before she could get vaccinated. ![]() Kate Giblin had COVID-19 in December, and in January she was treated with monoclonal antibodies. Matt Rourke/AP Photo Some With Chronic Symptoms See Hope They Can Put Pandemic Behind Them In this March 5, 2021, file photo a sign outside a pharmacy in Steelton, Pa., announces a drive-thru administering COVID-19 vaccinations. "I can smell it when my husband puts his cologne on." "My smell has been 100 percent better" since she got vaccinated, Britton said. She's part of the group whose symptoms improved. Britton had been experiencing lingering symptoms since her family got sick in January. Jalaine Britton, 56, of Wisconsin Rapids, said she and her 19-year-old daughter got vaccinated together last month. Research into vaccines' effects on long-haulers is ongoing. Unfortunately, she also found up to 15 percent say they feel worse after vaccination - and the rest report no noticeable change. A researcher at Yale found as many as 40 percent of those who get the vaccine report an improvement in their symptoms. Its causes still aren't fully understood, and neither are the reasons vaccinations appear to help some people and not others. Fatigue and gastrointestinal distress are other common symptoms.ĬOVID-19 was a new and little-understood disease for much of 2020 it wasn't until months into the pandemic that post-acute COVID-19 syndrome was named or recognized by doctors. Many patients report a persistent loss of smell and taste as well as tachycardia, or a sudden racing heart rate. Some people experience "brain fog" or depression in extreme cases previously stable patients even had paranoia or psychosis. "I'm hoping maybe it will just finally subside and go away," Burbank, 61, of Lodi, said in an interview last month, the day after she got her second vaccine dose. Still, after months of frustration and confusion around the new chronic condition, many who deal with it are finding hope that vaccines can be the beginning of the end of their long hauls. Researchers say it's too soon to draw any firm conclusions, and early surveys suggest only some people with post-acute COVID-19 syndrome see improvement after vaccination. In recent months, Burbank and thousands of other "long-haul" COVID-19 sufferers have been buoyed by early indications that getting vaccinated can trigger improvements in their conditions. For her, that has meant persistent fatigue, intermittent loss of taste and smell, and an odd numbness and tingling in her right hand. 22.Īfter that, she became one of the roughly one-third of patients for whom some symptoms of the disease don't go away. She spent weeks in the hospital, and then on oxygen at home after she was released Dec. ![]() What started as a tickle in her throat ended up flattening her. Dixie Burbank got COVID-19 in December after she was exposed at her job. ![]()
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