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Comment by deegles | Hacker News Reader

46 pointsdeegles7 comments

This happens a lot with the flu, also.

For example, here's a paper going over heart inflamation and the flu, going over data gathered in the last 100 years [0].

Here's one of many references to myocarditis, this one happens to be from mild cases of the flu:

> During the Sheffield, England influenza epidemic from 1972 to 1973, the cases of 50 consecutive patients who were initially diagnosed as mild cases and were treated on an outpatient basis were followed. Transient electrocardiogram (ECG) changes were seen in 18 patients, and long-lasting changes were seen in 5 patients.

The paper is full of other examples. I didn't know this as common as it appears to be.

[0] http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.685...

Nearly every click-baity article I read about covid 19 symptoms also seems to apply largely to the seasonal flu. What I'm learning is that the flu is a lot more dangerous than I thought.

Flu is very dangerous. I have two friends: one who suffered kidney failure and is on dialysis and the other with myocarditis that caused arrhythmia which transformed healthy marathon runner into miserable man barely has energy to leave his home.

When people think flu they usually "oh, that's a bigger cold". No, it isn't. It's serious condition and you need a lot of rest after that. There are many complications that can be had and a lot of them will go undiagnosed or misdiagnosed (who does the CT scan after they had flu?)

That's where the resistance came when people said that Covid is like flu. It's not like "Covid is like a common cold". It was more like "Covid is a serious disease that you need to be aware of, that can leave your organism devastated, but ultimately that's a pathogen that most of you are going to live through, just as flu".

This isn't a bad take-away, but should probably be combined as "the flu is more dangerous then you think, and COVID is more dangerous than the flu"

They cite their sources! Many of the points they make are based on case studies, and some appear to be misinterpreted. But importantly, they cite their sources so we actually look at the science, and as such are a shining example of what good science journalism looks like.

That said, I think they accidentally omitted a couple words or edited something in a way that it no longer makes sense:

> According to some reports, as many as 7 percent of deaths from COVID-19 may result from myocarditis. (Others feel that estimate is too high.) The arrhythmia that sometimes accompanies it is also worrisome, and researchers have found that to be fairly common among COVID-19 patients. In J.N.’s case, he noticed his heart racing on several occasions into the 130 beats per minute range. And while the prevalence of this in virus patients is not known exactly, a study found that ventricular arrhythmias occurred in 78 percent of patients without COVID-19, with up to 30 percent of them experiencing serious arrhythmias 27 months later.

I think that latter sentence was based on "Peretto et al32 reported in a recent study that 78.7% of myocarditis patients exhibited some form of ventricular arrhythmia" from Siripanthong et al[1]. "78% of patients with myocarditis present with arrhythmias" makes a lot more sense than "78% of patients without COVID-19 experience arrhythmias".

Still, I think it's important to note, once more, that this is science journalism that actually cites and links to its sources, and as such should be encouraged.

[1] https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7199677/#bib32 -- yes they're citing a researcher citing something else, but the Peretto et al study appears not to be available without a paywall so that's understandable

It's important to note that the German study they cite ("78 percent of recovered COVID-19 patients...") has been largely debunked.

There were a number of statistical problems with the original paper, and the authors completely changed the reported metrics. The claimed effect was so greatly diminished that it now appears to be statistically insignificant when compared to the control group:

https://mobile.twitter.com/ProfDFrancis/status/1298514453642...

The author/editor is completely irresponsible with the use of the word "can" in the title, and the immediate next line walks it back with "raises concerns". This is what tabloid magazines do. Disappointed that its coming from a magazine with the word science in their name.

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