- A recent University of Utah Health study finds COVID-19 increases chronic fatigue syndrome risk by eightfold.
- Research director Suzanne D. Vernon urges healthcare providers to address this condition post-COVID-19.
- Chronic fatigue syndrome cases have surged, with nearly 90% linked to symptomatic long COVID.
SALT LAKE CITY — The virus associated with COVID-19 increases the risk of chronic fatigue syndrome by almost eight times, according to a study recently completed by University of Utah Health.
The study used information from the National Institute of Health’s Researching COVID to Enhance Recovery Initiative, which has 11,785 patents who were infected with COVID-19 and 1,439 who were not. Of those, 4.5% of those infected with COVID-19 developed myalgic encephalomyelitis, also known as chronic fatigue syndrome, where only 0.6% of those who were not infected with COVID-19 developed the disease.
Suzanne D. Vernon, research director at the Bateman Horne Center and lead author of the study, encouraged urgent action based on those results…