Study: Whether It Is Treated Or Not, Covid Symptoms Can Ease And Then Rebound
Nikki Attkisson | Last Updated : November 2, 2022A new medical report published in the online JAMA Network open Journal finds that Covid symptoms can make a rebound after the patients feel completely ok. According to Dr. Davey Smith, Head of the Division of Infectious Diseases and Global Public Health at the University of California, this sort of rebound is quite normal in people as one in three are experiencing this sort of phenomenon without the intervention of any medicine.
The Paxlovid rebound is a similar phenomenon in which the symptoms of Covid return after taking the antiviral and the patients to feel better. President Joe Biden also faced a Paxlovid rebound in late July this year.
According to the clinical trials done by Pfizer, Paxlovid is 89 percent effective in preventing severe symptoms of Covid, especially for people who are having pre-existing conditions and people who are older with weak immunity.
Covid Symptoms Can Subside And Then Rebound Regardless Of Treatment
Smith says that in most cases of Paxlovid rebound, it is observed that the medication is only taken for 5 days. This would temporarily inhibit the virus from spreading in the body but as soon as the medication is stopped, the virus strikes back.
So it is possible that using the Paxlovid medication for more than 5 days may inhibit the virus from spreading further but there is no clinical data to back this alternative as of now. So it is not advised to continue the medicine for more days than what was prescribed by your healthcare expert as there can be serious side effects to this.
During the study, 158 Covid patients were enrolled who did not have any severe complications due to Covid. They weren’t given any sort of treatment for 4 weeks and the researchers checked for 13 Covid symptoms like coughing, sore throats, headaches, body and muscle pains, fever, nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, chills, and fatigue.
At the end of the tracking period, about 5 percent of them ended up in the hospital. But for the other 85 percent of participants who didn’t go through any treatment, it should be noted that the rebound symptoms were less severe than the initial symptoms, according to the result of the study.
Smith however warned that this rebound phenomenon is different from that of the conditions caused by Long Covid, as this was studied in the short term for a period of just 29 days after contracting Covid. So according to Smith and his fellow researchers, people shouldn’t be so scared about the return of symptoms even after they feel better for some days.
But this also doesn’t mean they should not seek medical assistance, especially people having pre-existing conditions as they are at a higher risk of Covid complications.
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John Donnelly, a research investigator at the Department of learning health sciences, University of Michigan stated that people need not be alarmed by the results of this study as most of the people who contract Covid and go through treatment or not, the rebound symptoms seem to be mild.
Donnelly said that the reasons for such recurrence are not yet clear and it needs further research to find the exact explanation. But he definitely discusses the possibility of the Covid infection having a non-linear pattern of illness that can create symptoms at different points of time after the initial infection.
Currently, the US is facing a “tripledemic” threat as multiple viral infections like Covid, Respiratory Synciatic Virus (RSV) and Common Flu are putting more and more Americans in the hospital. The pressure on the US healthcare sector has also increased because of the rapid increase in the number of patients and also because of the mass exodus of healthcare professionals into other jobs.
References:
🔵National Library Of Medicine (n.d) Clinical recurrences of COVID-19 symptoms after recovery: Viral relapse, reinfection or inflammatory rebound? (Available On):https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7326402/
🔵Science Direct (n.d) COVID-19 reinfection: prolonged shedding or true reinfection? (Available On):https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2052297520301645
With over 15 years as a practicing journalist, Nikki Attkisson found herself at Powdersville Post now after working at several other publications. She is an award-winning journalist with an entrepreneurial spirit and worked as a journalist covering technology, innovation, environmental issues, politics, health etc. Nikki Attkisson has also worked on product development, content strategy, and editorial management for numerous media companies. She began her career at local news stations and worked as a reporter in national newspapers.