Partly True: COVID-19 survivors are likely to experience issues with their mental health.

A third of COVID-19 patients have experienced psychiatric issues, but more research is needed to confirm its specific effects on mental health. A large-scale retrospective study published in The Lancet Psychiatry journal found that one in every three people diagnosed with COVID-19 suffered from neurological and psychiatric disorders within 6 months of contracting the infectious disease. To arrive at this finding, researchers from the University of Oxford analyzed anonymized electronic health records retrieved from the U.S. based TriNetX network. They analyzed records of over 236,379 patients with COVID-19 and compared them with the health records of patients who had influenza and other respiratory tract infections including influenza. The patients were all over ten years of age and were infected with COVID-19 on or after 20 January 2020. The researchers analyzed 14 different psychological and neurological outcomes among patients including dementia, psychotic, mood or anxiety disorders, Parkinson’s disease, among others. The study excluded those who had received the diagnosis before contracting COVID-19. The authors of the study found that overall 33.62% of patients diagnosed with COVID-19 developed a neurological or mental health disorder within six months of being infected with COVD-189. Furthermore, they found that patients who had a severe COVID-19 had a much higher incidence of being diagnosed with neurological or mental disorders. COVID-19 patients who were hospitalized had a 38.73% incidence rate, those admitted in intensive care had a 46.42% incidence rate, and those who suffered from delirium and related conditions (encephalopathy ) had a 62.34 incidence rate. The most common diagnoses included anxiety disorders (17.39% of the patients), mood disorders (13.66%), substance misuse disorders (6.58%), and insomnia (5.42%). The incidence of neurological disorders was much lower. The study found that most of the psychological and neurological outcomes analyzed were more common among patients diagnosed with COVID-19 compared with patients who had influenza and other respiratory tract infections. The findings of the study also highlighted the need for enhanced neurological follow-up of patients who were admitted to intensive care or had delirium and related conditions during their COVID-19 illness. That said, the authors acknowledged that large scale, robust, and longer term data is needed to properly identify and quantify the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health. They stated that such information will be beneficial in order to plan services and identify research priorities. In view of the above, it is clear that there is an increased risk of being diagnosed with a neurological or mental health issue following COVID-19. However, Bloomberg has reported that more in-depth research is needed on the neurological risks, and resources are needed to address the full range of implications. It added that Oxford researchers stressed that external factors, such as job loss and loneliness brought on by the pandemic could contribute to poor mental health, and that more research was needed before the implications of COVID-19 could be understood. As we do not yet know that the COVID-19 virus is directly contributing to mental health issues, we have rated the claim partly true. The COVID-19 pandemic has given rise to a lot of potentially dangerous misinformation. For reliable advice on COVID-19 including symptoms, prevention and available treatment, please refer to the World Health Organisation or your national healthcare authority.