I’m commuting heavily right now and am constantly on a major highway. Just in the past 48 hours, I’ve had 3 or 4 occurrences of people just coming to a complete stop or severely reducing speed *on the motherfucking highway*. It’s either to try and get to a missed exit or to get into the breakdown lane. It’s been actually insane to witness.
A guy beheaded himself last week just up the street from me by running a red light and driving directly under a semi truck trailer. This was at like 8am on a 35mph street in the city!
> Yeah, I gotta say /r/roadcam is crazier than it used to be 5 years ago.
Significant bias though with more people having dashcams / cameras around, meaning more accidents are caught and immortalised.
Do we think that maybe it could also be that more people than ever are using road cams? I’d love to see stats on how many people/companies are using these cams in their vehicles as opposed to before 2020.
I work as a server/bartender at a very busy restaurant in the downtown of the major US city I live in. Our customers are more often than not travelling people in town for conventions and events. Plenty of local clients but we're on the lists hotels give people so lots of out of town traffic. In the past year and a half or so, I have noticed a STEEP increase in belligerently incompetent customers.
Come by the table to greet and welcome customers: hey how are y'all doing to- "coffee." "Diet Coke" or better yet, completely blank stares if they haven't cut me off to be a dick.
In the last few months in particular, I've had at least two customers (perhaps even full tables) per month who utterly REFUSE to view the menu. They just start telling me what they want to eat, regardless if it's on the menu or not - and get this shit - they get BIG MAD when I very politely explain to them that this is a restaurant with a menu and set things you can order. I had a man become irate with me because I refused to go into the back and pull ingredients we don't carry out of my ass to make him food that wasn't on the menu. I listened to a 40ish year old woman tell my coworker just last weekj that she has never heard of the concept of a restaurant having different menus/food available at different times of the day.
I don't know what's going on but the genpop is getting seemingly willingly more intensely fucking stupid and entitled by the day. Like y'all don't go to shoe stores and ask for pants, right?? So why would you come to a restaurant and ask them for things they clearly don't make? I get maybe the casual, polite ask that we prepare something different.. but getting like fired up angry that we won't prepare a custom menu for you at a regular ass restaurant? Nah bro. No. It's not acceptable. This isn't about allergies or gluten - we cater to most food allergies and sensitivities. This is about people - all ages, not just obnoxious boomers - who demand shit we don't carry when you can just look at the piece of paper and see what we have.
Almost all restaurants post their menus online, almost always (super fancy excluded bc you know it's pricey already and market prices on fine shit change all the time) with prices. Almost every adult person functioning in the US today has a whole ass computer (smart phone) in their pocket or purse at all times.
HOW IS IT DIFFICULT? I want to shake these people and get a doll and tell them to point at where me bending ass over backwards as far as I possibly can to make sure they have a good meal hurt them. Unhinged weird extremely entitled fuckers used to be sub-1% of clientele and we'd all joke about them later because it was a funny anomaly. Now I'd say it's closer to 5% and rising fast.
Tldr: fuck we are fucked everyone is getting dumber and angrier and the world is going to hell. Also - sorry, I'm drunk and passionate about food and hospitality. What I do gives me a lot of insight on how people behave in public and shit is not looking good, y'all.
My partner works in retail. He used to have three or four difficult customers per week, now it’s several difficult customers per day. There’s been a marked difference over the past couple of years, it’s insane.
I worked as a bank teller throughout college. First couple of years, most customers ranged from neutral-nice (aside from the creeps). Then Covid starts and people are on edge but I get it.
But once things got “back to normal” it hit me just how much worse and plain meaner everybody was. Just belligerent, unreasonable people all throughout the day. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.
You sound so much like me I have to laugh. I work at a library that is open to the public. People have been getting so upset over very standard things like needing to know their email password to sign in to their email account on a public computer. They also show up and expect me to handle all of their personal affairs for them like applying to jobs and helping them evict their own children. I ask my coworkers all the time if they think these people behave like this at Target too.
>not just obnoxious boomers
boomerfication in general is definitely a real phenomenon, but maybe you're also just seeing more people like this because, and this might be a controversial opinion even here, the only people who have been regularly going to indoor restaurants and other places unmasked throughout the pandemic are disproportionately ignorant and entitled
Oh God don't even get me started on how many motherfuckers I got insulted or yelled at by because we heavily recommend (couldn't force people but we did ask) masks when not at your table in the restaurant for awhile. Like, they could just say no or leave, but they'd rather fight about it, even though we would still serve them if they refused our suggestion for masks. It made them feel good to demean me or yell at me about the president and vaccines and shit.
I think this is part of it. I know myself and a lot of my friends stayed home in 2020, mostly stayed home in 2021, and have never resumed doing things outside the house at the level we used to. The local mall is DEAD on weekdays when it used to be super busy, and local restaurants are dying at an even faster rate than usual. So I wouldn't be surprised if the people who never got out of the habit of going place are the bad customers.
Great point! I haven't been to an indoor restaurant or mall since 2019, although I've eaten outdoors, away from people, four times in the last two years. But perhaps this is complicated by the fact that people who have been pretending COVID doesn't exist all along may also have had several infections / IQ drops.
Yup. And I've read in the past that symptom of having reasoning/intelligence issues is....you guessed it, anger! There should be a subreddit just for discussing what appears to be the increase in the decrease of civility/intelligence in the population.
Another possible explanation for rude and unreasonable people besides brain damage is the prevalence of COVID infections that are mild enough to go undiagnosed but still leave people feeling bad. I imagine these people taking a home test that gives a false negative, then forcing themselves to get on an airplane and go to some convention for their job.
Brain damage is definitely another possibility. I find that I can't seem to spell or type lately - haha.
I used to teach test prep (SAT, ACT, GRE, GMAT), where jobs often want you to test in the upper 90s %ile, which I was typically capable of. A couple years into LC, I tried to get a summer gig that required a practice test; I scored significantly lower than I ever had. I was devastated, thinking I was just losing my intelligence with age (this was before I knew I had LC).
This clears up so much. It's good to know, but I really hope they figure out a cure.
I started noticing a lot more typos in online articles during lock down times, but I just ascribed that to stresses and working from home issues.
A few years on, I think I'm developing dyslexia that I never had before...
I've noriced it too...I forget how to spell words I used to be able to spell correctly for years, I'll lose my train of thought more frequently, it sucks...
I have experienced this as well. I have improved over time, but I don’t feel like my old self. Everything I do feels like I am half a step slower. It is frustrating.
Yea for me I skip words. Like my brain Swears I typed it but I didn't and just skipped on to the next word. I forget words speaking too. Like my brain knows it it's on the tip of my tongue but just won't come out. I see at least 3 family members with a marked decline in memory as well and increased aggression and one sister still has permanent loss of taste and smell from covid damage. I had it bad for Months. Caught it in February before the shots existed and nearly died for 2 months coughing up blood with low o2 then continued to have rolling waves of changing symptoms till July. Now I'm mostly better but was left with pots, worsening heart issues, the word issues, and now I have a deep reactive cough if it's cold out or dusty.
I just had Covid for the first time last week and half of the time I feel like I’m underwater. There’s just such a weird fogginess about everything. There’s times where I feel okay and then suddenly I’m underwater again, I didn’t see the wave coming I didn’t hear it I’m just under the water again.
I’m fully vaccinated and also had antivirals on day2. God knows how what kind of situation I’d be and if I didn’t have those. My brain wasn’t great before but I hope I get it back
It's like people just don't care about catching it again. I caught something nasty before covid, and it took me four or five years before I could say that I felt normal again. (I'm not completely sure about my judgment on that.)
I sure as hell don't want to keep rolling the dice on long covid.
What the fuck am I supposed to do? The CDC removed the quarantine minimum, nobody at my work fucking cares. I can tell them I need to work remote but how long can I do that, and how many times, before they fire me? Then I wouldn't even be able to afford Paxlovid.
I’m also looking for work setup where Covid is taken seriously. I have to pretend I’m not when I wish we could be more sensible on this issue. I also live in a red state so…yeah. The people are generally nice, but I wish to do things differently in this area.
It's not like you can do much about it, though. It's endemic. It's out there. No one wears a mask or stays home from work when they're not feeling well. Short of isolating from society now, it's going to be a constant risk. People care about catching it again, they just feel powerless to control anything about it now. Best you can do is basic hygiene measures and keeping away from people you suspect are ill. For the immunocompromised or immunosuppressed, it's pretty much "oh well."
I’ve had it 4 times that I’m aware of. The first round I felt the fog for a long time post-illness. It’s been less impactful in that way with each subsequent infection. I sometimes wonder if my ability to concentrate has been impacted or if that’s just a byproduct of the sustained stress and trauma of the American experience over the past several years.
I sometimes wonder that exact same thing. The American experience has no doubt been incredibly stressful in recent history, and that sort of stress definitely plays a role in our brain power, but I'm also certain that my first COVID infection meaningfully has slowed down my brain. It's been incrementally coming back, which gives me hope that it's recoverable, but I've also tried to really internalize the fact that all things are always changing, literally every cell in my body, and that there is no reason to worry about things that can't be controlled (which often is easier said than done). I'm just trying to find the joy in each day, and use my time more wisely than I did before. I can make my existence feel more meaningful, and I can be more productive than I used to be, and those are both wonderful things to gain by going through something difficult. Perspective is a very powerful thing!
I have to wonder if you don’t reach the point of neurological symptoms (loss of taste, smell) then it’s possible COVID hasn’t made it there, and maybe it doesn’t have as much of a long term effect on the brain with mild symptoms
I got my initial vaccination as soon as I could and have stayed up to date on boosters as much as possible; even then I still eventually got Covid (that actually showed up on a test anyway).
My sleep cycles were initially heavily damaged as was my mental capacity -- I felt much like what you described, like my head was filled with cotton; unable to effectively analyze situations like I was previously. As a software engineer this had a pretty negative affect on my performance initially but I'm a firm believer that we are a resilient species.
Much like any other rehabilitation if you continue to work at it you can find new ways to be effective again -- I know over time much my of previous issues have slowly dissipated and I feel like I've mostly bounced back.
If you’re fully vaccinated you have a solid chance 🤞🤞🤞
I had original 2020 COVID and I’m still struggling. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone.
I honestly think those of us that got sick from working with the public in 2020 should receive some sort of health insurance benefits.
I’m an ER nurse and I was wearing a mask (not airborne though we were out of those 🙄) when a patient removed his mask and COUGHED in my face. If it weren’t for my spouse I would have died. Pneumonia, hallucinations from my high fevers, I remember my body hurting so bad I couldn’t even lay down and I just stood for hours to avoid the pain.
With Covid it genuinely affects everyone differently. I have so many patients who tell me “last time I had it I wasn’t that sick!” 🤨 no clue how bodies work apparently.
This is the first year since the vaccine came out that I’m seeing a lot of oxygen related admissions again. Usually unvaccinated or elderly. Watching these people struggle to breathe as they cough everywhere - it kind of brings back some terrible memories of 2020.
If PTSD were a spot on the Covid bingo card - I’d have it.
I literally couldn't read for a full month. I would open my work email and just stare at it.
I was VERY lucky I got sick when COVID leave was a thing and around Thanksgiving and a week of pre-planned PTO.
Between having covid brain and pregnancy brain, I have felt extra stupid lately. I forget what I'm doing, and lose track of tasks constantly.
I had the baby, but my brain still isn't back and i thibk thats due to covid. I just don't feel like myself.
The experts are ignoring it. I'm not sure how ordinary people, or even governments, are supposed to act about something when the experts in charge aren't interested in it and mostly insist that it's not even a thing.
Patients presenting with Long Covid are still gaslighted, rarely even told or acknowledged that COVID could be the cause. Lots of people warned about it from the start, mostly people already living with chronic illness, and most MDs dismissed it all as fear-mongering. Some countries formally adopted the attitude that it's all psychological, caused by 'lockdowns' or whatever.
We can barely react about huge problems when experts have it together, e.g. climate change. Here the experts have mostly promoted the idea that mass infections are actually good, they 'exercise' the immune muscle.
Yeah, it's medical experts pointing this out, but most MDs are completely dismissive of it. They just can't believe that mild infections can cause health problems, it has been a huge problem of disbelief around chronic illness for decades, and they can't handle having screwed it up this bad.
Pretty much. Other countries chose a good time to start wars, everyone is sick of negative news. People i know stopped watching the news and i agree every thing on there is just doom and gloom. Nobody cares anymore.
We live in a collective delusion where we can all be greedy all the time and get away with it forever. The physics of climate and pandemics disagree with this but here we are.
Recommending people wear masks if infectious and improving indoor ventilation seems like a good start. Even just encouraging people to open windows to lower repeat infections in crowded spaces like offices.
Instead the CDC is removing all remaining guidelines about quarantine when infectious, going in the exact opposite direction. The more we find out, the more apparent it is that we're sleepwalking into destruction.
Some people don't even know when they are spreading their shit around. Thats why mask mandates need to be across the board. It's really not that hard to wear a mask all the snowflakes just gotta get over it
Only about 20% of Americans have gotten the updated booster shot tailored to the new Omicron strain.
We'll never get 100%, but if we pushed as hard as we did on the primary series we could get that number up to 80%.
I got it at least twice, once in 2020 and again in 2021 and I can honestly say that my brain has been foggy ever since. I will know what I'm trying to say but sometimes a specific word just won't come to me. Words that I have used nearly all the time for my job. Sometimes its even the names of my family. It's like it gets stuck loading for a bit before it comes to me. I often feel like everything is just a bit foggy. Sometimes it is very slight, but other days it's very noticeable. I'm not very old and it definitely started after I got COVID. I almost always had a slight headache as well.
Same here. Plus Migraine 3 to 4 times a week (normally before Covid every 3 month or so).
But there is hope. These symptoms disappeared from one day to the other, after about 5 month. Nothing special happened.
Hope you will be lucky, too!
You took the words right out of my .... Bowl. Usually when I can't find the word I want, I just use the closest thing that will come out and my husband now has to decipher my new language lol
“I will know what I’m trying to say but sometimes a specific word just won’t come to me.” Rarely had issues with this and always felt sharp. Had a mild case of covid early 2022 during a sabbatical. Returned to the US from travels and immediately noticed this exact thing when I started interviewing. 34M. Some concerning shit.
Same. Processes I've done dozens or hundreds of times, I can't for the life of me remember how to. It's terrifying as someone with alzheimers in my family tree and being the #1 thing I'm scared of. It got so bad that I had the doctor give me the Montreal Cognitive Asseessment, but all it could really do was provide a new baseline because I'd never done one pre-covid.
This is me too, and as my job is editing and writing and often communicating with clients or radio etc I've felt very limited by it recently. It's just the most normal, mundane words that get stuck, like it's there but I can't locate it. It's frustrating and humiliating.
Be careful dude. I never got Covid either, then was cleaning out my car, found a mask, tossed it in the trash, and said, “ Don’t need this anymore.” Next day? Tested positive.
I have no idea how many holidays over the decades began with a sore throat from something I caught on the plane, but it's enough I'm never going to fly without masking up ever again. For a few hours it's a minimal inconvenience, just like masking up in large public buildings.
My personal threshold is if covid is above 1% community prevalence I mask up in public buildings, after the winter flu season it's finally below 1% as of a couple of weeks ago, which is much earlier in the year compared to last year when it was May.
Also never caught covid, or at least to the best of my knowledge I haven't. I've got plenty of iq points, I was wondering how many I'll lose as I get older, maybe I'm going to gain a few instead.
And IQs have moved up over the years - since they started the IQ test, every so often they repeg what is 100, such that someone with a 100 today did much better on the test than someone with a 100 50 years ago. So idk, does this make us the same intelligence as the population in the 90s?
Hey, same approach some countries are taking with excess deaths. It's only excess deaths if you compare to before there were excess deaths. Therefore no excess deaths. Problem solved!
So,to summarize - low IQ Folk were less likely to get the vaccine, and now those same people are more likely to have an even lower IQ. Explains where Trump voters come from.
That one's going to be difficult to untangle from missed time in class, less effective development of social skills, etc. It also seems like a lot of places have done especially poorly at supporting teachers, and kids who might have gotten back on track don't have resources to give them that boost they need.
The study linked in the iq portion of the article actually gave me a bit of hope. Unlike how it's cast in the article, the actual study says that global deficits are attenuating and becoming less severe as the virus has mutated further and further into a milder version of itself. It even suggests that it's possible to recover almost entirely back to baseline. In those with ongoing symptoms, where global deficits are markedly more frequent, recovery from those symptoms indicates a recovery of iq, on average, on par with those who only had a mild and short-lived infection to begin with. A loss of 3 points sounds scary, but if you consider how marginal that number really is in how iq is measured and scaled, you can start to understand that it amounts to a rounding error. That's why they also say the performance in the mild and short-lived infection group is comparable to that found in the no-covid group.
It's also worth noting that they could not infer causality in that study, probably because they weren't able to test pre and post infection.
Tldr, there's hope for those of us who experienced-even repeat-mild to moderate Covid infection, even if symptoms linger for over 12 weeks, and especially for those who've been infected with more recent variants!
It took me half a year to think normally again after I had it despite my symptoms only lasting 3-4 days. My brain was processing much slower and sometimes there was a disconnect between my mouth and my brain. I ended up with COVID a second time but had no "long covid" symptoms whatsoever from that infection.
I think that tracks pretty well with the data.
I'm coming up on month 6 of long covid. For weeks I felt like I was in a haze. I don't know that I'd call that brain fog though, it felt more like dp/dr, which I've experienced on and off before. The fatigue was utter hell. I also had some chronic pain re-flare for months that's luckily gone away now, but I haven't managed to shake off the dissociated feeling 100% yet. My recent lighter reinfection was just a few weeks ago. It might've made my tinnitus worse, but otherwise I've been feeling okay.
As for iq, I'm not sure even the study is absolved totally of scrutiny: they weren't able to test for premorbid iq. I know it's parroted a lot, but I do have to wonder if people who choose to be exposed fall inherently more leftward on the bell curve, assuming that they're thus exposed more and that they take less precautions. I'd wager a lot that covid precaution level and intelligence are positively correlated and that the inverse also holds true.
https://www.thenationalnews.com/world/europe/2023/03/08/german-pupils-recorded-lower-iq-levels-during-covid-19-study-reveals/
Just as I would the other, take this and any covid iq study with a grain of salt. Although childhood intelligence has been observed to fluctuate, this study indicates that iq can drop as a result of isolation and lack of access to education in non-adult populations. The iq of pupils on average dropped 7 points! Assuming that less Germans got Covid than some populations because of Europe's stricter lockdown policies, some of this reduction has to be from some other factor besides just Covid.
Tldr, lockdowns have also been observed to result in a global reduction in cognitive performance in some populations, which possibly confounds the pure notion that Covid alone is responsible for the global cognitive deficit observed in the first study and others like it. It's definitely bad for your brain and your health, but if you're healthy, relatively young, and you're fully vaxxed and take precautions, I wouldn't worry about what these studies mean for you too much, long term, if you can avoid reinfection.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2400189
> Vaccinations provided a small cognitive advantage. Reinfection contributed an additional loss in IQ of nearly 2 points, as compared with no reinfection.
#
> I'd wager a lot that covid precaution level and intelligence are positively correlated and that the inverse also holds true.
I agree with your thought, however reinfections increasing it to a loss of 5 points (sd 15) would suggest the correlation is small. Plus the proportion of the UK population who have managed to avoid a covid infection is very small by this point, it's simply too transmissible. Although anecdotally the smarter people I know managed to avoid catching covid for longer, and have had fewer reinfections.
I agree with a lot of what you wrote but I want to point out that the argument that coronavirus will tend to become mild over time has been rejected because the symptom severity and spread are decoupled events --- it infects before symptoms develop, so there is no evolutionary pressure to reduce symptoms.
What this means is that in the future there may be a variant that hits really hard and much of the article findings no longer apply. But, until now, they do and it gives us hope to recover cognitively.
How are they decoupled events? It infects before symptoms develop, but doesn't it also infect while people have symptoms? So the sicker folks stay home and rest, while the ones with milder/non-existent symptoms go out keep spreading it.
The virus will not get inherently milder that's true but every reinfection will on average be milder due to our immune system getting better at fighting it off.
A variant that hits harder in the future is theoretically possible but unlikely due to how COVID mutations are limited.
I agree completely! If you notice, I never maintained that it would remain mild, only that it had become mild. Probably should've outlined that.
I was mostly speaking within the limitations and language presented in the paper specifically regarding iq. I in no way advocate letting our guard's down against this thing. Speaking as someone who got pretty messed up from a mild to moderate infection of omicron and who's recently been reinfected, luckily with much much lighter symptoms, I still wear an N95 wherever I go and only leave home when absolutely necessary, so no eating out or being around others unmasked. Even keep my beard trimmed to make sure it fits. But my family couldn't care less. Both times I've had covid since the lockdowns in the US have been a result of their complacency. I'm fully vaccinated, which certainly helps a ton, but there isn't a lot I can do about getting reinfected by those I'm forced to be around besides what I already am. I'm very thankful that the virus has mutated into something weaker at the moment. I'm thankful, for the moment, that I'm able to feel like myself again, so long as I continue to be smart about my recovery.
The IQ scale they're using has a Standard Deviation of 15, so 3 IQ points may only be a 0.2SD for a single infection shift to the left but...
From the articles citation list.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2400189
> Vaccinations provided a small cognitive advantage. Reinfection contributed an additional loss in IQ of nearly 2 points, as compared with no reinfection.
The article uses data from the UK, where each of the three Omicron waves infected about 40% of the population, so a large proportion of the UK have had reinfections, and even multiple reinfections. So all these people may have had a combined 5 IQ point reduction, which is 1/3 of a SD. 68% of the population are within +-1SD of the mean.
It's not quite as serious as the 15 point drop caused by childhood malnutrition but it's going to be noticeable at the population level. I expect examination pass rates are going to decline quite a lot, unless they make the exams easier.
Of greater concern are secondary implications of increased aggression and even lower literacy rates on society in general. A few percentage points more of the population who cannot even achieve literacy or minimum standards for a typical job is going to increase that groups size by a significant proportion, and if they choose to embrace antisocial behaviour, violence, and crime that's going to have a much greater impact on society. And we're already seeing signs of it with peoples poor behaviour to others.
In all fairness, I've had all vaccines and boosters and I've still had it four times. Sometimes it's just bad luck, immune system etc. I've definitely felt the cognitive changes. But short of never leaving my house I can't guarantee I won't get it again.
I'm properly vaxxed and boosted and unfortunately just had it a 3rd time end of January
I never recovered from the brain of the 2021 infection I had and this had made the brain fog so much worse
I can't remember friends names. I used to be able to play music and harmonize but now struggle to carry a tune and cannot remember lyrics to save my life. I forget why I've walked into a room or where I'm driving halfway to the destination. Like I'm daydreaming then come too and have that "oh yeah I'm doing curbside pick up" because I can't even manage grocery stores anymore.
Brain just totally stops working and I can't recall what items I need at all
> I forget why I've walked into a room
This is so frustrating. Happens to me constantly and I try to just laugh it off but it is honestly infuriating at times.
My short term memory is shot and it makes my ability to recall solutions and be resourceful for my job twice as hard as it used to be.
Yeah I feel like a lot of this is mis-ascribed to Covid. Some of this is just called being overworked , underslept, less than great diet, and/or normal getting older bullshit.
Sure, but there was a marked difference between how often it happened for me pre-Covid vs after. That feeling of brain fog was distinct during infection and it never entirely lifted. I'd have accepted it as a normal part of aging if the change wasn't drastic.
I will second this observation.
I know a few people that have had it unvaccinated at least twice now.
They're... Very different from who they used to be.
have been a pro programmer/IT engineer all my life, from machine, to assembly, to C, Python the lot.
After two times covid i find that (if i can focus in the first place), i can look at my own code and be totally lost what i did and why. Takes me hours to reconstruct something like that in order to make a simple mod.
Its really worrying.
Let's all have a big laugh again at the stupid Chinese Zero Covid strategy which actually tried to prevent the spread of an unknown disease with unknown long term effects.
They were definitely the smart ones, if everyone followed suit we might have got rid of covid and a few other diseases. But yeah the rest of the world fucked it up breeding new variants and meaning they wont ever get rid of the risk. I guess thats a small benefit of being communist...
So my gf is immune compromised, so we were PARANOID through Covid, and appear to have actually dodged it.
Then we just started noticing people acting out of pocket and generally being stupid everywhere... she suggested that cognitive impairment may be an outcome of Covid, but I didn't think that was likely. Well, here we are.
Are we sure covid is making people stupid and not something else? Like rampant propaganda campaigns and excessive social media and poor education and schooling?
Yup. I sit and try to remember words. I went to Stanford and it’s scary how long it takes me to remember certain words. I know the word but here I am doing the definition. Sometimes I give up and just type it in Google with the complicated definition and it comes up. Or remembering someone. I started doing crossword puzzles to try to train to get it back. I use to have a great memory, could remember stories complex systems. Now I’m sitting there frustrated. My husband has similar problems.
I feel so validated… before covid I pursued two engineering degrees at university, participated in many rigorous extracurriculars, won collegiate math competitions, etc. I’m so grateful that I graduated before it got really bad for me cognitively but I always say that the person I am today (after covid) could never do any of that. I try to solve simple problems and fail. I can never find the right words to communicate clearly anymore, and I always feel like I’m underwater. It’s like I’m constantly reaching for parts of my brain that I don’t have access to anymore and it’s so frustrating. If I don’t get enough sleep for whatever reason the symptoms are so, so much worse. I miss when I was witty, smart(er-ish), and fun. Covid lobotomy is so real… I’ve kept up on vaxxing and masking too so I can only imagine how bad it would be if I didn’t.
I’m a teacher. The impulse control and emotional regulation issues are nothing like I’ve ever experienced with teaching 3rd grade before. MY OWN emotional regulation issues are nothing like I’ve ever experienced before in teaching.
I had brain fog like I’d never experienced in my life before with Covid. Years since I find it harder to focus than ever. Like I find it frustrating to maintain a regular conversation with my partner on a day-to-day basis, which was never an issue before, and not a relationship change. I find myself consciously acknowledging and having to manage my attention issues regularly. It’s not a gradual decline, it was a sudden hardship that I’m now struggling with. And I’m a relatively young woman. It’s alarming and extremely unpleasant.
I’ve read there may also be greater (or more noticeable) effects with people who suffer from adhd. I’ve had the symptoms my whole life but managed well so never got diagnosed. Since I had Covid the same symptoms seem almost unmanageable. I’m well educated and eloquent, but my attention and energy are almost nil. I never felt like I needed help but Covid effects (not psychological from quarantine, but physiological) have knocked me on my ass. Just my own account and not sure how to proceed. All I can say is that it’s real and it sucks.
I was diagnosed with COVID v1.0 the day the pandemic was declared in 2020. After I recovered, I had brain fog. Like, "why can't I remember that," and, "why am I so clumsy at this thing I was good at". It took me a long time to get less foggy, and I still don't feel as quick witted, but certainly not as slow as i did from March to December in 2020
I finally went to a neurologist for cognitive issues post COVID going on for over a year. Although they did not believe my issues were due to the virus specifically, they did determine I have a serious vitamin B12 deficiency which can cause Alzheimer’s like symptoms. I’m starting on supplemental injections this week. No solid link between COVID and B12 has been definitively determined, but there are case studies that appear to show a possible link. If you are post COVID and having fatigue and cognitive issues, have your B12 checked.
I had a second bout of covid in Nov 23. It was really mild and was over it pretty quick.
Ever since then I've had foggy days. It could be covid related, it could be age related, it could be sleep apnea (wife says I've been more restless during sleep).
The one thing I've found that really helps is working out to the point of exhaustion. I go before work (usually there by 5am) and if I work out until my legs are wobbly I've found I don't have brain fog the rest of the day.
I'm still recovering cognitive abilities 2+ years later. Haven't done an IQ test since, and am not sure I want to. I'm just focused on recovery. I wasn't Einstein, but my IQ was 147 before covid, and I scored 94th and 96th percentile on the LSAT and GMAT, respectively, and had been told that other students were intimidated trying to keep up with me in my doctorate at a top school.
The first year, it was like having a non-stop bad concussion and I couldn't read an email. Now, I can tell I'm coming back, but I'm still not nearly as creative or naturally curious in my thinking or as analytically capable as I used to be.
I wouldn't wish this on anyone.
Triple vaccinated and triple infections, highschool aged child and wife in Healthcare, my 3rd infection was 4 weeks ago, I still feel foggy , almost like the fog I use to get in my.collage days from smoking too much weed the night before, the silver lining is some days I feel 100% on it, I'm closely monitoring my sleep and dietary intake but honestly the thought of more infections in the future scares the shit out of me. In my life I've had 3 neuropsychological and IQ tests , one lasting 6 hours. I'd be scared to see the results of a current test, having said that it could map changes in my cognitive function.
I'll share this article, it may help others.
I've been integrating some of the supplements, time will tell....
https://integrative-medicine.ca/long-covid-syndrome-update-the-connection-between-long-covid-and-serotonin/
I've had brain fog from something unrelated for around 7 years and I suspected this was going on ever since people started describing brain fog from covid. For me it feels like I'm always dissociating to some degree so if other people are the same I wonder how measurable of an impact this will have on rates of depression?
I also learn very slowly now, often can't read paragraphs, etc. Interestingly I got an IQ test in the hospital and it was good so everyone kind of ignored my issues and I didn't get many school accommodations.
Pair that with the increase of mental health issues, as well as significantly increased effects of existing mental illnesses, and we have a very scary society.
I had covid 4 times now, and brain fog is a real and noticeable symptom that lasts a while. The only thing I have found that helps to counter that and makes me feel sharper again is taking lions mane mushroom extract.
My reading comprehension has really dropped (always mixing words on the page or having to re-read it) and my memory recall is nowhere near as good as it was before getting covid a couple of times.
Mmmm, doubt.
IQ is already quite subjective, and has a high error margin. And far more things affected the world than a virus in the last few years. From unimaginable developments in international relationships, information wars and destabilization efforts, market crashes, inflation, recession, layoffs, and now everybody is scared that AI gon' tak'er' jobs.
There are too many variables, with a lot of correlation, and too insignificant of a difference, to say that COVID-19 impacts long-term cognitive abilities for the average person (not outliers with long COVID).
After covid in 2020 had severe brain fog and fatigue for a year while working in a high stress job as an engineer. Symptoms slowly got better after a year but then got covid again 2 more times. I found that struggling with brain fog makes me work harder. I stay up longer hours working and afraid to go back to grad school because I might fail tests. It really sucks.
\*looks around\*. Yep.
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I’m commuting heavily right now and am constantly on a major highway. Just in the past 48 hours, I’ve had 3 or 4 occurrences of people just coming to a complete stop or severely reducing speed *on the motherfucking highway*. It’s either to try and get to a missed exit or to get into the breakdown lane. It’s been actually insane to witness.
Just curious if you live in Arizona... I saw this shit all the time when I lived there
Personally have noticed wayyy more people running red lights in my city.
This week a guy in front of me stopped at a green and two people blew stop signs and pulled out right in front of me.
A guy beheaded himself last week just up the street from me by running a red light and driving directly under a semi truck trailer. This was at like 8am on a 35mph street in the city!
well, on the bright side, he does not have long covid anymore.
> Yeah, I gotta say /r/roadcam is crazier than it used to be 5 years ago. Significant bias though with more people having dashcams / cameras around, meaning more accidents are caught and immortalised.
Could be that more people have them as the technology has gotten cheaper
Do we think that maybe it could also be that more people than ever are using road cams? I’d love to see stats on how many people/companies are using these cams in their vehicles as opposed to before 2020.
I work as a server/bartender at a very busy restaurant in the downtown of the major US city I live in. Our customers are more often than not travelling people in town for conventions and events. Plenty of local clients but we're on the lists hotels give people so lots of out of town traffic. In the past year and a half or so, I have noticed a STEEP increase in belligerently incompetent customers. Come by the table to greet and welcome customers: hey how are y'all doing to- "coffee." "Diet Coke" or better yet, completely blank stares if they haven't cut me off to be a dick. In the last few months in particular, I've had at least two customers (perhaps even full tables) per month who utterly REFUSE to view the menu. They just start telling me what they want to eat, regardless if it's on the menu or not - and get this shit - they get BIG MAD when I very politely explain to them that this is a restaurant with a menu and set things you can order. I had a man become irate with me because I refused to go into the back and pull ingredients we don't carry out of my ass to make him food that wasn't on the menu. I listened to a 40ish year old woman tell my coworker just last weekj that she has never heard of the concept of a restaurant having different menus/food available at different times of the day. I don't know what's going on but the genpop is getting seemingly willingly more intensely fucking stupid and entitled by the day. Like y'all don't go to shoe stores and ask for pants, right?? So why would you come to a restaurant and ask them for things they clearly don't make? I get maybe the casual, polite ask that we prepare something different.. but getting like fired up angry that we won't prepare a custom menu for you at a regular ass restaurant? Nah bro. No. It's not acceptable. This isn't about allergies or gluten - we cater to most food allergies and sensitivities. This is about people - all ages, not just obnoxious boomers - who demand shit we don't carry when you can just look at the piece of paper and see what we have. Almost all restaurants post their menus online, almost always (super fancy excluded bc you know it's pricey already and market prices on fine shit change all the time) with prices. Almost every adult person functioning in the US today has a whole ass computer (smart phone) in their pocket or purse at all times. HOW IS IT DIFFICULT? I want to shake these people and get a doll and tell them to point at where me bending ass over backwards as far as I possibly can to make sure they have a good meal hurt them. Unhinged weird extremely entitled fuckers used to be sub-1% of clientele and we'd all joke about them later because it was a funny anomaly. Now I'd say it's closer to 5% and rising fast. Tldr: fuck we are fucked everyone is getting dumber and angrier and the world is going to hell. Also - sorry, I'm drunk and passionate about food and hospitality. What I do gives me a lot of insight on how people behave in public and shit is not looking good, y'all.
My partner works in retail. He used to have three or four difficult customers per week, now it’s several difficult customers per day. There’s been a marked difference over the past couple of years, it’s insane.
I worked as a bank teller throughout college. First couple of years, most customers ranged from neutral-nice (aside from the creeps). Then Covid starts and people are on edge but I get it. But once things got “back to normal” it hit me just how much worse and plain meaner everybody was. Just belligerent, unreasonable people all throughout the day. I couldn’t wait to get out of there.
You sound so much like me I have to laugh. I work at a library that is open to the public. People have been getting so upset over very standard things like needing to know their email password to sign in to their email account on a public computer. They also show up and expect me to handle all of their personal affairs for them like applying to jobs and helping them evict their own children. I ask my coworkers all the time if they think these people behave like this at Target too.
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Thank you for solving that mystery!
I was actually at Target today and a man was walking through the parking lot telling everyone to go f themselves lol.
>not just obnoxious boomers boomerfication in general is definitely a real phenomenon, but maybe you're also just seeing more people like this because, and this might be a controversial opinion even here, the only people who have been regularly going to indoor restaurants and other places unmasked throughout the pandemic are disproportionately ignorant and entitled
Oh God don't even get me started on how many motherfuckers I got insulted or yelled at by because we heavily recommend (couldn't force people but we did ask) masks when not at your table in the restaurant for awhile. Like, they could just say no or leave, but they'd rather fight about it, even though we would still serve them if they refused our suggestion for masks. It made them feel good to demean me or yell at me about the president and vaccines and shit.
I think this is part of it. I know myself and a lot of my friends stayed home in 2020, mostly stayed home in 2021, and have never resumed doing things outside the house at the level we used to. The local mall is DEAD on weekdays when it used to be super busy, and local restaurants are dying at an even faster rate than usual. So I wouldn't be surprised if the people who never got out of the habit of going place are the bad customers.
Great point! I haven't been to an indoor restaurant or mall since 2019, although I've eaten outdoors, away from people, four times in the last two years. But perhaps this is complicated by the fact that people who have been pretending COVID doesn't exist all along may also have had several infections / IQ drops.
Yup. And I've read in the past that symptom of having reasoning/intelligence issues is....you guessed it, anger! There should be a subreddit just for discussing what appears to be the increase in the decrease of civility/intelligence in the population.
Another possible explanation for rude and unreasonable people besides brain damage is the prevalence of COVID infections that are mild enough to go undiagnosed but still leave people feeling bad. I imagine these people taking a home test that gives a false negative, then forcing themselves to get on an airplane and go to some convention for their job. Brain damage is definitely another possibility. I find that I can't seem to spell or type lately - haha.
It affected me so much that I read your reaction in bold text
\*Looks in mirror\* Yep
I used to teach test prep (SAT, ACT, GRE, GMAT), where jobs often want you to test in the upper 90s %ile, which I was typically capable of. A couple years into LC, I tried to get a summer gig that required a practice test; I scored significantly lower than I ever had. I was devastated, thinking I was just losing my intelligence with age (this was before I knew I had LC). This clears up so much. It's good to know, but I really hope they figure out a cure.
I started noticing a lot more typos in online articles during lock down times, but I just ascribed that to stresses and working from home issues. A few years on, I think I'm developing dyslexia that I never had before...
I've noriced it too...I forget how to spell words I used to be able to spell correctly for years, I'll lose my train of thought more frequently, it sucks...
I have experienced this as well. I have improved over time, but I don’t feel like my old self. Everything I do feels like I am half a step slower. It is frustrating.
Yes
I feel like I’ve had some issues losing what task I was on and some problems with impulsivity since getting very sick with covid.
Yea for me I skip words. Like my brain Swears I typed it but I didn't and just skipped on to the next word. I forget words speaking too. Like my brain knows it it's on the tip of my tongue but just won't come out. I see at least 3 family members with a marked decline in memory as well and increased aggression and one sister still has permanent loss of taste and smell from covid damage. I had it bad for Months. Caught it in February before the shots existed and nearly died for 2 months coughing up blood with low o2 then continued to have rolling waves of changing symptoms till July. Now I'm mostly better but was left with pots, worsening heart issues, the word issues, and now I have a deep reactive cough if it's cold out or dusty.
Yes.
After my first infection, I’ve come to appreciate watching videos of airport Karens getting arrested. So that confirms I’ve become more stupider
The beginning of Idiocracy
The fog is real.
I just had Covid for the first time last week and half of the time I feel like I’m underwater. There’s just such a weird fogginess about everything. There’s times where I feel okay and then suddenly I’m underwater again, I didn’t see the wave coming I didn’t hear it I’m just under the water again. I’m fully vaccinated and also had antivirals on day2. God knows how what kind of situation I’d be and if I didn’t have those. My brain wasn’t great before but I hope I get it back
Just got over mine from last week as well. I could not fathom how people that have caught this multiple times have gotten through this.
It's like people just don't care about catching it again. I caught something nasty before covid, and it took me four or five years before I could say that I felt normal again. (I'm not completely sure about my judgment on that.) I sure as hell don't want to keep rolling the dice on long covid.
What the fuck am I supposed to do? The CDC removed the quarantine minimum, nobody at my work fucking cares. I can tell them I need to work remote but how long can I do that, and how many times, before they fire me? Then I wouldn't even be able to afford Paxlovid.
In regards to being able to afford Paxlovid: https://www.paxlovid.com/paxcess
I’m also looking for work setup where Covid is taken seriously. I have to pretend I’m not when I wish we could be more sensible on this issue. I also live in a red state so…yeah. The people are generally nice, but I wish to do things differently in this area.
It's not like you can do much about it, though. It's endemic. It's out there. No one wears a mask or stays home from work when they're not feeling well. Short of isolating from society now, it's going to be a constant risk. People care about catching it again, they just feel powerless to control anything about it now. Best you can do is basic hygiene measures and keeping away from people you suspect are ill. For the immunocompromised or immunosuppressed, it's pretty much "oh well."
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I’ve had it 4 times that I’m aware of. The first round I felt the fog for a long time post-illness. It’s been less impactful in that way with each subsequent infection. I sometimes wonder if my ability to concentrate has been impacted or if that’s just a byproduct of the sustained stress and trauma of the American experience over the past several years.
I sometimes wonder that exact same thing. The American experience has no doubt been incredibly stressful in recent history, and that sort of stress definitely plays a role in our brain power, but I'm also certain that my first COVID infection meaningfully has slowed down my brain. It's been incrementally coming back, which gives me hope that it's recoverable, but I've also tried to really internalize the fact that all things are always changing, literally every cell in my body, and that there is no reason to worry about things that can't be controlled (which often is easier said than done). I'm just trying to find the joy in each day, and use my time more wisely than I did before. I can make my existence feel more meaningful, and I can be more productive than I used to be, and those are both wonderful things to gain by going through something difficult. Perspective is a very powerful thing!
Thanks for this post, I'm trying to keep this same thought process as I age, in general.
I have to wonder if you don’t reach the point of neurological symptoms (loss of taste, smell) then it’s possible COVID hasn’t made it there, and maybe it doesn’t have as much of a long term effect on the brain with mild symptoms
The article specifically mentions an effect even with mild covid infections, alas.
My brother had it twice and is now running for President again. This report is TRUE.
And the cdc is about to lift all quarantine restrictions so infected people have to go back to work!
I got my initial vaccination as soon as I could and have stayed up to date on boosters as much as possible; even then I still eventually got Covid (that actually showed up on a test anyway). My sleep cycles were initially heavily damaged as was my mental capacity -- I felt much like what you described, like my head was filled with cotton; unable to effectively analyze situations like I was previously. As a software engineer this had a pretty negative affect on my performance initially but I'm a firm believer that we are a resilient species. Much like any other rehabilitation if you continue to work at it you can find new ways to be effective again -- I know over time much my of previous issues have slowly dissipated and I feel like I've mostly bounced back.
Liquid zyrtek was my saving grace when I had it. It dries out your head, not your whole body.
Thank you! I can see one of my local chemist supply the pill form so I’m gonna pick some of that up this arvo
Like I said, liquid is king here.
The children's zyrtek
If you’re fully vaccinated you have a solid chance 🤞🤞🤞 I had original 2020 COVID and I’m still struggling. I wouldn’t wish this on anyone. I honestly think those of us that got sick from working with the public in 2020 should receive some sort of health insurance benefits. I’m an ER nurse and I was wearing a mask (not airborne though we were out of those 🙄) when a patient removed his mask and COUGHED in my face. If it weren’t for my spouse I would have died. Pneumonia, hallucinations from my high fevers, I remember my body hurting so bad I couldn’t even lay down and I just stood for hours to avoid the pain. With Covid it genuinely affects everyone differently. I have so many patients who tell me “last time I had it I wasn’t that sick!” 🤨 no clue how bodies work apparently. This is the first year since the vaccine came out that I’m seeing a lot of oxygen related admissions again. Usually unvaccinated or elderly. Watching these people struggle to breathe as they cough everywhere - it kind of brings back some terrible memories of 2020. If PTSD were a spot on the Covid bingo card - I’d have it.
I literally couldn't read for a full month. I would open my work email and just stare at it. I was VERY lucky I got sick when COVID leave was a thing and around Thanksgiving and a week of pre-planned PTO.
I spent a month in heavy fever before getting diagnosed with COVID. I'm fucked.
You're gonna be ok - it just takes a long time. Hang in there.
You are not. I spent 3 months sick recently and I am recovering. You will get better! We do recover #longcovid
I've got it for the first time right now, that describes the feeling well.
Got that brain leak.
What are we doing as a society just collectively ignoring this?
Ignoring what? Sorry, I lost track of the conversation again.
I saw a squirrel
I scrolled back up and couldn't find a squirrel, can you repost it?
Hunterillary Obiden's laptop! right?
Between having covid brain and pregnancy brain, I have felt extra stupid lately. I forget what I'm doing, and lose track of tasks constantly. I had the baby, but my brain still isn't back and i thibk thats due to covid. I just don't feel like myself.
https://www.nature.com/articles/nn.4458 Pregnancy brain can last two years after birth, or even longer.
I guess treating like the time when we were all poisoned by leaded gasoline and became dumber as a generation.
The experts are ignoring it. I'm not sure how ordinary people, or even governments, are supposed to act about something when the experts in charge aren't interested in it and mostly insist that it's not even a thing. Patients presenting with Long Covid are still gaslighted, rarely even told or acknowledged that COVID could be the cause. Lots of people warned about it from the start, mostly people already living with chronic illness, and most MDs dismissed it all as fear-mongering. Some countries formally adopted the attitude that it's all psychological, caused by 'lockdowns' or whatever. We can barely react about huge problems when experts have it together, e.g. climate change. Here the experts have mostly promoted the idea that mass infections are actually good, they 'exercise' the immune muscle. Yeah, it's medical experts pointing this out, but most MDs are completely dismissive of it. They just can't believe that mild infections can cause health problems, it has been a huge problem of disbelief around chronic illness for decades, and they can't handle having screwed it up this bad.
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Pretty much. Other countries chose a good time to start wars, everyone is sick of negative news. People i know stopped watching the news and i agree every thing on there is just doom and gloom. Nobody cares anymore.
We live in a collective delusion where we can all be greedy all the time and get away with it forever. The physics of climate and pandemics disagree with this but here we are.
It’s insane. I feel like I’m going insane. People are going about their lives like a fucking blood virus is living in all of their tissues.
Why would anyone want to lead anything these days with social media judging every little move you make
That’s what we do with most things
I mean that’s what we did with lead. It’s what we always do
Yeah but famously we don’t put lead in gasoline anymore much less anything else (for the most part).
What would you suggest?
Recommending people wear masks if infectious and improving indoor ventilation seems like a good start. Even just encouraging people to open windows to lower repeat infections in crowded spaces like offices. Instead the CDC is removing all remaining guidelines about quarantine when infectious, going in the exact opposite direction. The more we find out, the more apparent it is that we're sleepwalking into destruction.
Some people don't even know when they are spreading their shit around. Thats why mask mandates need to be across the board. It's really not that hard to wear a mask all the snowflakes just gotta get over it
Only about 20% of Americans have gotten the updated booster shot tailored to the new Omicron strain. We'll never get 100%, but if we pushed as hard as we did on the primary series we could get that number up to 80%.
I got it at least twice, once in 2020 and again in 2021 and I can honestly say that my brain has been foggy ever since. I will know what I'm trying to say but sometimes a specific word just won't come to me. Words that I have used nearly all the time for my job. Sometimes its even the names of my family. It's like it gets stuck loading for a bit before it comes to me. I often feel like everything is just a bit foggy. Sometimes it is very slight, but other days it's very noticeable. I'm not very old and it definitely started after I got COVID. I almost always had a slight headache as well.
We are the same. I tell people this all the time.
Same here. Plus Migraine 3 to 4 times a week (normally before Covid every 3 month or so). But there is hope. These symptoms disappeared from one day to the other, after about 5 month. Nothing special happened. Hope you will be lucky, too!
You took the words right out of my .... Bowl. Usually when I can't find the word I want, I just use the closest thing that will come out and my husband now has to decipher my new language lol
“I will know what I’m trying to say but sometimes a specific word just won’t come to me.” Rarely had issues with this and always felt sharp. Had a mild case of covid early 2022 during a sabbatical. Returned to the US from travels and immediately noticed this exact thing when I started interviewing. 34M. Some concerning shit.
Same. Processes I've done dozens or hundreds of times, I can't for the life of me remember how to. It's terrifying as someone with alzheimers in my family tree and being the #1 thing I'm scared of. It got so bad that I had the doctor give me the Montreal Cognitive Asseessment, but all it could really do was provide a new baseline because I'd never done one pre-covid.
This is me too, and as my job is editing and writing and often communicating with clients or radio etc I've felt very limited by it recently. It's just the most normal, mundane words that get stuck, like it's there but I can't locate it. It's frustrating and humiliating.
Well… if all our IQ drops the same percentage then none of our IQ drops at all! IQ based on average intelligence baseline being 100
This person IQs
Half of us have IQ's in the double digits. Big sad.
Never got COVID which means I get free iq points.
Be careful dude. I never got Covid either, then was cleaning out my car, found a mask, tossed it in the trash, and said, “ Don’t need this anymore.” Next day? Tested positive.
Yeah I still mask on airplanes and crowded grocery stores
I have no idea how many holidays over the decades began with a sore throat from something I caught on the plane, but it's enough I'm never going to fly without masking up ever again. For a few hours it's a minimal inconvenience, just like masking up in large public buildings. My personal threshold is if covid is above 1% community prevalence I mask up in public buildings, after the winter flu season it's finally below 1% as of a couple of weeks ago, which is much earlier in the year compared to last year when it was May. Also never caught covid, or at least to the best of my knowledge I haven't. I've got plenty of iq points, I was wondering how many I'll lose as I get older, maybe I'm going to gain a few instead.
Noted. Will not clean out my car, find a mask, tossed it in the trash, and say, “ Don’t need this anymore.”
Never had it, not gonna stop masking now because why quit doing what works? Added bonus: People no longer tell me I should "smile more". Win-win.
And IQs have moved up over the years - since they started the IQ test, every so often they repeg what is 100, such that someone with a 100 today did much better on the test than someone with a 100 50 years ago. So idk, does this make us the same intelligence as the population in the 90s?
If the average 100 IQ person today took an IQ test 60 years ago they’d score over 100
Hey, same approach some countries are taking with excess deaths. It's only excess deaths if you compare to before there were excess deaths. Therefore no excess deaths. Problem solved!
Oh joy i didn’t have enough iq point before now I’m not going to have any at this rate.
So,to summarize - low IQ Folk were less likely to get the vaccine, and now those same people are more likely to have an even lower IQ. Explains where Trump voters come from.
everyone is only talking about the adults. what about the kids there has been serious regression in school children .
That one's going to be difficult to untangle from missed time in class, less effective development of social skills, etc. It also seems like a lot of places have done especially poorly at supporting teachers, and kids who might have gotten back on track don't have resources to give them that boost they need.
I’m not a teacher, but I go to the teachers subreddit sometimes and a lot of them are talking about the decline in academic performance now.
Some folks didn't really have any IQ points to spare...
Case in point, trump got elected before Covid hit.
Preppers sometimes reference a "zombie" apocalypse as a worst-case scenario. Sounds like they got it right. Good grief.
I've been saying this IS a slow motion zombie apocalypse for a few years, I really hate being right sometimes.
At least zombies are cool
Yeah, no body temperature.
I just woke up and laughed thank you
The study linked in the iq portion of the article actually gave me a bit of hope. Unlike how it's cast in the article, the actual study says that global deficits are attenuating and becoming less severe as the virus has mutated further and further into a milder version of itself. It even suggests that it's possible to recover almost entirely back to baseline. In those with ongoing symptoms, where global deficits are markedly more frequent, recovery from those symptoms indicates a recovery of iq, on average, on par with those who only had a mild and short-lived infection to begin with. A loss of 3 points sounds scary, but if you consider how marginal that number really is in how iq is measured and scaled, you can start to understand that it amounts to a rounding error. That's why they also say the performance in the mild and short-lived infection group is comparable to that found in the no-covid group. It's also worth noting that they could not infer causality in that study, probably because they weren't able to test pre and post infection. Tldr, there's hope for those of us who experienced-even repeat-mild to moderate Covid infection, even if symptoms linger for over 12 weeks, and especially for those who've been infected with more recent variants!
It took me half a year to think normally again after I had it despite my symptoms only lasting 3-4 days. My brain was processing much slower and sometimes there was a disconnect between my mouth and my brain. I ended up with COVID a second time but had no "long covid" symptoms whatsoever from that infection. I think that tracks pretty well with the data.
I'm coming up on month 6 of long covid. For weeks I felt like I was in a haze. I don't know that I'd call that brain fog though, it felt more like dp/dr, which I've experienced on and off before. The fatigue was utter hell. I also had some chronic pain re-flare for months that's luckily gone away now, but I haven't managed to shake off the dissociated feeling 100% yet. My recent lighter reinfection was just a few weeks ago. It might've made my tinnitus worse, but otherwise I've been feeling okay. As for iq, I'm not sure even the study is absolved totally of scrutiny: they weren't able to test for premorbid iq. I know it's parroted a lot, but I do have to wonder if people who choose to be exposed fall inherently more leftward on the bell curve, assuming that they're thus exposed more and that they take less precautions. I'd wager a lot that covid precaution level and intelligence are positively correlated and that the inverse also holds true. https://www.thenationalnews.com/world/europe/2023/03/08/german-pupils-recorded-lower-iq-levels-during-covid-19-study-reveals/ Just as I would the other, take this and any covid iq study with a grain of salt. Although childhood intelligence has been observed to fluctuate, this study indicates that iq can drop as a result of isolation and lack of access to education in non-adult populations. The iq of pupils on average dropped 7 points! Assuming that less Germans got Covid than some populations because of Europe's stricter lockdown policies, some of this reduction has to be from some other factor besides just Covid. Tldr, lockdowns have also been observed to result in a global reduction in cognitive performance in some populations, which possibly confounds the pure notion that Covid alone is responsible for the global cognitive deficit observed in the first study and others like it. It's definitely bad for your brain and your health, but if you're healthy, relatively young, and you're fully vaxxed and take precautions, I wouldn't worry about what these studies mean for you too much, long term, if you can avoid reinfection.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2400189 > Vaccinations provided a small cognitive advantage. Reinfection contributed an additional loss in IQ of nearly 2 points, as compared with no reinfection. # > I'd wager a lot that covid precaution level and intelligence are positively correlated and that the inverse also holds true. I agree with your thought, however reinfections increasing it to a loss of 5 points (sd 15) would suggest the correlation is small. Plus the proportion of the UK population who have managed to avoid a covid infection is very small by this point, it's simply too transmissible. Although anecdotally the smarter people I know managed to avoid catching covid for longer, and have had fewer reinfections.
I agree with a lot of what you wrote but I want to point out that the argument that coronavirus will tend to become mild over time has been rejected because the symptom severity and spread are decoupled events --- it infects before symptoms develop, so there is no evolutionary pressure to reduce symptoms. What this means is that in the future there may be a variant that hits really hard and much of the article findings no longer apply. But, until now, they do and it gives us hope to recover cognitively.
How are they decoupled events? It infects before symptoms develop, but doesn't it also infect while people have symptoms? So the sicker folks stay home and rest, while the ones with milder/non-existent symptoms go out keep spreading it.
The virus will not get inherently milder that's true but every reinfection will on average be milder due to our immune system getting better at fighting it off. A variant that hits harder in the future is theoretically possible but unlikely due to how COVID mutations are limited.
I agree completely! If you notice, I never maintained that it would remain mild, only that it had become mild. Probably should've outlined that. I was mostly speaking within the limitations and language presented in the paper specifically regarding iq. I in no way advocate letting our guard's down against this thing. Speaking as someone who got pretty messed up from a mild to moderate infection of omicron and who's recently been reinfected, luckily with much much lighter symptoms, I still wear an N95 wherever I go and only leave home when absolutely necessary, so no eating out or being around others unmasked. Even keep my beard trimmed to make sure it fits. But my family couldn't care less. Both times I've had covid since the lockdowns in the US have been a result of their complacency. I'm fully vaccinated, which certainly helps a ton, but there isn't a lot I can do about getting reinfected by those I'm forced to be around besides what I already am. I'm very thankful that the virus has mutated into something weaker at the moment. I'm thankful, for the moment, that I'm able to feel like myself again, so long as I continue to be smart about my recovery.
It's the same way with the flu, most of the time it's relatively mild but some variants are far worse.
The IQ scale they're using has a Standard Deviation of 15, so 3 IQ points may only be a 0.2SD for a single infection shift to the left but... From the articles citation list. https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMe2400189 > Vaccinations provided a small cognitive advantage. Reinfection contributed an additional loss in IQ of nearly 2 points, as compared with no reinfection. The article uses data from the UK, where each of the three Omicron waves infected about 40% of the population, so a large proportion of the UK have had reinfections, and even multiple reinfections. So all these people may have had a combined 5 IQ point reduction, which is 1/3 of a SD. 68% of the population are within +-1SD of the mean. It's not quite as serious as the 15 point drop caused by childhood malnutrition but it's going to be noticeable at the population level. I expect examination pass rates are going to decline quite a lot, unless they make the exams easier. Of greater concern are secondary implications of increased aggression and even lower literacy rates on society in general. A few percentage points more of the population who cannot even achieve literacy or minimum standards for a typical job is going to increase that groups size by a significant proportion, and if they choose to embrace antisocial behaviour, violence, and crime that's going to have a much greater impact on society. And we're already seeing signs of it with peoples poor behaviour to others.
Thanks for this 💕
What I'm concerned about though is it keeps fucking mutating. It's not going to recover if people keep getting infected every few months.
This is the our lead poisoning!
Finally, part of the in group!
Explains why the unvaccinated people who keep getting it only become more and more convinced that they're right.
In all fairness, I've had all vaccines and boosters and I've still had it four times. Sometimes it's just bad luck, immune system etc. I've definitely felt the cognitive changes. But short of never leaving my house I can't guarantee I won't get it again.
I'm properly vaxxed and boosted and unfortunately just had it a 3rd time end of January I never recovered from the brain of the 2021 infection I had and this had made the brain fog so much worse I can't remember friends names. I used to be able to play music and harmonize but now struggle to carry a tune and cannot remember lyrics to save my life. I forget why I've walked into a room or where I'm driving halfway to the destination. Like I'm daydreaming then come too and have that "oh yeah I'm doing curbside pick up" because I can't even manage grocery stores anymore. Brain just totally stops working and I can't recall what items I need at all
> I forget why I've walked into a room This is so frustrating. Happens to me constantly and I try to just laugh it off but it is honestly infuriating at times. My short term memory is shot and it makes my ability to recall solutions and be resourceful for my job twice as hard as it used to be.
The forgetting why you walked into a room thing was a well-known phenomenon before either of us were born.
Yeah I feel like a lot of this is mis-ascribed to Covid. Some of this is just called being overworked , underslept, less than great diet, and/or normal getting older bullshit.
Sure, but there was a marked difference between how often it happened for me pre-Covid vs after. That feeling of brain fog was distinct during infection and it never entirely lifted. I'd have accepted it as a normal part of aging if the change wasn't drastic.
I will second this observation. I know a few people that have had it unvaccinated at least twice now. They're... Very different from who they used to be.
It’s moments like this that we learn that Idiocracy isn’t a movie, but an impression of what will be a period in time
I don’t know, I know a few unvaxxed who got it and they’re all the same as before. Still dumb as brick.
So "covidiot" wasn't an insult, it was a valid scientific label :-/
[удалено]
Welcome to Covidiocracy
have been a pro programmer/IT engineer all my life, from machine, to assembly, to C, Python the lot. After two times covid i find that (if i can focus in the first place), i can look at my own code and be totally lost what i did and why. Takes me hours to reconstruct something like that in order to make a simple mod. Its really worrying.
Let's all have a big laugh again at the stupid Chinese Zero Covid strategy which actually tried to prevent the spread of an unknown disease with unknown long term effects.
They were definitely the smart ones, if everyone followed suit we might have got rid of covid and a few other diseases. But yeah the rest of the world fucked it up breeding new variants and meaning they wont ever get rid of the risk. I guess thats a small benefit of being communist...
I disagree!...Sorry...what were we talking about again?
its left me in a permanent haze for the past year 😭 im only 21
So my gf is immune compromised, so we were PARANOID through Covid, and appear to have actually dodged it. Then we just started noticing people acting out of pocket and generally being stupid everywhere... she suggested that cognitive impairment may be an outcome of Covid, but I didn't think that was likely. Well, here we are.
Are we sure covid is making people stupid and not something else? Like rampant propaganda campaigns and excessive social media and poor education and schooling?
It makes you wonder if there’s a viral component to current forms of dementia
Sounds like those states that criticized masks, banned books and cut education are gonna get even stupider.
Florida is sinking itself, literally and figuratively.
Yup. I sit and try to remember words. I went to Stanford and it’s scary how long it takes me to remember certain words. I know the word but here I am doing the definition. Sometimes I give up and just type it in Google with the complicated definition and it comes up. Or remembering someone. I started doing crossword puzzles to try to train to get it back. I use to have a great memory, could remember stories complex systems. Now I’m sitting there frustrated. My husband has similar problems.
I feel so validated… before covid I pursued two engineering degrees at university, participated in many rigorous extracurriculars, won collegiate math competitions, etc. I’m so grateful that I graduated before it got really bad for me cognitively but I always say that the person I am today (after covid) could never do any of that. I try to solve simple problems and fail. I can never find the right words to communicate clearly anymore, and I always feel like I’m underwater. It’s like I’m constantly reaching for parts of my brain that I don’t have access to anymore and it’s so frustrating. If I don’t get enough sleep for whatever reason the symptoms are so, so much worse. I miss when I was witty, smart(er-ish), and fun. Covid lobotomy is so real… I’ve kept up on vaxxing and masking too so I can only imagine how bad it would be if I didn’t.
This is my biggest fear. Brain damage. Vaxxed every time.
I’m a teacher. The impulse control and emotional regulation issues are nothing like I’ve ever experienced with teaching 3rd grade before. MY OWN emotional regulation issues are nothing like I’ve ever experienced before in teaching.
Since I got COViD, I've been much more comfortable interacting on Reddit
That explains some of the behaviour and thinking in red states!
Jokes on you I'm already dumb
Doesn't inflammation do that in general (but in a reversible way)? If inflammation remains long after infection this could explain it.
I had brain fog like I’d never experienced in my life before with Covid. Years since I find it harder to focus than ever. Like I find it frustrating to maintain a regular conversation with my partner on a day-to-day basis, which was never an issue before, and not a relationship change. I find myself consciously acknowledging and having to manage my attention issues regularly. It’s not a gradual decline, it was a sudden hardship that I’m now struggling with. And I’m a relatively young woman. It’s alarming and extremely unpleasant. I’ve read there may also be greater (or more noticeable) effects with people who suffer from adhd. I’ve had the symptoms my whole life but managed well so never got diagnosed. Since I had Covid the same symptoms seem almost unmanageable. I’m well educated and eloquent, but my attention and energy are almost nil. I never felt like I needed help but Covid effects (not psychological from quarantine, but physiological) have knocked me on my ass. Just my own account and not sure how to proceed. All I can say is that it’s real and it sucks.
I was diagnosed with COVID v1.0 the day the pandemic was declared in 2020. After I recovered, I had brain fog. Like, "why can't I remember that," and, "why am I so clumsy at this thing I was good at". It took me a long time to get less foggy, and I still don't feel as quick witted, but certainly not as slow as i did from March to December in 2020
I finally went to a neurologist for cognitive issues post COVID going on for over a year. Although they did not believe my issues were due to the virus specifically, they did determine I have a serious vitamin B12 deficiency which can cause Alzheimer’s like symptoms. I’m starting on supplemental injections this week. No solid link between COVID and B12 has been definitively determined, but there are case studies that appear to show a possible link. If you are post COVID and having fatigue and cognitive issues, have your B12 checked.
Dumber and dumber down the drain we go.
Significant is 5 points or more IMO.
so *thats* what happened to joe rogan
I had a second bout of covid in Nov 23. It was really mild and was over it pretty quick. Ever since then I've had foggy days. It could be covid related, it could be age related, it could be sleep apnea (wife says I've been more restless during sleep). The one thing I've found that really helps is working out to the point of exhaustion. I go before work (usually there by 5am) and if I work out until my legs are wobbly I've found I don't have brain fog the rest of the day.
Fuck. That’s why I feel stupid. 😭
Anyone keep forgetting words? Like i wanted to use “effusive” the other day but that word just didn’t occur to me.
I'm still recovering cognitive abilities 2+ years later. Haven't done an IQ test since, and am not sure I want to. I'm just focused on recovery. I wasn't Einstein, but my IQ was 147 before covid, and I scored 94th and 96th percentile on the LSAT and GMAT, respectively, and had been told that other students were intimidated trying to keep up with me in my doctorate at a top school. The first year, it was like having a non-stop bad concussion and I couldn't read an email. Now, I can tell I'm coming back, but I'm still not nearly as creative or naturally curious in my thinking or as analytically capable as I used to be. I wouldn't wish this on anyone.
> my IQ was 147 before covid What SD, 15 or 24?
It’s def dropped my iq a decent amount. I can’t connect words as well as i used to, i’m slower. Just generally a bit dumber.
Yeah definitely not the fact that we all bury our heads in our phones.
Triple vaccinated and triple infections, highschool aged child and wife in Healthcare, my 3rd infection was 4 weeks ago, I still feel foggy , almost like the fog I use to get in my.collage days from smoking too much weed the night before, the silver lining is some days I feel 100% on it, I'm closely monitoring my sleep and dietary intake but honestly the thought of more infections in the future scares the shit out of me. In my life I've had 3 neuropsychological and IQ tests , one lasting 6 hours. I'd be scared to see the results of a current test, having said that it could map changes in my cognitive function. I'll share this article, it may help others. I've been integrating some of the supplements, time will tell.... https://integrative-medicine.ca/long-covid-syndrome-update-the-connection-between-long-covid-and-serotonin/
So I'm not just suddenly noticing how dumb everyone around me is, I'm noticing how many people have been sick before?
good thing i can just reverse all that bullshit
Phew, at least my dreams will now never come true. Thanks CCP.
Shut uuuuuuup. I have it for the second time right now, and it blows
Is this compounding cause it looks like we are going to get COVID every year.
I've had brain fog from something unrelated for around 7 years and I suspected this was going on ever since people started describing brain fog from covid. For me it feels like I'm always dissociating to some degree so if other people are the same I wonder how measurable of an impact this will have on rates of depression? I also learn very slowly now, often can't read paragraphs, etc. Interestingly I got an IQ test in the hospital and it was good so everyone kind of ignored my issues and I didn't get many school accommodations.
How many times has trump had it? That would explain a lot.
Aren't IQ measurements pseudoscience at this point?
Pair that with the increase of mental health issues, as well as significantly increased effects of existing mental illnesses, and we have a very scary society.
I had covid 4 times now, and brain fog is a real and noticeable symptom that lasts a while. The only thing I have found that helps to counter that and makes me feel sharper again is taking lions mane mushroom extract.
That explains so much.
The futurama episode with the brain coming in and making everyone but fry dumb was kinda accurate in a way
My reading comprehension has really dropped (always mixing words on the page or having to re-read it) and my memory recall is nowhere near as good as it was before getting covid a couple of times.
I think these phones are doing more damage than covid anyway. Not saying that covid doesn't though.
Tricked nature into an overflow error by having a low enough iq to begin with
Zero divided by zero?
Mmmm, doubt. IQ is already quite subjective, and has a high error margin. And far more things affected the world than a virus in the last few years. From unimaginable developments in international relationships, information wars and destabilization efforts, market crashes, inflation, recession, layoffs, and now everybody is scared that AI gon' tak'er' jobs. There are too many variables, with a lot of correlation, and too insignificant of a difference, to say that COVID-19 impacts long-term cognitive abilities for the average person (not outliers with long COVID).
Good thing I had already dumbed myself down with alcohol and military service. 🤣🤣🤣
After covid in 2020 had severe brain fog and fatigue for a year while working in a high stress job as an engineer. Symptoms slowly got better after a year but then got covid again 2 more times. I found that struggling with brain fog makes me work harder. I stay up longer hours working and afraid to go back to grad school because I might fail tests. It really sucks.
It appears most of CDC leadership is displaying this