Covid Raises Risks for Mental, Neurological Disorders, Says Study: Lancet

The University of Oxford study analyzed health records of 236,379 Covid-19 patients infected last year, according to a report in The Lancet Psychiatry journal.

A third of Covid-19 survivors were diagnosed with a neurological or psychiatric condition in the six months after being infected, according to the first large-scale research to compare the risks to other illnesses, including influenza. The University of Oxford study analyzed health records of 236,379 Covid-19 patients infected last year, according to a report in The Lancet Psychiatry journal. As might be expected, anxiety and mood disorders were the most common diagnoses, at 17% and 14% of patients respectively. But the study also found 7% of those made sickest by the virus had a stroke and 2% were diagnosed with dementia. While the investigators stressed that the specific causes of these long-term affects are largely unknown, they suggested some of might be linked to stress, job loss or loneliness during quarantine. More in-depth research is needed on the neurological risks and more resources are needed to address the full range of implications, they said. "Although the individual risks for most disorders are small, the effect across the whole population may be substantial for health and social-care systems due to the scale of the pandemic and that many of these conditions are chronic," said Paul Harrison, a professor of psychiatry at the university and the study's lead author.