Many long haul Lyme disease symptoms are similar to long haul COVID symptoms, especially this trio of symptoms:
Fatigue
- Severe
- Disabling
Cognitive problems
- Memory problems
- Difficulty focusing
- Difficulty multi-tasking
Pain
- Musculoskeletal system
- Nervous system
- Autonomic nervous system dysfunction
A few common symptoms present in long haul COVID are not typically found in long haul Lyme disease:
Respiratory problems
- Shortness of breath
- Trouble breathing
Lessons learned from long haul Lyme disease could be relevant to long haul COVID:
Patients need to be listened to.
- Patient reported symptoms can be disabling
- Not being believed harms patients further
Patients are heterogeneous.
Multiple biologic mechanisms may be driving symptoms.
- Persistent microbial antigens from infection
- Host human immune and inflammatory response
- Neural network alterations of brain
- Dysfunction of autonomic nervous system
- Heart rate abnormalities
- Blood pressure
- Dysfunction of autonomic nervous system
Long haul Lyme disease and long haul COVID may share some disease mechanisms.
We are hopeful that the tremendous resources for long haul COVID research could help accelerate Lyme disease knowledge and treatments as well.
Suspicious Rash or Flu-Like Symptoms?
If you have a suspicious expanding red circular rash and/or flu-like symptoms such as fever, achiness, extreme fatigue, severe headache or neckache, this could be acute Lyme disease. Please seek medical care immediately.
