(1) Prior to covid, I was underrating how risky it is to get sick, because I was not accounting for the risk of chronic illness. I needed to update that prior, and take more general precautions against getting sick, period.
(2) Because chronic illness is not a unique or even (apparently) particularly special risk of COVID, fear of chronic COVID specifically should not change my risk calculus or precautions overall.
So I am simultaneously being more careful than I was before the pandemic, and less careful than my friends who still think “long COVID” poses a unique and novel threat that requires extra-special risk avoidance.
I think long COVID is particularly bad because I think you are much more likely to get it from pretty normal activities if you’re not careful. Lyme disease, which the author of that comment mentions (citing this article), also looks common:
Recent estimates using other methods suggest that approximately 476,000 people may get Lyme disease each year in the United States.
I would guess that there aren’t that many others nearly as bad, but I haven’t really looked into it. I think colds, flus and food poisoning are much less severe and less common than COVID-19.
One perspective on this, from a comment on the SSC reddit:
I think long COVID is particularly bad because I think you are much more likely to get it from pretty normal activities if you’re not careful. Lyme disease, which the author of that comment mentions (citing this article), also looks common:
I would guess that there aren’t that many others nearly as bad, but I haven’t really looked into it. I think colds, flus and food poisoning are much less severe and less common than COVID-19.