The Trump campaign asks: “Are you better off now than you were four years ago?”
The timing of the question offered a great opportunity for a response, so many people and their organizations offered measuring sticks and results.
Checking my email to see what I was thinking about 4 years ago, I found a variety of reports of friends coming down with COVID, organizations hurrying to modify their activities to “social distancing” or “virtual” events, and a sizeable number of inquiries about the disease and its likely consequences to health organizations and media sources. I was just starting to track the statistics for the nation and Colorado. On March 24, 2000, Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment reported 116 people hospitalized in the state. Eventually, they also reported 107 deaths during the entire month of March.
There was a growing sense of the scope of the epidemic, but no clear understanding of what could happen throughout our community. For example, I asked a reporter and editor at one Colorado source:
one more thing I've not seen, but am curious to know if there is any medical opinion about ... among those who "recover" from COVID-19, do docs expect there will be on-going medical impacts, or is it more like the flu, which apparently doesn't have carry-on impacts?
There was little to no information available for their response. So we began to wait for anecdotal reports, data reports from medical sources, and then the analysis of longer periods of observation with wider groups of people.
Now, four years into our experience with COVID-19, we have a much clearer idea of the consequences. Based on surveys, Coloradans have had at least 2.2 million cases. As an extreme consequence, earlier this month Colorado reported 14,181 COVID deaths.
There is a much clearer, but not yet complete grasp of “long COVID.” Colorado is among the forefront of the effort, having Lt. Governor Primavera lead the Office of Saving People Money on Health Care, providing a staff focused on Long Covid, and issuing annual reports. We also benefit from the Colorado Health Institute [CHI] — “a nonprofit, mission-driven research and consulting group advancing equity and well-being in our communities through deep expertise and implementational know-how.”
The government office issued its 2023 report. It can be found here. Lt. Gov. Primavera’s transmission letter explained
Long COVID is still not well understood and there are no defined systems in place to manage its effects, ranging in severity from mild and quickly resolved to permanently disabling or even fatal. While Long COVID is not the world’s first post-viral illness, it is one of the most significant because of the large numbers of people impacted. A preliminary rate estimate by the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment shows that between 228,000 and 651,000 Coloradans were affected by Long COVID through November 2022. According to recent data from the Census Household Pulse Survey, 15.2% of adult Coloradans report having developed Long COVID, while 5.4% of adult Coloradans reported currently experiencing Long COVID in October 2023.
The Colorado Health Access Survey measures COVID differently and finds
- Nearly half of Coloradans 16 and older (48.8%) said they tested positive for COVID-19 at a clinic or using a home test. (probably an undercount, but over 2.2 million in Colorado)
- Of the half who tested positive, 14% have dealt with long COVID, with symptoms for at least 3 months (works out to more than 300,000 Coloradans)
- About 8% applying for disability benefits (nearly 25,000 Coloradans)
I’ve now had two bouts and fortunately, both were relatively mild and did not have follow-on impacts. Unfortunately, I shared my germs with my spouse, she got sick two times, and both times took longer to recover than I did. On the whole, though, we have been fortunate — none of our extended family or our immediate circle of friends has died and I can only think of one we’ve talked with who continues to suffer from long-COVID.
COVID harms don’t neatly fall into partisan buckets. What does, for me, are the approaches to dealing with the disease. Democrats worked to minimize transmission, care for those who contracted the disease, and mitigate the social and economic consequences on the broader community. Republicans didn’t. So here in blue Colorado, I’d say the removal of uncertainty AND the engagement of government both made our community better now than it was 4 years ago, as we entered into the COVID era.
