Long COVID survivor reflects on struggles 5 years after pandemic’s surge

CHARLOTTE — Monday marks five years since North Carolina put a state of emergency into effect because of COVID-19.

Businesses, workplaces, and families were all impacted. Confirmed cases of COVID topped five million in North and South Carolina.

Some of those patients are still dealing with it, including one woman who told Channel 9′s Erika Jackson her life has changed forever.

“I have to pace everything. I have to plan out my entire day, to pace myself, to make things possible,” Brooke Keaton said.

Anything was possible for Keaton five years ago. She had a full plate as a private school teacher in southwest Charlotte and a mom of two girls.

But that all changed in December 2020 when she got COVID-19. She said she couldn’t shake off severe fatigue and memory loss.

“Just doing something small, my heart would be racing. I had spells where I would black out for a few seconds from just standing up,” Keaton said.

She credits a segment on TV for giving her and her husband answers.

“He turns it on, he was like, ‘They’re talking about everything, all the things you’re talking about, and they’re calling it long COVID,’” Keaton said.

Dr. John Baratta, founder and medical director at UNC at Chapel Hill’s COVID Recovery Clinic, told Channel 9 the length of long COVID differs from person to person. “For some people, it is a few months. For others, it is one or a few years. And for others, I unfortunately expect it will be a lifelong condition.”

Dr. Baratta said millions of people worldwide have experienced a form of long COVID.

According to the Centers for Disease Control, nearly seven percent of adults and more than one percent of children surveyed in 2022 reported experiencing long COVID symptoms for at least three months.

“Sometimes, these effects can be mild and mostly a nuisance in a person’s life, although other times they can be severe and debilitating, essentially preventing people from doing their daily activities, either at home, at school or at work,” Dr. Baratta said.

The CDC said people with long COVID generally have severe fatigue or a prolonged fever. But patients can also have a lingering cough, chest pain or neurological issues.

Anyone who had the COVID-19 virus can experience long COVID.

“Women are most at risk, unfortunately, by almost a three to one margin,” Dr. Baratta said. “It’s not totally understood why this is the case. though, women do frequently seem to be more at risk for inflammatory and autoimmune conditions, so this may be playing into their increased likelihood to get long COVID.”

Dr. Baratta said the best protection against long COVID is to avoid getting COVID-19 to start with by getting vaccinated and maintaining healthy habits.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration doesn’t have a treatment on the market for long COVID but research is underway into using the anti-viral medication Paxlovid.

“There is some basic research behind the possibility of this antiviral medicine treating long COVID symptoms, even months or years after the infection,” Dr. Baratta said.

He advises patients like Brooke Keaton to maintain a healthy diet and conserve their energy.

For Keaton, that meant going on disability. She swapped teaching kids in the classroom for teaching people worldwide about long COVID.

“I’m still loving on people. I’m still a support system. Life is different but I have a different calling right now,” Keaton said.

Read more about the UNC COVID Recovery Clinic, and how to schedule virtual visits, on the school’s website.

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