Long Covid

Lord Suri Excerpts

Monday 23rd May 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

The NHS is working with the wider scientific community to better understand both Covid-19 and its long-term health impacts. The £50 million in research is to understand, first, the actual condition—and, as I said earlier, it is not necessarily a medical condition—and how we map and treat it. In addition, we have had 22 research studies to examine the cause of long Covid, to diagnose the condition and to optimise the design of healthcare systems. A lot of this has been done by the National Institute for Health and Care Research, which continues to welcome applications for further research.

[Lord Suri (Con)]

My Lords, long Covid must be taken seriously, as it is a sickness that has different degrees of symptoms for everyone recovering from coronavirus. Although most people recover quickly, there are those who have symptoms which last weeks or months after the infection has gone. There is also a burden on the people who must look after, and take care of, those suffering from long Covid, as it impacts people across all age groups. I request that Her Majesty’s Government take the necessary steps for research into long Covid so that people do not continue to suffer for such lengthy periods following the infection stage.

[Lord Kamall (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right that we must take this seriously. This is why, first, we have tried to map it to the three medical conditions I mentioned earlier: acute Covid-19, ongoing symptomatic Covid-19 and post-Covid-19 syndrome. We are also looking at the WHO definition, which defines post-Covid-19 condition as the condition that

“occurs in people who have a history of probable or confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection; usually within three months from the onset of COVID-19, with symptoms … that last for at least two months”

and which

“cannot be explained by an alternative diagnosis.”

In my meetings with other Health Ministers from across the world, they want to learn from us what we are doing on long Covid and how we can co-operate better.