Hi Everyone!
As always, we ask that in order to participate in the weekly megathread, one self-identifies as some form of disabled, which is broadly defined in the community sidebar:
"Disability" is an umbrella term which encompasses physical disabilities, emotional/psychiatric disabilities, neurodivergence, intellectual/developmental disabilities, sensory disabilities, invisible disabilities, and more. You do not have to have an official diagnosis to consider yourself disabled.
Alright, with that out of the way, let's talk about COVID-19, specifically the kind that messes with you for long time, possibly forever! <-- (so fun /s)
From the Wikipedia Page on Long COVID:
Long COVID or long-haul COVID is a group of health problems persisting or developing after an initial period of COVID-19 infection. Symptoms can last weeks, months or years and are often debilitating. The World Health Organization defines long COVID as starting three months after the initial COVID-19 infection, but other agencies define it as starting at four weeks after the initial infection.
Long COVID is characterized by a large number of symptoms that sometimes disappear and then reappear. Commonly reported symptoms of long COVID are fatigue, memory problems, shortness of breath, and sleep disorder. Several other symptoms, including headaches, mental health issues, initial loss of smell or taste, muscle weakness, fever, and cognitive dysfunction may also present. Symptoms often get worse after mental or physical effort, a process called post-exertional malaise. There is a large overlap in symptoms with myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS).
The causes of long COVID are not yet fully understood. Hypotheses include lasting damage to organs and blood vessels, problems with blood clotting, neurological dysfunction, persistent virus or a reactivation of latent viruses and autoimmunity. Diagnosis of long COVID is based on (suspected or confirmed) COVID-19 infection or symptoms—and by excluding alternative diagnoses.
As of 2024, the prevalence of long COVID is estimated to be about 6-7% in adults, and about 1% in children. Prevalence is less after vaccination. Risk factors are higher age, female sex, having asthma, and a more severe initial COVID-19 infection. As of 2023, there are no validated effective treatments. Management of long COVID depends on symptoms. Rest is recommended for fatigue and pacing for post-exertional malaise. People with severe symptoms or those who were in intensive care may require care from a team of specialists. Most people with symptoms at 4 weeks recover by 12 weeks. Recovery is slower (or plateaus) for those still ill at 12 weeks. For a subset of people, for instance those meeting the criteria for ME/CFS, symptoms are expected to be lifelong.
Globally, over 400 million people have experienced long COVID.
Mask up, love one another, and stay alive for one more week.
I am getting more and more terrified by the day by all the stuff in the British news about how they are cracking down on benefits and even the disabled will have their benefits stopped and have to work, or starve. I worked for 16 years, I even kept struggling on for a while after being diagnosed with cancer and suffering all the side effects of the illness and meds. Now I'm partially sighted and learning to walk again after a stroke too, my doctor wrote a letter to the DWP (benefits assessors) telling them I'm totally unfit for any type of work at all, still I get re-assessed frequently and had my benefits stopped at the last assessment, as the DWP said there's nothing wrong with me! Now I'm going through an appeal, completely penniless.
Of course the idiots over at reddit are all for this, saying what a good thing it is, sharing stories about all the people they supposedly know, who pretend to be disabled to claim benefits. Stories like "my dad/neighbour/friend pretends to be a helpless blind cripple to claim benefits but on the side he runs marathons and has a part-time job as an acrobat for cirque de soleil." Completely ignoring the fact that even the DWP themselves admit that the rate of disability benefit fraud is tiny, the vast majority of claimants are genuine cases. Genuine cases who they still give zero points to and make us go through endless appeals and assessments just to keep our tiny pittance.
And each time this happens you sink further into debt, as you end up maxxing out your overdraft and getting whatever loans you can to survive during the appeal, meaning you end up with a ton of interest to pay off as well as having to pay off the original debt. If you win your appeal and get backpay, it's never enough to pay off the debt and interest.
But seriously, what do these people expect someone like me to do? I'm exhausted and brain foggy from cancer treatment, I'm learning to walk again and struggling with becoming partially sighted since the stroke. My balance and coordination have been affected too, I struggle to do even basic things like get dressed. I do not feel well enough to hold down a job any more, nobody would hire me anyway. The population don't want to financially support me with benefits, they've also decided I should not have the right to a peaceful exit via assisted suicide. All the easy painless suicide methods have been made illegal and difficult to get hold of. I've already tried once, that was a disaster that left me in intensive care for 5 days. And if we end up homeless on the streets, we'll be ciminalised for vagrancy/begging/loitering/whatever charges they throw at us for being homeless. And if we do manage to commit suicide ourselves then society wails an endless chorus of "How can you be so selfish as to kill yourself? Don't you realise people care about you and were hurt by your suicide? Some poor person had to find your body! WhY DIdn'T You jUSt aSK foR HelP?"
God, I hate our society. I am not being dramatic when I say that the British government and majority of the British public are worse than the Nazis. At least the Nazis were open and unashamed about committing a genocide of the disabled. They didn't hide behind making it about employment figures, they didn't pretend they were acting in the best interests of the disabled. Which the British government do, saying disabled people will feel less depressed if they work. How about asking us? It is not in our best interests to be starved and threatened into working when we cannot even care for ourselves without help.
In the reddit thread, they outright acknowledged that genuinely disabled people would die because of these proposals, but think that the greater good of reducing unemployment makes the price worth paying. We aren't even seen as human, we're just unemployment statistics and useless eaters. Don't these people ever worry that this could happen to them? It only takes an illness or an accident and you find yourself unable to work too. Then they'll find themselves saying "They came for the disabled and I did not speak out as I was not disabled. Then I became disabled and they came for me."
EDIT: Now those redditors are claiming that everyone on benefits is a criminal who is constantly being arrested for petty theft and draining police resources. well, maybe if benefits weren't so low and constantly being stopped at reassessments, people wouldn't need to steal to survive?
EDIT2: Now they're claiming people on benefits don't bother voting, so we deserve whatever we get. I need to stop reading that thread.
There's a German film called Never look Away. It's about a Third Reich doctor murdering and sterilising ill and disabled people during ww2. At the end, when the Russians take over, a Russian commander asks the doctor, "If my child was born with health problems, should it be put to death?"
The German doctor replies, "Space and resources on this earth are limited. Should they be given to the healthy or the sick?"
And this is the exact perspective and thought process that the majority of the British government and public have. That money, and space in housing, are limited, and shouldn't be wasted on the sick. The logical consequence of this is that payments to the disabled are stopped and the disabled die. Die a longer and slower death than being put in gas chambers.
I'm right there with you, it's absolutely unbearable. I've already been homeless once since I burnt out on work, and it fucked with me pretty bad. And I didn't even end up sleeping rough, I was very lucky.
No, you really are not. I'm convinced that the british only go so hard on teaching about the horrors of nazi germany in schools to deflect from their own incomprehensible evil. The union jack is a hate symbol worse than the swastika; death to fascist britain.
Have the doctor tell them that the only work you can qualify for is MP because every other job requires some degree of physical or mental proficiency.
lol.
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