The virus that keeps on giving!

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 girlymonkey 20 Feb 2021

I watched a video on the BBC today about a guy who appears to have developed diabetes due to Covid. I looked up another source and it seems there might be some sort of emerging link where it may indeed trigger or worsen diabetes in people. Joy of joys! 

It's still not confirmed, but the picture seems to be building towards this at the moment. 😕

https://www.diabetes.org.uk/about_us/news/new-worse-cases-coronavirus

Post edited at 11:41
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 Neil Williams 20 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

Viruses often cause autoimmune disorders, which Type 1 is.  By no means exclusive to COVID.

 Dave the Rave 20 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

Is it not just the case that people have become diabetic due to sitting around during lockdown and gaining weight due to diet, and then catching COVID too?

10
OP girlymonkey 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Neil Williams:

There appears to be a rise in both types and the article even speculates that it may cause it's own specific type also. 

Obviously, they don't know yet, they are just seeing trends just now

1
OP girlymonkey 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

That is not what the article says! 

They think it could be to do with Covid attacking the pancreas and some other organs too.

1
 Dave the Rave 20 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> That is not what the article says! 

I’m not picking a fight hun.

> They think it could be to do with Covid attacking the pancreas and some other organs too.

Finding answers

The evidence to suggest coronavirus could trigger type 1, type 2 - or even a new type of diabetes - is growing but there’s still a lot we don’t know. We can’t yet be sure if coronavirus is directly causing any new cases of diabetes, or whether there are other factors that could explain the link.

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 Neil Williams 20 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

Will be interesting (but sad) to see if it causes other autoimmune stuff e.g. arthritis, coeliac etc.

 Rob Parsons 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

> Is it not just the case that people have become diabetic due to sitting around during lockdown and gaining weight due to diet, and then catching COVID too?


There's no reason (or evidence) to suggest that, Dave. Is there?

(Obviously the enforced inactivity we've all had to endure is no good for anybody - I get that.)

2
 Timmd 20 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

It turns out the site of the outbreak has a lab which was studying the same strain of virus as the one which is now causing problems. I won't be surprised if it did come there, and China doesn't want to let on, or surprised if it has the capacity to cause different kinds of problems due to probably being a cross species transmission from bats (as studied by the lab it's plausibly escaped from). 

It's interesting that people with type 1 diabetes are meant to be more vulnerable to being more poorly from covid, given the content of your link. I've just been poorly for 4 weeks, with a general virally vibe until the start of this week, where my sense of taste went funny briefly, and I had a dry cough for about 3 seconds. Either I'm a healthy type 1 diabetic, it hasn't been covid I've had, or it's been a mild case of it. I shall be interested to see what my antibody test turns out to show.

Post edited at 21:09
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 Dave the Rave 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Rob Parsons:

> There's no reason (or evidence) to suggest that, Dave. Is there?

> (Obviously the enforced inactivity we've all had to endure is no good for anybody - I get that.)

Nope, but in their Finding Answers bit they don’t know for sure if it’s COVID causing it. Let’s not create fake news and anxiety. There’s enough of that already in the press.

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 Timmd 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave: That's a fair enough sentiment, about not causing concern.

 Dave the Rave 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Timmd:

> That's a fair enough sentiment, about not causing concern.

I agree. There’s stuff on the media every feckin day, yer vaccine won’t work against blah, yer all doomed blah, there’s a new pandemic coming blah. People need to take a chill pill.  

2
 Blunderbuss 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

Bird flu detected in humans in Russia  

 Cobra_Head 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

> I’m not picking a fight hun.

Really? WTF

3
 Cobra_Head 20 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

I heard it on the radio a bloke had covid sometime after he ended up in hospital when the tested his blood sugar it as 120 or so, normal is 5-7. He said another hour and he'd have been brown bread.

I can't remember what the figure was but I think they said around 5% of covid victims are having trouble with blood sugar regulation.

Now this is becoming common knowledge at least it might be something to check early on, I think for the bloke above it took a while to find out.

 Cobra_Head 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Blunderbuss:

> Bird flu detected in humans in Russia  


Just saw this today too, doomed, we're all doomed!!

 Dave the Rave 20 Feb 2021
In reply to Cobra_Head:

> I heard it on the radio a bloke had covid sometime after he ended up in hospital when the tested his blood sugar it as 120 or so, normal is 5-7. He said another hour and he'd have been brown bread.

Must be true if it was on the radio. Or was it he should have been eating brown bread and not white bread?

> I can't remember what the figure was but I think they said around 5% of covid victims are having trouble with blood sugar regulation.

It would be helpful if you could remember. ‘They’ are the source of most misconstrued evidence. By victims, do you mean the dead? I don’t know of any dead that can control their blood sugars well.

> Now this is becoming common knowledge at least it might be something to check early on, I think for the bloke above it took a while to find out.

There you go, a poorly evidenced piece of journalism has again become common knowledge, so it must be true

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 Neil Williams 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Timmd:

How come you didn't get a PCR test?

 Cobra_Head 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

> Must be true if it was on the radio. Or was it he should have been eating brown bread and not white bread?

Well OK then it was all made up and isn't a thing.

> It would be helpful if you could remember. ‘They’ are the source of most misconstrued evidence. By victims, do you mean the dead? I don’t know of any dead that can control their blood sugars well.

Why would I mean the dead FFS? I would have thought it was pretty self evident I was talking about people who had contracted covid, or don't you see them as victims?

> There you go, a poorly evidenced piece of journalism has again become common knowledge, so it must be true

hilarious, I'm presuming you were trying to be funny. He might have made it all up of course and the BBC4 news might have been duped and the doctor explaining the phenomenon might simply be lying. But there again there are people who think covid's made up anyway, so yeah, fake news, if you like.

Here's a link to the lying bastard https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/health-56132391

Post edited at 00:47
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 NorthernGrit 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Timmd:

> It turns out the site of the outbreak has a lab which was studying the same strain of virus as the one which is now causing problems. 

Where's the evidence for that? 

 Lankyman 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Cobra_Head:

> Just saw this today too, doomed, we're all doomed!!

Don't panic! Don't panic!!

 deepsoup 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Timmd:

> It turns out the site of the outbreak has a lab which was studying the same strain of virus as the one which is now causing problems.

Eh?  What are you on about?
According to every report I can see the 'site of the outbreak' was a poultry farm, precisely as you would expect for bird flu really.

 Timmd 21 Feb 2021
In reply to deepsoup:

> Eh?  What are you on about?

> According to every report I can see the 'site of the outbreak' was a poultry farm, precisely as you would expect for bird flu really.

Oops, my mistake, the lab was studying covid strains, but not the one was has been causing problems. 

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/05/24/asia-pacific/science-health-as...

My PCR and antibody test emails arrived today, and I'm clear, so that's alright.

mick taylor 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Blunderbuss:

> Bird flu detected in humans in Russia  

If it’s near Moscrow them more likely Corvid. 

 Cobra_Head 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Rob Parsons:

> There's no reason (or evidence) to suggest that, Dave. Is there?

> (Obviously the enforced inactivity we've all had to endure is no good for anybody - I get that.)


Also, wouldn't we be seeing increase diabetes increases across the board, not just in people who had covid?

 Dave the Rave 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Cobra_Head:

> Also, wouldn't we be seeing increase diabetes increases across the board, not just in people who had covid?

From the OP.

Type 1 diabetes

Small studies have suggested that rates of new type 1 diabetes diagnoses in children are higher in 2020 compared to average rates in previous years.

The causes of type 1 diabetes are complex, and scientists think that there are a variety of environmental and genetic reasons that could explain why the condition develops.

Viruses could be one of these reasons, but the evidence around this is mixed and we just don’t know for sure yet. And as the virus that causes the Covid-19 infection is so new, there’s a lot we still need to learn about how it interacts with our immune system and its longer-term effects.

 Cobra_Head 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

> Viruses could be one of these reasons, but the evidence around this is mixed and we just don’t know for sure yet. And as the virus that causes the Covid-19 infection is so new, there’s a lot we still need to learn about how it interacts with our immune system and its longer-term effects.

Agreed, but like I said, there should be the same increase in diabetes across the board, shouldn't there, not just in people who've had covid.

No doubt there'll be all sorts of complications, by the sound of things, which will come out eventually.

 Dave the Rave 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Cobra_Head:

> Agreed, but like I said, there should be the same increase in diabetes across the board, shouldn't there, not just in people who've had covid.

But we don’t know that there isn’t.  There simply just isn’t enough information in the article to establish methods and cohorts etc.

Its an article basically asking for funding for further research which I think is a good thing.

> No doubt there'll be all sorts of complications, by the sound of things, which will come out eventually.

I agree. It’s a bizarre virus.

 Michael Hood 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

A thought, is this virus actually producing more weird effects or has it just got a very large sample size?

Various viruses are often implicated as pre-cursors for things like CFS/ME although a causal mechanism hasn't been established. A lot (but I think not all) of the long-Covid symptoms fall into the CFS/ME, Fibromyalgia sort of area, which has a wide range of symptoms.

We have a virus that has infected a lot of people in a short space of time, more than any other recent virus (excluding colds). If 1 in n people (I have no idea what "n" actually is) who get a CFS/ME/Fibro/etc pre-cursor virus end up with CFS/ME/Fibro/etc, then we would expect a lot of these people to appear if Covid is also one of these pre-cursor viruses. The fact that many such afflicted people appear together makes it seem like something new, but I wonder if it actually is new & different, or just a very large occurrence of something that's already being experienced.

Regardless, I hope resources are made available to help those who are suffering.

Edit: to avoid misunderstanding, not talking here about what one might call "core" Covid (which is definitely new), but about all the other stuff that happens to some who get Covid (which might be a more general viral effect that Covid is rather good at).

Post edited at 18:44
 Dave the Rave 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Michael Hood:

Good points.

 Dave the Rave 21 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

> I’m not picking a fight hun.

Evening girlymomkey. Hope you’ve had a good day.

I need to apologise for the hun bit. Sorry.

I’d had a few swallies and think that your ! triggered a self defence mode and thought that ‘hun’ was appropriate.

On reflection after a couple of swallies, it clearly wasn’t, so, sorry again

 wintertree 22 Feb 2021
In reply to girlymonkey:

> They think it could be to do with Covid attacking the pancreas and some other organs too.

Things make a lot more sense if you think of Covid as an endothelial virus - attacking the vasculature and the blood/organ interfaces.

I wouldn't be surprised if that turns out to be upsetting the bidirectional interface to the intestinal microbiome, changes in which form the "memory" of an infection that lies behind the ME/CFS effects of a lot of long Covid long after the virus is cleared from a person.

It just manifests as a respiratory disease so often because there's something like 100 square meters or so of endothelium in a person's lungs.

Fascinating thing, the endothelium.  Lots of finely balanced non-neuronal multi-cell signalling happens constantly in healthy tissues.

Post edited at 19:30
OP girlymonkey 22 Feb 2021
In reply to Dave the Rave:

Apology accepted. I decided not to engage with it!

I do tend to use ! quite a lot. I think it's a reflection of the way I speak. I tend to be quite animated, lots of hand movement etc. I guess typing makes me feel a bit under animated, so a ! feels right! 😀

OP girlymonkey 22 Feb 2021
In reply to wintertree:

Yes, the emerging picture does seem to be more of a blood disease than a respiratory one. 

If it was Covid I had this time last year, one thing that really struck me was how fast my pulse was! 

It will be interesting in the future when we have unpicked a lot of these things and see which of our current assumptions and suspicions are right or way off mark.


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