According to a study conducted by scientists at the University of Oxford and the NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Center, a fifth of patients who contracted Covid-19 present with psychiatric disorders within three months of being infected. The study was published on November 10 in The Lancet Psychiatry and relayed by The Guardian newspaper.
18% of Covid patients suffer from mental illness within three months of infection
To reach this conclusion, specialists from the University of Oxford and the NIHR Oxford Health Biomedical Research Center based themselves on the medical records of 69 million Americans including 62,354 cases of Covid-19 that did not require hospitalization or emergency room visits.
According to the results, 18.1% of patients with Covid-19 suffered from a mental illness within 14 to 90 days of diagnosis. Among them 5.8% of cases were a first diagnosis. In other words, one in five people with and recovered from SARS-CoV-2 will develop a diagnosis of anxiety, depression or insomnia within three months of infection.
To find out whether the risk of developing a mental illness may be associated with Covid-19, the researchers analyzed the occurrence of these psychiatric disorders in patients with six other disorders such as the flu, a skin infection, a fracture of a large bones, stones in the urinary tract, gallstones and other infections of the respiratory tract. According to analyzes, 8% of patients had their first recorded diagnosis of psychiatric illness within three months of infection compared to 2.5% to 3.4% of patients who experienced the other six health events.
People with psychiatric disorders are 65% more likely to contract Covid-19
At the same time, the team of researchers discovered that people with a prior mental health diagnosis are 65% more likely to contract the virus. According to Dr. Max Taquet, NIHR University Clinical Researcher and one of the review authors: “ This discovery was unexpected and requires investigation. In the meantime, having a psychiatric disorder should be added to the list of risk factors for Covid-19 “.
For Paul Harrison, professor of psychiatry at the University of Oxford, it remains to be proven that a diagnosis of psychiatric disorders could have a link with the contamination of the virus. According to him, more research needs to be done especially since certain factors were not taken into account during the study. Among them, we can cite the socio-economic context, smoking or drug consumption. “ It is not at all implausible that Covid-19 could have a direct effect on your brain and mental health. But I think that, again, this remains to be demonstrated in a positive way. Paul Harrison said.
