COVID-19 Won't Raise Odds for Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Study

Key Takeaways

• COVID-19 isn’t more likely to cause chronic fatigue syndrome than other infectious diseases

• Fewer than 4% of people who catch COVID develop chronic fatigue

• About the same percentage occurs in sick people who’ve tested negative for COVID

WEDNESDAY, July 24, 2024 (HealthDay News) -- COVID-19 doesn’t raise a person’s risk of developing chronic fatigue syndrome more than any other infectious disease, a new study finds.

The rate of chronic fatigue syndrome following a brief illness was roughly the same between people who caught COVID and those who came down with some other malady, researchers reported July 24 in the journal JAMA Network Open .

About 3% to 4% of people who get COVID go on to develop chronic fatigue syndrome, about the same percentage as those who fell ill but tested negative for the coronavirus, results show.

Formally known as myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS), the condition is a long-lasting illness marked by severe fatigue, trouble thinking and other symptoms that have a profoundly negative impact on daily living, researchers said.

“ME/CFS is no more likely to occur in people infected with COVID-19 than people with other acute illnesses,” said co-senior researcher Dr. Joann Elmore , a professor of medicine in the division of general internal medicine and health services research at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

“However, a 3 to 4% prevalence of ME/CFS after an acute COVID-19 illness would impose a very high burden on society and our healthcare system given the many millions of persons infected with SARS-CoV-2,” Elmore added in a UCLA news release.

There’s no known cure or definitive cause for chronic fatigue syndrome, researchers noted. However, many experts suspect the condition might be tied to an infection, since many develop ME/CFS symptoms following a short-term illness.

For the study, researchers analyzed data on 4,700 people who experienced COVID-like symptoms between December 2020 and August 2022.

The average percentage of patients who developed chronic fatigue within three months of their illness was 3.4% for people who tested positive for COVID and 3.7% for those who tested negative, results showed.

More information

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has more about COVID symptoms .

SOURCE: UCLA, news release, July 24, 2024

What This Means For You

People getting over COVID shouldn’t worry too much about developing chronic fatigue syndrome, as fewer than 4% will wind up with the condition, results show.