COVID-19 pandemic accelerated brain aging – even if you didn’t catch the virus

A longitudinal study of nearly 996 healthy adults found that the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated ageing of their brains. The resulting paper, "Accelerated brain ageing during the COVID-19 pandemic," appeared in the Journal Nature Communications on Tuesday The paper explains that the UK's Biobank contains longitudinal …

[Anonymous Coward]

Agree

I worked from home before the pandemic, through the pandemic and since the pandemic.

It was really stressful seeing a large proportion of the UK population being paid to lounge around, or garden, or whatever.

The same for anyone who had to go into work: Healthcare, Utilities, Sys Admins, etc.

Ready for the flaming, but you know that it is unfair.

[Sorry that handle is already taken.]

Re: Agree

I'd have been more concerned about the number of people dying due to government incompetence but, you do you anonymous coward.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Agree

The OP here. My daughter was working on the Covid wards through-out the pandemic, so I have a reasonably unique insight for an el Reg reader.

Yes, a small percentage of healthy people died from Covid in hospital, but mostly it was accelerating the inevitable for people who really didn't look after themselves - the smokers, the obese, the people who drank more than the recommendations, the ones with COPD - these factors are more to blame than any government cockup. (Surprising under represented were the homeless and drug addicts! Even Asthmatics were under represented, and of those that went into hospital they were often the very ill before hand, but still survived. In the early weeks at my daughters hospital, a shortage of bariatric strength beds was more of a problem than PPE!)

Sending the ill back to the Care Homes was a serious cockup, but that was the trusts, not the government. The Covid inquiry has already taken the evidence on this.

And yes, there were statistics gathered by many trusts on the prior life expectancy of those on the wards, but because many trusts didn't, then it hasn't made its way into the inquiry, along with quite a few other inconvenient truths!

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Agree

>” My daughter was working on the Covid wards through-out the pandemic”

We too, had family members working on the high dependency wards where people were dying of any unknown disease prior to COVID-19 being identified and then through the pandemic.

I expect others here also had family members working the wards.

>” Sending the ill back to the Care Homes was a serious cockup, but that was the trusts, not the government.”

That was the government, the minister at the time has already made a statement, accepting it was a bad decision, but one that freed up hospital beds in preparation for the projected need.

[Sorry that handle is already taken.]

Re: Agree

Jesus Christ! And now all of those people who died with pre-existing conditions only have themselves to blame? Not the government that mismanaged the entire situation, putting them at unnecessary risk in the first place?

Bugger me sideways, anonymous coward!

[tiggity]

Re: Agree

Role I had in first part of the pandemic* was office based, most days I was only one going to the office.

It was so much better than "normal" as the door to door drive was quick & hassle free due to far emptier roads (in normal times car journey not viable due to traffic jams making it a very long & slow scenario & so normally had to use trains (train station not that close at either end either)). Really enjoyed commute not taking hours, got a lot of time back & began teh day with a lot more energy as could wake at a later time.

Furlough would have been nice for zeo stress, but pandemic far shorter working day** a huge improvement over "Normal"

* Now WFH role, commute even better!

** as when considering overall working day ought to factor in commute for full scale of time "lost" from doing other activities, e.g. if an 8 hour working day has 4 hours commute then its essentially a 12 hr working day

[Anonymous Coward]

"The researchers aren't sure why subjects' brains aged so fast during the pandemic"...

Daytime drinking ? ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------->

[Bebu sa Ware]

Re: "The researchers aren't sure why subjects' brains aged so fast during the pandemic"...

Daytime drinking ?

The paper's authors mentioned that along with other dietary factors some of which I imagine might have been exacerbated by the Brexit.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: "The researchers aren't sure why subjects' brains aged so fast during the pandemic"...

Odd, I feel like that's what keeps me young...

[Anonymous Coward]

The paper is worth a read.

I skimmed the first bit and was confused with all the BAGs and R_BAG until penitent I went back to discover BAG = Brain Age Gap.

Not really a great surprise that the usual suspects amongst social determinants correlated with BAG even before taking COVID into account. The much greater effect of these determinants on BAG when taken with the intervening pandemic is surprising.

I don't know what is was like living through COVID in England but I could see it was insane and I imagine it was pretty hellish. The sustained affect on the mental health of the population might account for some of the differences.

In AU some parts weren't a lot better than the UK in terms of lockdown and other restrictions but other regions were pretty much unaffected - Northwards from Gympie in QLD basically ignored even the masking requirements (nascent trumpistas there.) Repeating this study in AU adding the geographical difference in restrictions the subjects endured might quantify the affect of those restrictions on BAG.

That prolonged uncertainty, stress and trauma stuffs the brain and health generally is unsurprising. Might be interesting how US BAGs changed pre and post Trump I and from Biden I and post (hopefully)Trump II. Although during the first interval the high mortality might skew results as I assume the BAG of the deceased is 0.0.

[abend0c4]

A drop in certain cognitive abilities

The whole pandemic experience suggests our cognitive abilities need an upgrade.

[Hugo Rune]

scientists have used machine learning and those records to create a brain age prediction model.

I have an idea of why this maybe bollocks.

[I ain't Spartacus]

Re: scientists have used machine learning and those records to create a brain age prediction model.

I see the phrase "brain age" and think of all those bullshit online and Facebook "quizzes" (data harvesting and advertising combined into one shitty app). Improve your brain age. Doctors hate this one easy trick! etc...

[breakfast]

Interesting dissonance

The conclusion (as described here) is interesting - "we need to address ... factors to mitigate accelerated brain aging."

But brain aging didn't have any associated symptoms. The only people who showed active cognitive decline were the ones who had had COVID.

To me it seems like a problem that they couldn't say "we need to mitigate the factors that lead to the spread of COVID" because that has somehow become a forbidden statement, in spite of being stunningly obvious to anyone who has looked into the long term impacts of COVID.

As an aside, having lived through the pandemic also means that for most of us in the UK we have lived through the worst governments the country has ever known, rising costs of living, and a general feeling like the country is falling apart around our ears and nobody with any power cares or is prepared to do anything about it. To blame the impact purely on the pandemic maybe understates how stressful everything has been over the last five years.

[Korev]

Re: Interesting dissonance

I was thinking the same. I started to wonder if better-run countries with Biobanks would enable the comparison (Finland springs to mind)

[HXO]

Re: Interesting dissonance

I thought I had seen articles on that, but the only ones I find ATM are on post infected people, like this one

"SARS-CoV-2 Infection and Risk of Postacute Psychiatric and Neurologic Diagnoses"

https://www.neurology.org/doi/10.1212/WNL.0000000000208113

[heyrick]

Meanwhile, us introverts...

...wonder what all the fuss is about: stay at home, don't mix with others, don't go, don't touch, read a book instead...that's just another day.

[Korev]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

The really funny one were all the "prepers" who had bought lots of survival gear and other toys awaiting a global catastrophe and when it came all they had to do was stay at home...

[Arthur the cat]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

I'd like to see a documentary on all the people who sold up and moved to the the arse end of nowhere with survival kits because of Y2K fears.

[Caver_Dave]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

I have a T-shirt that reads - "I was Social Distancing before it was cool".

I bought it early on in the Pandemic and still wear it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

My daughter had a T-shirt made when they had to wear full PPE, she wore it to work everyday. It had her smiling face on it and the words “Hi I’m Aaaa”. It allowed the patients to see the face behind the mask. It got her photo in the Telegraph and caused many other nurses to do similar.

[Spherical Cow]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

It's pretty bad parenting to name your daughter Aaaa.

;-)

[logicalextreme]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

I wouldn't criticise AC's parenting style. Aaaa's older brothers Lorem and Ipsum are brick shithouses

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

I was going to give her name, then decided as she had taken similar t-shirts to Ukraine, it might not be a good idea.

Since COVID she has become much more confident and committed and has been doing a lot of work in conflict zones. Fortunately she has no intention of going to Gaza et al.

[heyrick]

Re: Meanwhile, us introverts...

Could have just said "Anna"...?

[amess]

"A longitudinal study of nearly 996 healthy adults found ... "

What is nearly 996? 995.5?

[Steve Jackson]

Almost certainly

995 point something….someone was in the process of mutating. Strain….R was maybe less than 1?