Russia (bbabo.net), - A new study shows that even a mild case of COVID-19 can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease for at least a year after infection. Rates of many diseases, such as heart failure and stroke, were significantly higher in people who recovered from COVID-19 than in those who did not get it, writes Nature.

What's more, the risk was increased even in those under 65 years of age who did not have risk factors such as obesity or diabetes.

"It doesn't matter if you're young or old, it doesn't matter if you smoked or not. The risk is there," the authors of the study, conducted at Washington University in St. Louis, quoted the publication as saying.

The scientists' conclusions are based on an analysis of an extensive database of more than 150,000 patients who survived at least 30 days after being infected with COVID-19, compared with two groups of people who did not experience the infection: a group of more than five million people during the pandemic, and a group of the same size, whose health data were taken for 2017, that is, before the spread of SARS-CoV-2.

In people who have had COVID-19, within a year after infection, the frequency of cardiovascular diseases has increased dramatically - scientists have established the occurrence or progression of 20 such pathologies. So, the probability of a stroke in them was 52% higher than in the modern control group, the risk of heart failure increased by 72%. In patients with severe disease who required hospitalization, the likelihood of future cardiovascular complications was expectedly higher, but even people who were treated as outpatients were at higher risk of many diseases.

The researchers warned that health care workers around the world should be prepared for the fact that the number of cardiovascular diseases will seriously increase. Health authorities must be prepared for the challenges posed by the pandemic's fallout.

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