Answers emerge about long COVID recovery – Nature Briefing

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How many people with long COVID recover

Research is slowly shedding light on how many people get bettter from long COVID, despite debate over the definition of the condition, its cause and what ‘recovery’ even means. Improvements seem to plateau after one year: in a study of 1,106 people, close to 23% still had symptoms after six months, falling to around 19% after one year and 17% after two. Another study finds that one-third of people who had symptoms after six months no longer had them at nine months. Risk factors include being female, being older, having a high body mass index, smoking, having asthma or diabetes, and having a severe COVID-19 infection. Vaccination seems to reduce the risk. The diabetes drug metformin and the antiviral Paxlovid are showing promise for preventing long COVID — but only if given during the acute phase.

Daily briefing: Answers emerge about long COVID recovery – https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-02190-8

Yikes!

Sleep Apnea and Heart Failure

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Sleep apnea affects ∼50% to 75% of patients with heart failure.

Still Too Hot To Blog but I had to share this.

Too Hot To Blog

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How the day began…

Then this happened…

And of course, advice from the Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation on staying hydrated…

Which generates the highest of intellectual conversations…

Save as Much as You Can Because Whatever You Manage to Save Will Never Be Enough – Random Thoughts on Retirement

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As a gentle reminder to readers who may be visiting this blog for the first time my Random Thoughts About Retirement are written by an Old Guy who is old enough to be retired but isn’t retired and is still working. To be clear, saving as much as you can is different than saving more. I come across way too much “financial advice” that emphasizes saving more for retirement as the hands down absolute solution for a secure retirement. Saving more is typically followed by advice to spend less. Well life keeps getting more expensive so it’s getting harder to save more AND spend less.

So save as much as you can. That’s it. That’s the post.

Where Gen Z is Buying Homes

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At 22.59%, Salt Lake City has the largest share of mortgage requests from Gen Zers. Though the average mortgage amount in Salt Lake City is higher than in many of the nation’s other large metros, it’s a hot spot for younger homebuyers, likely owing to — among other factors — its strong jobs market and a good blend of urban and rural amenities.

After Salt Lake City, relatively inexpensive Oklahoma City and Birmingham, Ala., are the next most popular metros among Gen Z buyers. Respectively, 22.36% and 20.79% of mortgage requests in these two metros come from Gen Zers.

Most Popular Metros for Gen Z Homebuyers — https://www.lendingtree.com/home/mortgage/the-most-popular-us-cities-for-gen-z-homebuyers-ranked/

Where Are These People Coming From?

Is it the food? We have Chef Andrew Black of Grey Sweater, James Beard Best Chef Southwest – Andrew Black brings Best Chef: Southwest James Beard Award home to Oklahoma City – https://www.oklahoman.com/story/lifestyle/food/2023/06/05/james-beard-award-2023-winners-andrew-black-best-chef-southwest/70289770007/

Could it be the lower cost of living or because Oklahoma is producing 64 times more marijuana than licensed users consume – The Oklahoman

Nah, probably the catfish.

Oklahoma producing 64 times more marijuana than licensed users consume – The Oklahoman

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“The supply-to-demand ratio of regulated medical marijuana supply to regulated medical cannabis demand is 64:1,” the report states. “Using a general assumption that units of supply should not exceed two times the units of demand, the medical marijuana program has no less than 32 times more regulated marijuana necessary than licensed patient demand.”

The significant oversupply is likely funneling large amounts of marijuana out of state and adding to the illegal market, according to authority officials.

Oklahoma producing 64 times more marijuana than licensed users consume, report shows — https://www.oklahoman.com/story/news/state/2023/06/21/marijuana-oklahoma-overproducing-64-times-omma-report/70343452007/

The Truth behind the medical marijuana industry.

At least we know there may be a positive longevity effect to all of this excess supply.

What the Scientists Who Pioneered Weight-Loss Drugs Want You to Know – Wired Magazine

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What happens is that you lose your appetite and also the pleasure of eating, and so I think there’s a price to be paid when you do that. If you like food, then that pleasure is gone. The craving for food for some people is taken away when they take GLP-1 drugs.

So you don’t eat through GLP-1 therapy because you’ve lost interest in food. That may eventually be a problem, that once you’ve been on this for a year or two, life is so miserably boring that you can’t stand it any longer and you have to go back to your old life.

What the Scientists Who Pioneered Weight-Loss Drugs Want You to Know – https://www.wired.com/story/obesity-drugs-researcher-interview-ozempic-wegovy/

Just another GLP-1 receptor agonist post. See Tirzepatide (another GLP-1 receptor agonist post) for more on the new miracle weight loss drugs that were originally developed to treat duodenal ulcer disease (bet you thought it was diabetes).

The entire article is worth reading.