A COVID-19 infection of any severity doubles your risk of heart attack or stroke, a recently published study found. The elevated risk of a major cardiac event last for up to three years after the infection. People who lived through a COVID illness severe enough to get hospitalized were even more likely to suffer a major cardiac event. Specifically, people who were hospitalized for COVID were 385% more likely to experience heart attack or stroke than those who were not hospitalized.
Put another way, a severe COVID infection increases your chances of suffering a major cardiac event as much as heart disease does. “These findings reveal while it’s an upper respiratory tract infection, COVID-19 has a variety of health implications and underscores that we should consider history of prior COVID-19 infection when formulating cardiovascular disease preventive plans and goals,” said co-senior researcher Dr. Stanley Hazen, Chair of Cardiovascular and Metabolic Sciences at Cleveland Clinic’s Lerner Research Institute.
