{"title":"Contextualising Long Covid: Viral Sequelae, 'Post-Encephalitis' Lethargica and the Modern British Healthcare System, c. 1918-1945.","authors":"Kate McAllister","doi":"10.1093/shm/hkae052","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>In the months after March 2020, people across Britain began to seek medical attention for protracted illness following an infection with coronavirus disease 2019. Through the efforts of patients, these illnesses were eventually gathered into the diagnostic category of 'Long Covid' and therefore viewed as viral sequelae, in turn opening up the possibility for medical care and treatment in the British health system. This article adds to such patient-made knowledge of Long Covid through a comparative historical analysis with the problem of 'Post-Encephalitis' Lethargica (EL). In the early twentieth century, the viral sequelae of EL were parsed in line with and thus shaped by the binary divisions that were becoming used to structure healthcare in Britain. By telling this story of the past, this article provides a framework to understand if and how such administrative divisions within the National Health Service (NHS) might continue to inform perceptions of and responses to Long Covid in the present.</p>","PeriodicalId":21922,"journal":{"name":"Social History of Medicine","volume":"37 4","pages":"737-757"},"PeriodicalIF":0.6000,"publicationDate":"2024-09-27","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11994849/pdf/","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Social History of Medicine","FirstCategoryId":"98","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1093/shm/hkae052","RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"2024/11/1 0:00:00","PubModel":"eCollection","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"HISTORY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
In the months after March 2020, people across Britain began to seek medical attention for protracted illness following an infection with coronavirus disease 2019. Through the efforts of patients, these illnesses were eventually gathered into the diagnostic category of 'Long Covid' and therefore viewed as viral sequelae, in turn opening up the possibility for medical care and treatment in the British health system. This article adds to such patient-made knowledge of Long Covid through a comparative historical analysis with the problem of 'Post-Encephalitis' Lethargica (EL). In the early twentieth century, the viral sequelae of EL were parsed in line with and thus shaped by the binary divisions that were becoming used to structure healthcare in Britain. By telling this story of the past, this article provides a framework to understand if and how such administrative divisions within the National Health Service (NHS) might continue to inform perceptions of and responses to Long Covid in the present.
期刊介绍:
Social History of Medicine , the journal of the Society for the Social History of Medicine, is concerned with all aspects of health, illness, and medical treatment in the past. It is committed to publishing work on the social history of medicine from a variety of disciplines. The journal offers its readers substantive and lively articles on a variety of themes, critical assessments of archives and sources, conference reports, up-to-date information on research in progress, a discussion point on topics of current controversy and concern, review articles, and wide-ranging book reviews.