Following the Pandemic: Exploring Long COVID's impact on Global Health through the World Heart Federation Global COVID-19 Study.

Abstract

Although the COVID-19 pandemic crisis has come to an end, Long COVID continues to pose a profound challenge to global health. Based on findings from the World Heart Federation (WHF) Global COVID-19 Study, an international prospective cohort study, this editorial reflects on the enduring burden of symptoms and complications among 2,535 previously hospitalized patients across 16 countries during the Omicron era. Beyond a mortality rate of 15% and clinical manifestations such as fatigue, dyspnea, and adverse cardiovascular events, the study highlighted substantial psychosocial and socioeconomic impacts, with reduced work capacity and functional limitations particularly affecting populations in low- and middle-income countries captured through EuroQol 5-dimension scale and employment data. These findings emphasize that the burden of Long COVID extends beyond individual health, with significant implications for healthcare systems and economic stability. Addressing this challenge requires ongoing multidisciplinary research, validated diagnostic criteria, novel biomarkers, and effective preventive and therapeutic strategies. Furthermore, decentralized monitoring models-exemplified by telephone-based data collection in the WHF study-may offer scalable approaches to improve surveillance and inform global health policies for current and future public health crises.