Thanks for posting this! I’d vaguely planned to try it after seeing David’s tweet, but never got around to it.
I see Healthline says there is little evidence on long-term effects—any thoughts on how long to take it?
Sameerishere
Karma: 359
Maybe ask on EA forum in addition? I donate to Amnesty International and I seem to recall my googling suggesting they are not totally useless, but no ideal what is optimal.
Dwarkesh Patel seems to have a full transcript on his blog https://www.dwarkeshpatel.com/p/carl-shulman#details
Any concerns about long term side effects?
FWIW, I haven’t consulted the literature on this, but if you’re interested, I noted my personal experience with some of these treatments here.
Judging from my PCP’s positive reaction to my sharing I was using these approaches and my subjective experience with them, they are safe and effective. (My PCP also suggested phenylephrine, which is the more readily available but weaker variant of Sudafed, to alleviate nasal congestion, but after the steaming I didn’t feel a need for it.)
You cite studies indicating that iodine spray (of which Betadine is one brand) can make you test negative “at least temporarily,” and say, “Some people do test negative after applying the iodine, but this doesn’t seem that relevant to whether you get better sooner.”
Any thoughts on whether this poses the risk that the spray could temporarily suppress the virus but leave you still infectious a few hours later? (I’m worried about this in the context of testing myself to see if I’m ready to exit isolation.)
I do seem to recall that Roche Pilot rapid antigen tests caution to avoid testing for at least half an hour after using any nasal spray, whereas Flowflex tests have no such guidance and in fact indicate no interactions with iodine. I don’t know what to make of this.
Interesting, hadn’t heard of that! Thanks for sharing. Looks like the video lists all of its sources in the notes below.
Has anyone experimented with keeping consistent wakeup time on weekends at the expense of more sleep, and have anecdotes to share on the impact it made for them?
Your Local Epidemiologist looked at a recent meta analysis and concluded the following
“the risk of debilitating long Covid is double the risk of permanent impairment from driving. Risk of debilitating long Covid is much higher than getting injured during a house fire and about the same as getting a serious dog bite”
(Source: https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/long-covid-an-update-and-gauging)
But the objections here need to be addressed, and suggest the risk could be significantly higher: https://yourlocalepidemiologist.substack.com/p/long-covid-an-update-and-gauging/comment/11173302 (read through the back and forth under that comment… Jetelina has not responded to his last one) -- if anyone better at reading studies than I am has insight, I would be very grateful!
Based on this, and the fact that anecdotally in my peer group, the incidence of significant long COVID is trivial, I have moved to taking significant COVID risk where I get appreciable value from doing so (e.g. I will go to an indoor house party without a mask, or eat or drink indoors in a bar/restaurant on a date if my date wants to. But I still wear masks in grocery stores or on transit, err towards outdoor public dining when it’s comfortable, etc because there’s little benefit to not doing so, and I still think the likelihood of non-debilitating but significant long term health effects from COVID is non-trivial, and the risk of debilitating long COVID is more than vanishingly unlikely.)
You should put this in your main post—it greatly increased my interest in actually trying to learn.
I find exercise super helpful as well. I’d amend the suggestion to note that you should also avoid pushing yourself so far that you’re drained or exhausted.
Next on my list is 30-60 sec of cold shower at the end of a hot shower.
And then meditation.
More generally, I find making a schedule the night before and the pomodoro technique helpful.
Got it. It’s actually possible this is true for me as well—I have minor knee problems and always assumed that it’s the knee braces I wear while jogging that keep my knees feeling ok, but I haven’t really tested this systematically, so perhaps I have more leeway to run short distances than I think!
Wild, thanks!
I seem to recall your saying at some point (on a post about biking?) that you have knee problems. How do you handle that with this approach?
I live in the Bay Area and I don’t check the news in detail daily. I knew we have more rain coming but found this post helpful in increasing the salience of the storm and the precautions I might want to take.
Given the range of incredibly niche and personal things people post on LW, I think posting this here is perfectly fine.
I eat a slice of Dave’s killer bread with almond butter and some honey and cinnamon drizzled on top, microwaved for 30 sec, along with half a glass of vegan milk. I don’t track my blood glucose, but am sensitive to simple carbs, and I feel quite good after this breakfast.
I used to simply eat a couple scoops of nut butter for breakfast, but then I grew soft or something.
Thank you for writing this! I was wondering whether Kat’s babysitting test would lead to false negatives, and was thinking of writing a post polling LW on the subject. To add more anecdata, I asked a friend who’s been a dad for… 8 years, I believe, and he thought that he just cares about / likes / finds it easier to tolerate his own kids in a way that’s not true with others’ kids, and he expects this would generalize to other parents as well.
(I—a man in my mid 30s without much experience actually spending time with kids—have had a clear felt sense of wanting a kid for several years now, but value my time and energy fairly highly, so Kat’s post really gave me pause. I still feel an emotional pull to having a kid that I don’t think would be satisfied by the alternatives in her post, even though I think it will have lots of costs/difficulties.)
FYI, Alyssa Vance provided additional disability statistics https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/4z3FBfmEHmqnz3NEY/long-covid-risk-how-to-maintain-an-up-to-date-risk?commentId=GKmqE9PKXfRSKb5PC which suggest “serious, long-term illness from COVID is pretty unlikely.”
Siebe, I would be interested to hear your take on that, since you seem to have a substantially more pessimistic view of this.
Thanks!
Thanks for this! Are you able to offer a text summary for folks who are busy and don’t want to watch a bunch of videos?
Also suggest posting to EA Forum if you haven’t already.