Shawdesh Desk:

These aren’t the only instances of people having encountered heart attacks post-COVID. An Oxford-led study conducted recently established that over 50%, or 5 out of every 10 COVID-19 patients with a severe infection have a high chance of getting a heart attack days, or weeks after recovery.

In some of the cases, it has also been witnessed that those who had zero heart risks before contracting COVID-19 reported cardiac issues after recovering from the virus infection.

But what explains the link between heart attacks and COVID recovery? Here’s what doctors have to say…

Post-COVID heart damage: What do we know

Post recovery, the heart too can suffer gravely. A prime reason for this being the extensive inflammation and myocardial damage.

Dr Anil Kumar R, Lead Senior Consultant Cardiologist, Aster Centre of Excellence in Cardiac Sciences, Aster Medcity, Kochi, Kerala asserts that there’s extreme inflammation caused by the virus, a lot more than any other viral infection which poses issues:

“During the course of a COVID infection, there’s acute inflammation that happens to the blood vessels, blood clots which cause damage and result in heart issues,” adding that most cases of a heart attack come up in the first month or so of recovering, reports Times of India.

Dr Sanjay Mittal, Senior Director- Clinical Cardiology and Research at Medanta, The Medicity also adds that having heart diseases predisposes a patient to more COVID complications than usual. The virus itself can induce a lot of vascular damage and viral toxicity, which triggers ailments and weakens the heart muscles, which make catching a severe infection with the virus all the more threatening.