I read sorryantivaxxer.com, and I’ve noticed that many of those profiled (or their friends/relatives) say the person has/had ‘COVID pneumonia’. OK, I get that the patient has/had pneumonia that was brought on by COVID. But what’s with them saying ‘COVID pneumonia’? Do they think, ‘I/he/she don’t/doesn’t have COVID. It’s COVID pneumonia! Completely different! COVID isn’t real!’? Why the distinction?
Aside: Every time I see the phrase, I want to sing it to the tune of Waltzing Matilda.
I’m not sure just what you’re asking. The medical profession often describes pneumonias by what’s causing them: Staph pneumonia, strep pneumonia, aspiration pneumonia, pneumococcal pneumonia, parainfluenza pneumonia, chemical pneumonia, etc.
COVID pneumonia is just another shorthand way of describing a pneumonia caused by or contributed to by the covid virus.
Okay then, how do you explaining Walking Pneumonia?
Folk etymology after mishearing the actual diagnosis
I think most people would say they have COVID, or say they have pneumonia. It seems to me to be a phenomenon amongst anti-vaxxers to call the illness ‘COVID pneumonia’.
But covid manifests many ways. One can have covid myocarditis, covid upper respiratory infection, covid pneumonia, covid gastroenteritis, covid hypercoaguability state, etc.
I’ve told more than a few of my patients “you’ve got covid and it’s causing a pneumonia”. Pretty logical and accurate for them to tell others that they have covid pneumonia.
But it’s only the anti-vaxxers who say ‘COVID pneumonia’ in my observation.
Ok, but that’s not been my experience. I’ve heard it widely used by health professionals and patients and others.
Now, THAT would be terrifying to see on an x-ray!
But I’m not aware of that practice being used by non-medical people, until now. For instance, I have never heard of a cause of death being reported by a non-medical person as “flu pneumonia” – rather, it would just be reported as either (most likely) “flu” or (possibly) “pneumonia.”
On my hospital discharge papers - it is stated as “Pneumonia due to covid-19 virus” along with “pneumonia - unspecified organism”.
SO - the cause of the pneumonia itself was due to having had Covid - but the specifics of the Pneumonia are not listed.
the Anti-vaxers, etc all want to downplay the covid-19 part (for some stupid reason) - and anything they can do to distract is their goal.
At the end of the day - I have no doubt about the cause of my issues.
Pneumonia is a condition describing the inflammation of the alveoli (tissues in the lung responsible for exchange of atmospheric oxygen and carbon dioxide dissolved in blood). It is not a disease but a condition of any number of diseases and trauma that affects the lower respiratory system. This is similar to how AIDS is the expressed condition of infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), although in the case of AIDS it is uniquely identified with the HIV family of viruses whereas pneumonia can be caused by a large array of different pathogens and injuries.
Stranger
I fail to see how your response is in any way relevant to what I posted.
I’ve been aware of that practice among non-medical people for decades.
I’ll back up @Qadgop_the_Mercotan . My wife works in Long-Term care and her notes have included the phrase “COVID Pneumonia” a soul-crushing number of times over the last two years. Often shortly followed by a death certificate containing the same phrase.
Maybe it’s not super common among non-medical people that aren’t routinely around old and sick people. And there may be something to the idea that “COVID Pneumonia” as used by anti-vaxxers is a short hand for “not real COVID”, but that is just them being ignorant.
But “COVID Pneumonia” is a perfectly cromulent phrase.
actually a year ago around this time, I had “pneumonia-related and due to covid-19”
Lurking in r/HermanCainAward, you can certainly see efforts being made to minimize the “COVID-ness” of a death, either to pre-empt "I told you so"s, or to not invite other anti-vaxxer relatives to argue. “COVID pneumonia” seems like the most innocuous of these. I imagine that it is the choice of obituary writers where most relatives know the deceased died of COVID and wouldn’t want to be pretending they didn’t, but also a few relatives are anti-vaxxers/COVID-is-a-hoaxers who want an out that a blunt “died of COVID” doesn’t provide.
It helps that it is a legitimate and accurate medical term.
Other variations I’ve seen that are a little more distancing are “COVID and pneumonia” (like they would have totally beaten just COVID, but they just happened to coincidentally catch pneumonia at the same time) or “Complications of COVID” (like COVID is normally very mild, but in this case it was weird) or “COVID and <list of other chronic diseases that deceased had>”.
And of course there are the “I’m going to sue the hospital because they totally didn’t die of COVID an the doctors must have killed them” but that passes beyond mere keeping-the-peace wordsmithing.
You don’t ‘catch’ pneumonia - and since the overwhelming majority of folks do ‘totally beat covid’ at this point with few issues, it does catch some by surprise - me being one of those that progressed to pneumonia from Covid.
I don’t understand how “covid pneumonia” minimizes that it’s covid. Fwiw, i am not a medical professional, nor am I a covid denier, and it’s a phrase I’ve used to describe what killed my mother, and the symptoms an on-line friend had.
Because they are de-emphasizing Covid itself and focusing on the pneumonia - which can come for lots of reasons.
Its part of the ‘Covid is no big deal and its an excuse by drs to charge more’ routine.
