What is Long COVID and how do you treat it?

It sounds like an incredible number of people are dealing with this.

Although most people who are infected will develop mild or moderate symptoms -- or none at all -- scientists are now researching another way COVID-19 continues to stagger and show up, sometimes for months or even a year.

"Long COVID," also referred to as "Long-Haul COVID or Post-COVID syndrome" is a condition where a person continues to experience symptoms of COVID-19 after their body has cleared the virus. Long COVID is under the umbrella of Post-COVID conditions, which the CDC describes as "new, returning or ongoing health problems" caused by the disease more than a month after infection.

News of potential COVID "long-haulers" in the US has been circulating for more than a year, and experts are still working on collecting data to best assess who's at risk of developing the syndrome. Right now, research suggests even those who have mild cases of COVID-19 can develop Long COVID. One study found that 27% of patients with COVID-19 who hadn't been hospitalized had persisting symptoms, and another found that about 75% of patients who had been hospitalized developed Long COVID.