impairment is equivalent to losing about 10 IQ points. The study analysed 46 Covid-19 patients who received in-hospital care, on the ward or intensive care unit, for six to ten months.
Out of the total, 16 patients were put on mechanical ventilation during their stay in the hospital. After detailed computerised cognitive tests, the researchers were able to detect that the patients showed slower and less accurate responses than what was expected for their age and demographic profile.
Those patients who required ventilators and organ support scored even worse. By comparing the patients to 66,008 members of the general public, the researchers estimate that the magnitude of cognitive loss is similar on average to that sustained with 20 years of ageing, between 50 and 70 years of age, and that this is equivalent to losing 10 IQ points.
Survivors scored particularly poorly on tasks such as verbal analogical reasoning, a finding that supports the commonly-reported problem of difficulty finding words.