A sudden cardiac arrest suffered by an athlete causes stupor, especially if it is not an elderly amateur, but a high-performance, young and well-trained athlete.
That was what recently happened to American basketball player Bronny James, son of basketball superstar LeBron James. Also the Italian professional cyclist Sonny Colbrello, and the British soccer player Charlie Wyke, suffered cardiac arrests. Fortunately, all three have made a satisfactory recovery.
But claims quickly circulated on social media that such cardiac arrests were likely to do with COVID-19 vaccines. Researchers at the University of Amsterdam Medical Center (UMC) analyzed all the existing literature on the subject and found no evidence of such a relationship. “We looked at all the studies we could find, including one from Australia involving more than four million people.” The scientists found no increases in sudden cardiac arrest rates or myocarditis there, according to Dr. Harald Jorstad, sports cardiologist at UMC.
What is myocarditis?
Myocarditis (inflammation of the heart muscle) can affect anyone, regardless of age or physical training. In most cases, the origin is usually a dragged viral infection. Symptoms of exhaustion or tiredness are often attributed to infection rather than inflammation of the heart muscle.
In such cases, the main thing is to rest and additional therapies are usually not required. If you don’t rest and play sports instead, you run the risk of inflammation leading to heart weakness or arrhythmias. At worst, that can lead to death.
That is why it is so fatal that high performance athletes, and also amateurs, do not recognize warning signs, such as feeling weak or short of breath, and ignore these symptoms.
Myocarditis caused by the coronavirus
During the coronavirus pandemic, there have been isolated cases of myocarditis as a sequel to a COVID infection. And that’s not surprising, since inflammation of the heart muscle is caused by a viral infection of the respiratory tract or digestive system.
However, in very rare cases, myocarditis or pericarditis occurred after challenge, primarily with mRNA vaccines. The prognosis is usually positive and the evolution less severe than after an infection, but myocarditis cannot be completely ruled out as a possible side effect of the vaccine, even if it is very rare.
That’s not to say that a COVID vaccine has to be responsible for cardiac arrest, says Joelle Daems, a doctoral student at the University of Amsterdam. “While athletes are at higher risk of myocarditis due to their relative youth, we found no evidence in studies that a COVID vaccine, linked to intense sports activity, further increases that risk.”
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2023-08-14 21:35:24
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